Marcus Oakley inspired collage, 1st grade

Marcus Oakley is an American artist whose work I follow on Instagram - he has a bold and colorful style that makes me feel happy and upbeat. We looked at some of his shape collages and made our own compositions with a variety of textured materials like burlap, cardboard, and foam, then we enhanced with line patterns.

Memory Quilts in 4th grade

 
Fourth graders did some reflecting on their year and turned their memories into colorful shapes and symbols in their memory quilts, which were inspired in design by traditional American quilt patterns and the contemporary whimsical style of illustrator Lisa Congdon. Using a grid, students filled each square to represent a month from last year.

                            

My ridiculously late post about our December artwork :/

Please forgive my tardiness in updating this blog! The end of 2017 was more hectic than usual and many of the things I regularly enjoy got placed on the back burner, but I am feeling much more organized in 2018, both physically and mentally! :) If you follow me on Instagram (@smartestartists) you might feel a bit more up-to-date.
We did a lot of fun things back in December - my youngest students enjoyed the hilarious book You Must Bring a Hat by Simon Philip and Kate Hindley. We drew outrageous party hat designs in K-1 and second graders made theirs into collages

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Third thru fifth grades spent some time thinking like designers with our Winter Wear Designs - we sketched ideas for things you wear in the winter, and drew a collection of pieces that showed unity through color or pattern.

 




                            
 

During our final week before break, the art room was transformed into a "Gingerbread Factory" and we had a great deal of fun rotating around the art room painting and printing our gingerbread houses.

Here we are now, back again and it is 2018! This week we are wrapping up last semester with a catch-up day - students are finishing up last bits and pieces from their portfolios, updating Artsonia, and tallying up our media usage from the first semester - it is always fun to look back at what we have accomplished. Thanks for checking in with us - all new work starts next week including clay and a focus on art culture around the world - Happy New Year!