Week Nine

National Silver Medals! 

Since 2008, I have been proud to enter student work in the Scholastic Art Awards. During these past nine years, we have had numerous regional winners and now nine National Medalists with the recent addition of this year's winners! Congratulations to Lindsey Peters, Magnus Smith, and Clay Brown for earning National Silver Medals! I am very excited to add your names to the list of Cam Schuelke, Ethan Pipe, Anna Pavlak, Jordan Cooper, Mackenzie Reid, and Amanda Strayhorn as previous BCWMS winners! 

What is even more exciting than winning this recognition is the conversations from each of this years' winners already planning what to make for next year. I can't wait to see it made!

Where are you going? Where have you been?

Students finished their second major challenge this week and explored various ideas about where they have been and where they would like to go. Some students took the prompt literally, while others more figuratively. It was fun to see them go through various materials of their choosing and draw on the artists we studied for this project as inspiration. 

Here are some of the results: 

Kenzie: I chose to do this place out of all my thumbnail sketches, because I thought it was different. In most of my sketches I had chose a place that was tropical area with a sunset or a city. I decided to incorporate both in my finished product of Cuba. I responsibly used water color, sharpies, and metallic colored pencils. I used principles and visual characteristics in my artwork effectively, and I fully understand how to use them. My final artwork shows craftsmanship and many techniques such as mainly shading. The materials I used appropriately fit my artwork. I used media to get an idea of how to correctly draw buildings in Cuba. My artwork is similar to Red Grooms, because I used buildings in a busy area which is most likely to be similar to Red Grooms.

Samantha: The theme of this challenge was to create an art piece following "Where are you going, where have you been?". For my interpretation I created a piece about places all over the world that are very popular for tourism. I used pencil shavings to create individual places such as cities, beaches, and even amusement parks. I drew a big long road and everyplace connects there. I also have a big globe with red drop pins on certain places. This art piece follows the theme because it talks about all the places in the world but it also shows that all the places are connected through the roads on the globe. I used a lot of different materials including watercolor and chalk to create different textures and colors on the art. My art reminds me of the artist Eugina Loli because she uses a lot of different places in one image and this is exactly what I did. I created a lot of different backgrounds and connected them all through the globe and a road. My art is significant to me because it talks about places all over the world and a lot of these places I would love to go someday.

Arianna: My choice in materials represents my trip to Hawaii and shows a distorted effect to it. The puzzle effect shows that there are two sides to every environment. One can be dull, and one can be bright and flourished. I have been to Hawaii and saw different and unique landscapes and photographed them. This shows my interpretation of the theme by the materials I use. I connect to this artwork because I have been to Hawaii and everywhere I go there is different in many ways. The flourished image is the ocean and rocks. The duller image is when we visited the Big Island’s main volcano. This shows two extremely different landscapes even though it’s the same environment/land. This artwork is similar to the artwork created by Eugina Loli because we both use a distorted and abstract effect.

Katelyn: My artwork shows a space landscape. From the bottom left to the top right the planets get smaller. While it necessarily doesn't getter smaller as it get closer to the background, as usually used in composition, I chose to present it at a vertical angle and put my vanishing point in the top right corner. I started by drawing the planets and taping then, then I painted the picture plane black added purple accents to create an outer space appearance. Next, I sprinkled white paint over the plane with a paintbrush, adding stars. When I removed the tape from the planets I colored them in using water color pencils and blended them using water. Finally to add a more dramatic effect to the planets I shaded the left sides with black chalk pastel and tinted the right side with white chalk pastel. On some of the planets, I drew people standing on top of them. I have traveled to a lot of places in my life and met so many different people. I personally think that when we go places it is all about the people we encounter who influence us the most. The world is full of different unique people and personalities, and each one we meet, influences us, even if it is in a small way. So, looking out from where we are from, you never know who you might find, and who might just change your life.

Ethan: I choose clay to make the piece of art out of because clay is my favorite material to work with. The reason I made yellow stone is that me and my family have spent a lot of time there and now we cant.

Tess: For this piece, I first used pencil to draw the coral onto the carving block, then I used a carving tool to carve out the design. I chose black paper for my picture plane because I wanted the printing ink to really stand out. A couple of years ago, in fifth grade, my family went to Hawaii, and my favorite thing was all of the coral that we saw. Unfortunately, I later learned that a lot of the coral in all of our oceans is becoming subject to coral bleaching, and I wanted my piece of artwork to highlight this issue. My work is similar to Andy Goldsworthy's because it involves nature, but while he directly uses his environment, creating pieces out of snow, leaves, stone, and other things, and then photographs it, I simply created a picture of nature.

Ella: My art for this section was created from an old pair of jeans, using fabric as my main media. With this piece I cut each piece of felt to create every patch on my jeans also created roads from the paint that made roads connecting my life. I thought jeans would be a good media for they will always be part of my life I have grown up making whole in my jeans from falling down in the side walk to falling off my bike. They are worn, torn and lived in no matter what the age. I could go on and on about the jeans and each path but for easy means something new. I added a sun and clouds for that is my favorite weather when I sun just peaks out from the clouds and makes the perfect temperature. I also created a diploma for when I graduate high school and hope to be high in my class. The mittens represent the state I live in, Michigan, with the great lakes. With this art work I have branched out into several pieces of my life and also used parts from Faith Ringold and made a piece using fabric as I looked at her piece it made it easier to make mine looking at the parts and small additions she added to her quilt help me make mine.

Kheim: I this art I thought of book ad some other thing I do in English which is write something and I usually write in first point of view. So I came up with the idea for this. I usually I just get to the final art but this time I realize that I have try this out before but it doesn't work so I sketch out ton of perspective and more. I took some idea of some other art like a draw of the forest, room and much more so I use the room idea. I thought of my room so I draw my room. I use shading pencil just like my other art. It's about your teen life like how teen have more freedom than a children and more. In the end, I think my work is pretty similar to Georges Seurat art because my art use perspective to show how far the object and shading to show is 3d. The different is that my don't use a ton of don't Georges.

Hannah: This a cardboard collage with magazine objects overlaid on cardboard to create a 3D effect, there is also a watercolor flower and 2 drawn objects. I call this "Dream Objects" because I have a little artist in me, my dad is in the military, and I was born in oklahoma. Throughout all the trials I face I can always come back to my dreams wherever I go.

Isaac: The composition and materials that I used for this artwork are supposed to show a quiet nighttime setting, but with vibrancy as well. I also tried to use texture to give a feel of depth to the art. I can connect to this art personally when looking at how it portrays a vibrant, even exciting feel, and I can also connect this artwork to Red Grooms by thinking of how we both used a 3D effect, along with depth, to give a sense of reality in our work.

Next week we will continue this investigation of how place can shape people and the way they use it with our STEAM collaborative.