Birds of a Feather

 Standing outside the school the other day, many students witnessed the numerous flocks of migrating geese returning from their wintertime destinations.  In the spirit of these birds' great journey, the kindergartners have been working on their own bird in flight.  Many of these birds have been "flying" home recently. 

Mona Lisa's Mysterious Smile

The first graders are currently wrapping up their larger than life(-size) self portraits.  Using Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa as our inspiration, the first graders painted their own likeness using tempera paint.  They mixed several colors together to achieve their individual skin colors, and every student used a complementary color scheme for the shirt and background of their painting.  The last step is to use oil pastels to add facial features and details to the shirt and background.

What's your Secret Emotion?

The question on every second graders mind may be "What's your secret emotion?"  However, with the project at hand, there are two rules... no guessin' and no tellin'!

Portrait of a Third Grader

The third graders finally met the very famous artist, Pablo Picasso.  Well, I should say... they were introduced to Picasso's artwork, specifically his portraiture.  In keeping with Picasso's style of Cubism, the third graders are creating a single self portrait taken from multiple angles.  By combining the frontal and profile views of their face, the self portraits take on an abstract quality.  The use of five intersecting lines and a warm and cool color scheme further pushes the self portraits into abstraction.

Op Art Anyone?

After an especially long unit on Georgia O'Keeffe, the fourth graders have moved on to study the work of Bridget Riley.  Mimicking Riley's repetitive designs in her Op Art work, the fourth graders are using organic shapes to create their own ringed patterns.  The complementary color scheme helps make these fantastic works of art stand out!

While half the class was immersed in their very own Op Art, the other group of students experimented with marbling.  Using the dust of chalk pastels sprinkled on a pool of water, students dipped their papers to generate beautiful swirls of color.

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German Expressionism

The fifth graders are wrist-deep in plaster-wrap!  Each student has been working with a partner to wrap one another's hands with the plaster-infused cloth to create a cast of their hands.  Using the artist Kathe Kollwitz as our inspiration, each fifth grader selected an emotion at random in which to express through a hand gesture.  Here are a few photos of our fifth grade artists hard at work...

Happy Valentine's Day

What better way to celebrate Valentine's Day than to kick-off a blog to showcase all the amazing artwork that is created by the wonderful artists at Pleasant Valley School.