4th grade Picasso

The 4th graders learned about the artist Pablo Picasso. This was a deeper study in his work, after learning about Picasso in 3rd grade. This year we focused on Picasso's portraits that include the front AND side view of a face. This combining of viewpoints creates a rather odd and interesting portrait.
We drew a front and side view of a face. The side view was placed on top of the front view covering half of the front view. The side view was cut and glued on the front view. We traced it on a white piece if paper then colored abstractly with marker. A true Picasso look a like!!

2nd grade Kandinsky

The 2nd graders looked at the work of Wassily Kandinsky, an early 20th century artist who experimented with line and shape to create truly abstract works of art.
One of his pieces consists of circles within circles. We used this piece as the inspiration for our work. We reviewed primary, secondary, warm, cool and complementary (opposite) colors.
This was a painting done in tempera paint with oil pastel in the background.

Organizing/storing/ displaying artwork

Artwork will be coming home soon and so often projects are looked at and admired, maybe put on the fridge and then eventually tossed in the trash because the last thing you need is more "clutter."  (please don't actually admit to me that this is what happens to your child's art projects...I don't want to know! ha ha!) Oh sure, you may keep the occasional great masterpiece that comes home, but what about all the other projects? What do you do with them? Where do you keep them?  I too am now in the same situation with a daughter in Kindergarten and a son in preschool. SO much artwork and papers come home and as an art teacher I feel so bad throwing it all away, but its impossible to keep it all. Then all of the sudden, before you know it, 5 years go by and you have more artwork and papers than you know what to do with. Don't let this happen!
I present to you, my solutions to organizing, storing and displaying art work: (most from Pinterest...the best website ever!)

1.  The top picture shows mailing tubes labeled by grade. Brilliant! Roll up the work you want to keep, but not necessarily display or frame and put into a mailing tube.  Its organized and out of your way! This idea is from Martha Stewart. Yes, I know what you are thinking, Martha actually has an idea that doesn't have 37 steps. This is very easy, really!

 2. File artwork/papers - Create a filing system for each child in each grade. This mom even put her child's school picture on the outside!  Keep important papers and smaller drawings/projects together. This is from the blog: www.iheartorganizing.blogspot.com 
Her blog is a personal favorite of mine - SO, SO many great ideas -  not quite sure how anyone has this much time, but she does and it is amazing what she comes up with.

3.  Frame art work - this is the obvious one. Keep the art projects that you particularly love and frame them. I bought an inexpensive frame at Target that allows you to open the frame up like a door and replace artwork frequently.(sorry this link is so long!)
http://www.target.com/p/artwork-display-and-storage-frame-black-12x16/-/A-10871027?ref=tgt_adv_XSG10001&AFID=Google_PLA_df&LNM=|10871027&CPNG=home%20decor&ci_sku=10871027&ci_gpa=pla&ci_kw=

www.dynamicframes.com also sells these kind of frames. 

4.  Shutterfly - This is a personal favorite and one that I just did recently. My daughter loves to draw, paint, create, etc... I cannot possibly keep all the drawings she has done and now she is in Kindergarten and will certainly bring home more great things to add to the mountain of artwork from years past.  So...I created a Shutterfly photo book.  I took pictures of all her artwork from around age 2 until now, age 5 - drawings/ paintings she did at home, projects from the babysitter's and projects from preschool. It was easy, but yes, a bit time consuming - I took pictures with my phone and using the Shutterfly app, I directly uploaded them to Shutterfly's site. I then created an actual photo book using Shutterfly's format. You can pick what kind of book you want - hard or soft cover, page layout, backgrounds etc.. I couldn't be happier with the outcome!

5. Take pictures of your child's artwork, print and frame. This woman took pictures and made a grid collage in Photoshop (I have no idea how to do that, but many of you out there do..so there you go!!)
This is taken from www.jenthousandwords.com

www.simplycreatekids.com  Is a great website that will professionally shrink down, matte and frame your child's artwork. Just look at the example on the left, below - love, love this!!

6. Clothes line of sorts - This has been done many ways, but a great way is to nail a strip of painted wood to the wall and hot glue some painted wooden clothes pins to the wood as art holders. You could also find a metal, magnetic strip (Ikea and container store are great places for these) and use magnets to secure artwork. 

7. Clip boards. Love this idea! Put a few nails in the wall, hang a few clip boards and voila....an easy way to change out pictures and art work!!
www.ohdeedoh.com via Pinterest

8. Magnetic Chalkboard Wall - This has been all the rage lately and really it makes perfect sense.  You can display your child's artwork using magnets AND you can use chalk to draw "frames" around them or have your child doodle all around the artwork. Magnetic paint is like a primer - you paint it on and then paint chalkboard paint over it..or if you don't want the chalkboard aspect of it, just paint regular paint over it.Why haven't I done this yet? I love this!!
photo from New York Times via Pinterest

That's all for now - there are SO MANY ways to display your child's art and make it a stylish, colorful part of your home's decor! Take pride in what your child creates - they make some of the most amazing pieces of art! Now, go...pick at least one of these ideas and do it!

1st grade Picasso's

The first graders looked at Pablo Picasso's painting of hands holding a bouquet of flowers. We traced each other's right hand and arm then drew four stems, being careful to skip over the hand as we drew them. We drew flowers and then outlined it all in Sharpie. We used tempera paint to paint the flowers and stems. They are awesome!

1st grade snails

The first graders extended their knowledge of lines and patterns by creating these snails. They drew a large snail and filled the shell in using patterns of lines and shapes. Everything was outlined in black Sharpie marker and then crayons were used to color it all in using patterns with their colors. Additional spiral lines were drawn, outlined and colored in the background. One color of watercolor paint was chosen, then pained over the whole picture.
Lines, shapes and patterns were the focus of this project.

4th grade Tree of Life collage/painting

The 4th graders began the school year looking at and drawing "The Tree of Life" by artist Gustav Klimt (Austrian painter 1882-1918) we looked at a close up, cropped version of this painting which focused on the tree with many spiral lines.
We took a mixed media approach to this by using tissue paper in warm colors to fill the background. Liquid starch was used to make the tissue paper stick. Once dry, we painted our spiral tree in black. Looking closely at the painting we noticed small squares, rectangles, circles, ovals and triangles on the trunk and branches. We painted them with bronze, silver, white and goldish yellow. The result? A very creative Klimt inspired work of art!