We are the middle of the city and it's the middle of winter. We could all use a little pick me up. Since sunshine is not in the forecast, we decided to bring the outside in and keep the winter blues out.
If you've been following me you know I am into the environment. I try to instill environmental stewardship in our art classroom. We do a lot of projects that use recycled materials. We do it because (a.) we don't have a big budget and (b.) it just makes sense to be environmentally responsible. While we have been working hard to respect the earth and our materials, I realized that we haven't been taking the time to appreciate what we are protecting. Nature is constantly amazing me, you are an artist, I don't have to explain. It is what most artists fail to capture and merely represent, except for one artist, the GREAT Andy Goldsworthy.
This Andy Goldsworthy inspired project was just the thing to get me excited about teaching again.
It's easy, supplies are FREE, and here's a bonus FREE PREZI (I made this prezi to go with the project that you are welcome to use, change, or edit.)
If you've been following me you know I am into the environment. I try to instill environmental stewardship in our art classroom. We do a lot of projects that use recycled materials. We do it because (a.) we don't have a big budget and (b.) it just makes sense to be environmentally responsible. While we have been working hard to respect the earth and our materials, I realized that we haven't been taking the time to appreciate what we are protecting. Nature is constantly amazing me, you are an artist, I don't have to explain. It is what most artists fail to capture and merely represent, except for one artist, the GREAT Andy Goldsworthy.
This Andy Goldsworthy inspired project was just the thing to get me excited about teaching again.
It's easy, supplies are FREE, and here's a bonus FREE PREZI (I made this prezi to go with the project that you are welcome to use, change, or edit.)
Andy Goldworthy on Prezi
After I gave a short presentation on Andy Goldsworthy's work (see above) the students were inspired to get started. No GLUE, No SCISSORS, and they had to bring in natural materials to our next class. I put down some burlap and here is the art they created!
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| The "BELIEVE" flower. |
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| Three boats (see the leave sails?) |
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| Creating their boats. |
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| A mermaid |
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| Gotta love the shells! |
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| Flower, heart, tree and person. The shells on top are raining. |
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| Radial design |
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| She wrote about the believe flower! BeLIVE I kind of like the creative spelling. |
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| FIRST TRY: Trying to build a greenhouse. |
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| SECOND TRY: This group was trying to build a greenhouse. When they decided to change their idea, because it was too ambitious they created this. |
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| Whole group work. Each group brought one material at the end of class to contribute to a group work. |
4 comments:
I like the idea of bringing the natural materials inside for a Goldsworthy project. I took some 4th graders outside last May but we were limited to mostly rocks and weeds that we found near the playground. They were still so excited even without much to work with that I know they would love doing this inside with extras. :)
I had a hard time bringing the materials inside as it goes against Goldsworthy's whole deal!
BUT, I rationalized it as our Green Team meets after school and it gets dark and the weather gets bad. Also I rationalized that the kids were getting in nature by collecting supplies on their own. That's what I wanted them to do, interact with nature more. It ended up being completely successful. The kids came up to me today and told me again "wasn't yesterday fuN!"
Even though this year has been super busy and difficult because of a crazy schedule, I know what we do in the art room makes a difference. I just have to remember to appreciate the difference art makes in these kids lives!
Have I told you lately how amazing you are? Your commitment to these wonderful green projects and sharing Goldsworthy with your students is fabulous. I'm sure it was a great experience for your students.
I live in Southern California - I never thought about taking it all indoors! What a great rainy day idea.
Rina at www.k6art.com
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