Fourth Grade Portraits

Fourth graders have been creating portraits of people who are important to them. We started by looking at work by Hans Holbein, Alex Katz and Dana Schutz:

We noticed how each portrait tells something about the subject. We looked closely at costume, gaze and the way that paint and color were applied.

Next, we created sketches of our own portraits. We tried to decide how we could tell something about our subjects personality using detail and color choices. From our sketch, we created an under-painting. This is a value painting that we later cover. It is like a painted sketch.

Finally, we used the primary colors and black, white and brown to mix and add colors to our work. They all came out AMAZING! Here are a few examples:

First Grade Updates

First graders finished their clay pots ages ago, but I have not posted about them! Here are tons of photos of their finished pieces.

Now, we are working on mixed media pieces. We have studied artists who were inspired by their neighborhoods. We looked at The Block by Romare Bearden and I Live in Brooklyn by Mari Takabayashi. Mari even came and told us about how she makes her art! Now, we are working on pieces about our own neighborhoods. Here is a sneak peak of the studio in action: