Amber & Turquoise Class

Our reception, year 1 and year 2 artists have been developing their colour mixing skills this week by investigating the work of British artist Anthony Frost (see examples below). We discussed his use of vibrant primary and secondary colours, and the way in which he paints onto a textured background. We created our own background using a variety of textured fabrics, then mixed colours to paint our pieces. We got some very colourful results!

 

Magenta & Violet Class

Our year 3 and 4 artists have been studying the geometric compositions of Wassily Kandinsky this week (see example below). We talked about the use of straight lines, angles and shapes and how they interact with one another, and made a record of particular elements that we liked in our sketchbooks. We then combined these elements to create our own Kandinsky-inspired compositions, which we will be adding colour to next week.

 

Emerald Class

Our year 5 and 6 artists had a visit from one of our Bronze Arts Award students this week! Frances, who is in year 9, chose to share her skills with Emerald class as part of her award criteria. Frances had prepared a really enjoyable workshop on Tangrams- dissection puzzles consisting of seven flat shapes, called tans, which are put together to form shapes. She showed the group some examples of designs they could make using the tangrams, and then encouraged them to come up with some images of their own. 

Emerald class really enjoyed the session and gave Frances some positive feedback for her Arts Log.

Amber Class

This week Amber class worked with one of our Bronze Arts Award students, Lottie, who is in year 8. Part of the Arts Award structure requires students to share their skills with others, and Lottie chose to lead a workshop with a younger class. She prepared a lesson plan for teaching Amber class how to produce a colourful background using bubble wrap printing, and linked her teaching to the class’s previous work on mark making and colour mixing. The class then designed their own fish which will be added to the printed background. 

Amber class really enjoyed the session and gave Lottie some great feedback for her Arts Award log book!

Turquoise Class

Our other reception, year 1 and year 2 class developed their colour mixing skills this week. We identified primary and secondary colours, mixing our own secondary colours in our palettes before recording the colour wheel in our sketchbooks. We painted pictures of lollies showing which primary colours are needed to make each secondary colour, aiming to achieve an even, smooth finish with our brushes. We chose a coloured background to mount our lolly paintings. The results were very colourful!

 

Magenta & Violet Class

Our year 3 and 4 artists continued their investigation into the work of Vincent Van Gogh. We discussed ‘The Starry Night’, commenting on the different kinds of mark making we could find within the painting. We learnt how to change the tone of a colour by adding different amounts of white, and practised painting Van Gogh style stars in our sketchbooks. We then worked in pairs to create a large starry sky painting. 

 

Emerald Class

Our year 5 and 6 artists discussed the work of Fridensreich Hundertwasser, an Austrian-born New Zealand artist and architect (see examples below). We identified a range of elements which appear frequently in his abstract landscapes, such as lollipop-shaped trees, contour lines, rows of houses and hidden faces, and sketched them in our books. We then put the elements together to form a composition, which we drew out in marker pen onto mountboard. We will be continuing with our Hundertwasser-inspired artwork another week!

This term we are focusing on painting techniques. We’ll be experimenting with different varieties of paint and building on our knowledge of line, tone, texture and colour. We’ll investigate the work of different artists, and producing a masterpiece on canvas ready for our winter exhibition!

Amber & Turquoise Class

This week our reception, year 1 and year 2 artists spent time investigating mark making using ready mixed paint in two primary colours, yellow and red. We experimented with creating marks using a variety of tools, including brushes, sticks, clay tools, sponges, glue spreaders and plastic lids. We responded to prompt words such as ‘fluffy’, ‘spiky’, ‘rough’, ‘swirly’, ‘bouncy’ and ‘smooth’, and thought about how we might paint if we were feeling excited, or angry, or sad. 

As we worked, our two primary colours mixed together to give us a secondary colour, and as it was Halloween, we made different marks using black paint to turn our orange textures into spooky pumpkins!

Magenta & Violet Class

Our year 3 and 4 artists warmed up with a similar activity to Amber and Turquoise class. We used a variety of tools to respond to different prompt words, choosing appropriate tools for the kind of mark we wanted to create.

We then discussed some ink drawings by Vincent Van Gogh (see photos). We looked carefully at the different kinds of marks he used in the drawings, and made a record of them in our sketchbooks using first pencils, and then paint. We collected lots of different Van Gogh style marks, which we will be referring to next week! 

Emerald Class

Our year 5 and 6 artists also did the mark making warm up! We were responding to some more ambiguous prompts, such as ‘inside’, ‘under’, ‘corners’, ‘turn’ and ‘glide’. It was really interesting to see how each student interpreted the prompts in different ways. 

We then discussed some portraits by Australian artist Mike Parr (see photos). We talked about the different kinds of marks he’d created, and how he used them to convey expression and emotion. We then painted our own portraits inspired by Parr’s work- some based on his more recognisable portraits and some based on his more abstract work.