How to Make Fall Inchies

So here is a Fall version of the Inchie project.  When I polled Grade 2 last June, asking "what was your favorite art project this year?" the Inchie project won hands down.


The kids really liked the assembly line stations.


Now each one of these squares is an art project in it's own right and you could easily just do a large version of any one of these.

PLEASE CLICK ON PHOTO TO SEE LARGER



MATERIALS REQUIRED: (don't freak out now.....)

- little inchie squares, I cut mine 2" x 2" as they are easier to work with, use wc paper, heavy sketch paper, whatever you have on hand
- tempera disk paint or watercolors (pan or tube)
- paintbrush
- oil pastels or wax crayons
- some assorted papers (newspaper, old painted papers from your stash, etc)
- contact paper or masking tape
- a nickel
- a kleenex tissue
- glue
- a straw
- some raffia or tissue (optional)
- an old book page (can be photocopied if you prefer)
- some poppy seeds (optional)
- a small square of plastic wrap
- a small bit of modeling clay or plasticine
- toothpick
- a little googly eye
- sharpies, markers, or pencil crayons
- little alphabet stamps if you have them
- paper for mounting

whew.....honestly just adapt and use what you have that's the whole point of this project.

PROCEDURE:

I like using 9 squares.  A good number for a real nice collection/display yet not overwhelming.


Now one thing I have talked about before with an inchie project is you don't have to do them all in one sitting. 

- you could set it up as a center, one square a day, or however many you have time for.
- give each child an envelope and as the squares are completed (and dried) just have them keep it in their desk until you are ready to mount.

You can also do all the backrounds one session and then let these dry.


Come back and finish them off in a second session and mount your collection.

Now the first square is just a painted yellow background and some leaves cut out of colored/painted paper with FALL stamped on with.

I keep a stash of painted papers.I always get a few of the kids to paint extra pages whenever we do a project.

If you don't have a stash you can use colored paper, scrapbook paper, etc.

Now this is from a different project but you can see the little alphabet stamps I use.  I get them from Michael's in the dollar bin (yes, seriously!)  I have many many sets.

The next one is a sunset. You want to paint on some yellow and then some orange at the top. 

While the paint is still wet wrap the nickel in a kleenex and lift out a sun.

When the sky dries paint in your horizon line with brown paint, leaving 1/2 the sun.

You could do a large one similar to this project.

 The 3rd square uses a sticker resist.  Now I cut mine out of repositionable contact paper. (check out this post to learn about it)

You could also use painter's tape cut into the shape you want.

I chose candy corn, one of my favorite Fall indulgences, but you could do a leaf, pumpkin, apple, pear, squash, etc.

Stick on your sticker and paint  on your background color, go right over the sticker it will resist the paint.

When the square has dried remove the sticker and color in the details, use a fine marker or pencil crayon to outline if you wish.


You then can add stamps or cut out letters and words.  For a class I'll print out words off the computer.

Now the next square is just a little version of this project.

Paint your square with a few Fall colors.  With the square being so small just put a few drops of watery color at the corners and then shake the square to mix them just a bit.

When dry put a drop of black paint on the edge and blow with the straw.  Add some more drops  along the trunk if needed and blow additional branches.

For the crow square, have the kids glue the inchie to an old book page.  Trim off the excess and draw in your crow.

I added a little googly eye.

The little cobs of corn square is  made from paper that has been splattered with paint in fall colors.

At school I use a splatter box with the kids.  This saves me lots of clean-up at the end. 





Cut out a few little cobs and the glue onto your background with a little bit of raffia.

The pumpkin square is a pastel resist.  Draw on your pumpkin with oil pastel or wax crayons and then paint on a background color.

The sunflower square is based on this project.

Paint your background blue, cut out some petals and glue them on and then add a few poppy seeds for the middle.

The last square I did a plastic wrap effect background.  Paint some Fall colors on your square and then before they dry add a little piece of plastic wrap on top. Smoosh it a little to get a few wrinkles and then leave on until dry.  (a few minutes)

I then made a modelling clay/ plasticine stamp.  Kids love to make these stamps and we have tons of plasticine at school.

Take a little piece, roll into a little log.  For a leaf shape I taper the ends a bit. Pound one of the ends on the table a little bit to flatten the surface and then using a toothpick carve in the veins of the leaf.

Put a little bit of tempera on a plate (flatten out the paint on the surface with a paintbrush) and then use your stamp.  Stamp the first impression on some paper to blot a bit and then use the 2nd or 3rd impression.  When you are done just wipe off the stamp and put the plasiticine in a plastic bag.  You can reuse it over and over again to make more stamps.

Once all your squares have dried mount in a collection on some colored paper.

I double mounted this one. 

That's it.  I love making these collections and I'm sure your kids will too!

Give it a try.

Papier Mache Pumpkin Tower

Ok, next up with our series on "altering those little plastic pumpkins" is this Pumpkin Tower (totem pole).

It's based on this wooden pumpkin tower (totem pole) that I made several years ago.
































MATERIALS REQUIRED:

- 2 of those little plastic pumpkins from the Dollar store
- white glue
- a few paper towels
- water
- recycled container for the glue mix
- sheet of wax or parchment paper, or an old plastic bag
- paint, acrylic or tempera
- Mod Podge, optional






PROCEDURE:

Cut or tear your paper towels into strips.  Mix up your white glue with some warm water (makes it feel less yucky for the kids) in your recycled container. 1 to 1 ratio.

Remove the plastic handle.

Working on top of your wax paper,

start covering your little pumpkin with strips crossing the ends over. 

The middle pumpkin only needs a couple of coats but for the bottom one you want it to be a bit larger so add a few more.

Add a few features in papier mache to the faces.

Leave the opening in the plastic pumpkin as is, you don't need to cover it over.

For the top pumpkin I took a 1/2 sheet of paper towel and scrunched it into a ball.  I then papier mache a layer or two on top of this. You could also use paper, foil or newspaper.


Try to keep it smaller than your middle pumpkin.

When you added all the features you want let dry.  You'll need to turn them every so often to get all sides to dry out.

When they have dried out, (a couple of days), paint with acrylic or tempera.

I wanted my top pumpkin to have a witch hat so I made one out of felt.

I used the glue gun but you could use tacky glue.

Glue on top of your little pumpkin.

Then start gluing your tower together.  I used the glue gun as I was a bit impatient but you could use tacky glue again here.

Now if after gluing your tower doesn't stand up you can push in the bottom of large pumpkin.  This should help.

If you want you can seal the pumpkins with Mod Podge for a nice shiny coat.


.........and that's it.  You can vary your tower having the faces looking out at slightly different positions if you want.

I also do a variation of this with Grade 1 and Kindergarten using paper.  We talk about facial expressions and try to get 3 different looks to our pumpkins.




Give it a try and I'll see you next time.

Chalk Pastel Sunflowers

So this is a pastel project using a glue resist method I've seen several times.Most notably I've seen Kathy over at "Art Projects for Kids" use this many times.   I wanted to test the boundaries of this technique so I did a few experiments.























MATERIALS REQUIRED:

- chalk pastels, you can also try regular chalk, (results will vary, see below)
- black paper (cardstock, construction, tinted sketch)
- regular school white glue
- kleenex tissue
- pencil and eraser

Trace out your design in pencil.  I wanted to use odd cuts of paper for visual interest.

-Open(cropped) composition.

Now take your regular school glue or tacky glue and go over your outline.  Make sure you work on a flat surface.

I'm working on top of wax paper as my lines go off the page.


Let dry flat.

When dry you can snip off any little ends from the glue that go past the page.

Using the pastel add color in the sections marked off by the color and smudge.  Keep a tissue handy to wipe your fingers off.

Now I found the best way to approach this is to add color in small sections.  You can discuss with the kids the use of more than one color for each section as we have highlights and shading.

But when smudging I found it best to start with the lightest color first and then smudge into the dark.  This helps to keep those light colors from getting lost.  Wipe off fingers and then go to next part.  (for example I would smudge one petal, wipe, and then smudge the next).

Now I know not everyone has access to chalk pastels so I wanted to see how regular colored chalk would work.

This is done with chalk pastels.

and this is done with regular colored chalk.  We have fewer colors to work with and we don't have that richness in the colors but still do-able.

I tried this technique with oil pastels but found the glue sections very hard to smudge.  I could foresee lots of frustration and ripped papers for the kids so I recommend this only for chalk pastels.

Housekeeping:  Some of you may have noticed I added pictures for all the posts listed on my page directories at the top.  Seasonal is getting way to big so I am creating pages for each season.  I hope this will be more user friendly for you all.

 See you next time.

Open vs. Closed Composition

Before I reveal the winner of the giveaway I thought I would talk a bit about composition.  Now there are many elements within composition (symmetry/asymmetry, balance, harmony, etc.) but I just want to focus on open vs. closed, a basic understanding that I try to teach the kids.

So here are some pears. A great subject matter for Fall and this arrangement is a CLOSED composition.  Why is it closed, the focus is just on those 3 pears.  A closed composition tends to be kind of static, getting the viewer to focus on the subject matter within boundaries. Lots of still life's and portraits are considered closed composition.

Now let's look at this arrangement.  This is an OPEN composition. Parts of the pears are extending off the picture and you can imagine them beyond the boundaries.  Often lots of landscapes are very open compositions.

  Now it can sometimes get confusing when you look at a painting/picture that is considered a closed composition but the background is open.  I tell the kids to focus on what is going on in the foreground.

Here is a good example of what I'm talking about.  This composition is closed.  In fact, the manger defines the boundaries of where you should be looking, but the background could extend on.

Nativity Silhouette Project

Now here is another example of a closed composition, Cimabue's "Madonna Enthroned" (1280), a picture I took at the Louvre in Paris.  This is very closed with border/boundary built right in.  Although those angels are right at the edges their wings are painted complete and they themselves become the border, especially if you look at the arm positions of the 2 bottom angels, focusing your attention on the Madonna and Christ child.  This is good one to use to test your understanding!

Here is an example of an open composition, the focal point is on those dandelion seeds with the wishes printed on them but you can imagine lots of them being blown right off the page and into the wind.

Dandelion Poetry Project

Here is good example of an open composition by Edgar Degas "The Rehearsal" around 1874. You can imagine yourself in that rehearsal hall with dancers practicing all around you, your eye trying to take them all in.

So here is a good project to try with the kids.  Have them do both an open and closed composition of the same subject matter and display the 2 together.  For the closed composition you can just set up the still life but for the open you may have to get them to view it through a old mat or frame.  You can also add a photography component.  Get them to photograph an open composition and then paint the view.

Next time you are viewing a work of art or photograph ask yourself  "Is this an open or closed composition?"

On to the Giveaway results.  I had 61 entries total from both the comment section and email.

Using Random.Org we get:

Here are your random numbers:

7

Timestamp: 2011-09-09 16:55:25 UTC

So our winner (number assigned by time entered) is:

Dale Anne Potter:

Oh I would SO LOVE this DVD - I caught one of the episodes on PBS and wished I'd seen the others.
THANK YOU for this opportunity and for your FABULOUS blog (that I usually read via Google Reader)!

Sept 5th, 2011 6:03pm

So Dale if you could email me your shipping details at thatartistwoman@shaw.ca

I will get your new DVD series off to you right away.  Thanks everyone for entering and I'll see you next week.