Studio Art
8th Grade, Ms. McGraw
(click on each image below to view more images)
 

Me, Myself and I
8th graders created three versions of a self-portrait based on a photograph. The first was to be ‘realistic’ and was rendered in charcoal.  Students had to understand how to work with the idea of form when using this media.  Lines had to be made from using the ‘mass’ of charcoal and erasing by creating value change.

The second stylistic piece was created from a ‘marriage’ of a portrait by a master artist that they chose.  They examined the properties and style of the painting along with their photograph and had to be able to create a piece that synthesized both. The third piece was homage to Henri Matisse and his cut outs.  Students studied the idea of abstraction in art and used their knowledge to create a cut paper, abstraction of their photograph. Each one had to choose a color scheme and paint the paper that was used for the cut outs. Understanding balance, focal point as well as positive and negative space was emphasized.

 

Innovative Face Cards  - Lesson in Pattern
Problem: Create a large scale face card that incorporates both the traditional face card with a new design. 

Each 8th grader created a face card ‘person’ that went beyond the ‘king, queen or jack’ familiar to all of us. However, they had to keep the traditional ‘look’ by using only ‘face card colors.’  They also had to used multiple patterns found on face cards.  The most challenging objective was to create a symmetrical design that could be ‘seamlessly flipped.’ Pretty cool, eh??!!
 

Music (time) into Sculpture (space)
Students chose a piece of music and carefully listened to it. They were asked to take the elements of the music, which is manifested in time and to interpret it into wire sculpture, which is shown in space. The sculpture was not to be a linear interpretation, but the feeling, mood and sounds were to be transformed into line and shape.

Mona Lisa ala?
The class was to re-invent the most famous painting in the world, the Mona Lisa, and render her from the perspective of another artist’s particular style. This student chose Modigliani.

Cut Paper Project
8th graders looked at the graphic art of Rob Kelly and his method of using cut paper. We discussed what 'value' is in art and how every color has value. They took 'posterized' photos of themselves and determine 6 different values and decided on what color combination they would use. Each color had to have a distinct value going from light to dark.

They drew themselves in much larger scale and had to cut the paper and layer it in order to re-create their photos. The challenge was figuring out where to 'add' and where to 'subtract.' In some places another color was put on top, in other places, the paper was cut away to reveal paper underneath. Craftsmanship was extremely important.