Train of thought

I went looking for images of the African dance masks that may have inspired Lucero's sculptures from the previous post:




Then that one reminded me of the giant monster Sweetums from the muppet show...

so now I know it's time to go to bed.

Texture sampler from my weekend in NY

I'm currently enjoying a bit of a Spring Break, and managed to get up to NYC this past weekend! Mostly it was to do museum trips for my History of Modern Craft course. I went to the Museum of Art and Design to see their Global Africa Exhibit, SOFA at the armory, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Based on my photos it seems I was very drawn to textures!



closeup of rolled paper beads for Algernon Miller's "Change" hanging. The beads were made from Obama campaign literature and constructed by a women's co-op in Uganda. I think I'll write my final paper on this piece.



Detail of a collar piece of rolled paper beads by Sanaa Gateja who organized the KWETU co-op that worked on Miller's piece

 

Necklace of ceramic beads cut from a porcelain platter by Gesine Hackenburg. I like the heirloom made ornament idea.



SOFA was held at the armory at 67th and Park. Lots of ceramic and glass, but not much fiber =(



At SOFA Duane Reed Gallery from St Louis presented these ceramic and fiber sculptures by Michael Lucero which I'll use for my presentation in class



closeup of a wall piece by El Anatsui at the Metropolitan. The Miller piece above has a lot of similarities!



A resist-dyed tunic from Peru- I'm gathering resources for a shibori class this summer!



An incredible roof piece in the oceanic cultures section at the Met, with layered, patterned bark paintings. Incredible! 

Lots of inspirations to think about. It was really exciting to see many of the objects we've covered in class in person at SOFA and the Met. I was intrigued by all of the open storage at the MET. Philadelphia Art Museum should do that. I don't get up to NYC very often, and this was definitely  a great trip. I especially liked going up on my own instead of on the bus tour with the class, and taking things at my own pace.
Now, I'm looking forward to the end of this semester, the end of student teaching, and an upcoming printmaking studio class I'll be taking. I miss blogging on a regular basis! I miss time to focus on my studio. I miss going to see art more frequently. Thanks to any readers who've stuck around the last few months despite my slow post pace. It'll pick up again soon!

"one in the Crowd" project

One of my Art I classes just finished their "one in the crowd" projects. It started off with a week of gesture drawing to generate lots of different drawings of figures. Then we studied perspective and students drew and painted in tempera a perspective drawing of typically crowded space using color to express mood. Finally students collaged their figures into the space using overlap and scale shift to emphasize the sense of space and placement and interaction of the figures to also create mood.



a crowded school hallway

  

a wacky art museum



a subway scene



another hallway

This was a challenging project for my drawing-resistant students. But they were intrigued by the one-point perspective trick, and became quite invested in their spaces. Many of them redrew gesture figures specifically for their spaces.

Spring Break next week! Then only 2 more weeks of student teaching! I'm currently planning the layout for my "Art of Student Teaching" exhibit. Here's the layout so far with a few placeholders for pieces I don't have pictures for:

I need to come up with some kind of low shelf or table for all the sculpture projects. We did a surprising amount of sculpture!

Weight of the World figures

Only 3 weeks remain of my student teaching experience and we're wrapping up a lot of work. The district puts on a district-wide exhibition, the school wants an art fair at the end of April, and I have my own student teaching exhibit to mount. So we've been matting and finishing and weeding through piles of artwork. While this was going on I finally got to take pictures of two of the Kentridge-inspired collaborative works my students did near the beginning of my placement. Students helped collage the silhouetted figures and then drew objects of things they loved/hated/worried/hoped/feared to load on top of the figure.

 The one above has gone off to the school district building for display. It contains some of my favorite student drawings including a graduation cap on the figure's head, a devil whispering in his ear, and a clock to show the passage of time. Below is the one I'll put in my students exhibit at Tyler. She doesn't seem as loaded down by all these things. it's more like she's offering them to us. My favorite drawings in this one are a bowl of noodles, a giant cell phone, and a bouquet of flowers.

Fleisher classes are starting up again this week! I enjoyed the little break from the crazy schedule, but it was great having a new crop of kids in the silkscreen studio today, and both my adult classes are running! Just a few more weeks of crazy to get through....



Giveaway Winner!

It's Saturday, which means a winner has been selected in my little giveaway experiment. I'll have to try this again sometime and maybe get a few more takers. However 6 readers commented (thank you all!) and the random generator says the 4th commenter wins:

That would be Deborah from While I was Waiting who said:

Deborah said...



I'm a lurker and enjoy seeing both your work and your students' work. Blue is my favorite color but I would be thrilled if i won one of your pendants of any color!

So, if she'll send me her address I can mail off her new pendant. Congratulations!

In the meantime preparations are underway to do screenprinting, embroidery, and soft sculpture with my high school students next week. I'm a little nervous!!!