May 2018 Art Blog

Transitional Kindergarten:

TK Students had the opportunity to create three-dimensional turtles out of air-dry clay. To create an interesting texture for the turtle's shell, students stepped on a clay ball to imprint the texture of the sole of their shoes. Students viewed and compared the variety of textures everyone's shoe had left behind. Practicing rolling coils for the turtle's legs, head and tail was yet another clay molding technique students used. After the clay had dried, students painted their turtles in vibrant colors using liquid water colors. A coat of clear varnish finished the turtles with a nice shine. 

Kindergarten: STEAM The Cranky Machine

I would like to share with you, Kindergarten Arts/Science integration at it’s best. Modesto Tamez (artist in residence) taught students about forces: push and pull. Modesto showed us how to build a “cranky", a little machine with a crank, an axle and a piston animating one part of two artistic forms. 

Students persevered through the technical steps of engineering a crank and piston and loved the artistic challenge in creating two forms telling a story with one moving and one still part. 

Kindergarten students went full STEAM ahead into this hands on learning experience. Thank you Modesto Tamez and Anna Rochester for your help with the concept and technical portions of this project and Artist Teaching Art (ATA) and KSD PTA for your funding support. 

What an amazing learning opportunity for students and teachers!

1st Grade: Drawing Basics: Light and Shadows

Light and shadows visually define objects. First grade students were introduced to the concept of light and shadows and trained their eyes to see like an artist. First grade students studied a still-life model with a light source (lamp) illuminating objects. 

Students observed the following: A shadow is made when an object blocks light. The object must be opaque or translucent to make a shadow. A transparent object will not make any shadow, as light will pass straight through it. The Sun is a very bright natural light source. It seems to move across the sky during the day. In fact, it just looks like it does that because the Earth is spinning.The Sun casts (makes) the longest shadows at the beginning and end of the day, when the Sun is lowest in the sky. The Sun casts the shortest shadows at midday, when the Sun is highest in the sky.

Students practiced shading techniques and applied form and cast shadows to geometric forms. Students also drew a fruit still-life and defined the objects applying the concepts of light and shadows. 

 1st grade students are able to visually identify the following:

• Light source: The direction from which a dominant light originates. The placement of this light source affects every aspect of a drawing.

• Form Shadows: The areas on an object (form), a range of values that receive little or no light.

• Cast shadow: The dark area on an adjacent surface where the light is blocked by the solid object

2nd Grade: See-Stunners (Eyewear) inspired by Cyrus Kabiru

Cyrus Kabiru is a self-taught emerging Kenyan artist, best known for his elaborate and detailed sculptural spectacles or C-Stunners, (C for Cyrus instead of See) made from found objects and recycled material sourced on the streets of Nairobi.

Digging through electronic refuse and found metal in Kenya’s capital of Nairobi, Cyrus Kabiru refashions found materials into different wearable forms. Often these take the form of flamboyantly composed glasses, large eyewear that can often mask the entire face.

Kabiru explains that his glasses obsession started at a young age, and blossomed as his father crushed his dreams of owning his own pair. “When I was young, I used to admire real glasses but my dad was a bit harsh and he never wanted me to have real glasses. That’s the reason I started making the glasses.”

His creations situate themselves in several different areas of art, shuffling between performance, sculpture, and fashion—embodying the playfulness of the youth generation in Nairobi. “When you walk in town and you see someone with my glasses, the glasses will [get] all your attention,” said Kabiru. “If you have any stress it is like a therapy.”

As an African man, Kabiru realized that what people often noticed first about him was his skin color or gender – but with his creations, the glasses were the first thing people noticed.  His creations change people's perceptions and assumptions.  Creating a See-Stunner may give people something different to focus on (versus skin color, ethnicity, gender, etc).

Second grade students used a pair of 3D glasses as a starting point to envision, plan and create their own see-stunners. Students selected miscellaneous recycled materials that inspired them. Students personalize and decorate their glasses in an artistic, aesthetically pleasing way. They adhered materials to glasses frames using hot glue and glue dots. Students explored the concept of what we “see” and what we think based on what we “see” first about people. They were encouraged to consider perception and bias assumptions we make when we look at people. Students' See-Stunners may give people something different to focus on (versus skin color, ethnicity, etc).

3rd Grade: Book Folding

An altered book is a form of mixed media artwork that changes a book from its original form into a different form, altering its appearance and/or meaning.

The fourth grade students absolutely loved creating their own book sculptures. Students were introduced to beginner book folding techniques. Students practiced 4 basic folds and used their creativity in applying the 4 folds in symmetrical patterns and repetitions. Students were also encouraged to invent their own folds and patterns of folds. There are a variety of book folding patters online which some students referred to.

Students used a magazine to practicing folds and patters. After practice, each student was directed to come up with a design plan to alter a book into an amazing piece of art.

4th Grade:

We started our 2017/18 school year with a Kindness Chain, connecting  Bacich and Kent campuses with hundreds acts of kindness written on links of a colorful paper chain. We are finishing the school year with a one-of-a-kind fundraiser to share kindness through the arts benefiting San Francisco General Hospital Foundation. 

Fourth grade students collaboratively painted heart posters depicting acts of kindness. 

The 25 original posters are now available to view and purchase at SFGHF.org/Shop. Each 51” x 42”poster (shipping included) is $62.00. Each original poster can only be purchased once (no prints available).