everyONEcounts@school Exercise Three

This drawing by Candice (Grade 10) is the result of the Exercise 3 in my downloadable handout for teachers on the everyonecounts web site:

Excerpt from the handout:

"3. Take a close up self portrait (photograph), photostat it to get the tonal range/to remove it from the original photograph, and follow the same process of building up the surface: starting with white and working towards the darker colours. They are now starting to grasp the concept that COLOUR builds FORM. (Those areas that are light grey will stay yellow and the mid tones will be orange, etc) TIP: the larger the sheet of paper the more exciting the work will be, and-the more abstract it becomes.)"

Download the document here.

The beginning of everyONEcounts@school

I started my Grade 10 learners on a series of exercises that will culminate in an oil painting that will be sold on behalf of everyONEcounts.
The girls drew guided abstract pieces in oil pastel to music. They loved drawing to music & the freedom of expression that this lesson afforded them. I got them to devise titles for the artworks & we shared a brief discussion about the learning & experience of this lesson. The lesson was obviously successful because the grade 10's brought their friends back to the art room to see the drawings at break time. 

This one is by Anna and is called: Letting go of Voice  

 

  

This one (detail) by Caylee is called: Feeling Expressed

This one is by Maxine and is called: Something Anything

Instructions for this lesson (for teachers):  

1. Give each learner a large sheet of white paper and a white crayon/pastel (an inexpensive household white wax candle will do if you can’t find white wax crayons), they do this exercise standing at their desks. Play really loud music, which has a strong beat. The learners move their whole bodies to the music and start to build a surface with the crayon. Then you give them the yellow crayon and they repeat the exercise. Then give them a red one. And so on. Until the surface is glowing with a layer of marks and colour. Work from warm colours to cool colours through the box until you judge that most of the drawings have been sufficiently “worked”. (You will probably find that the cooler colours need less time allocated to them) I normally change music tracks each time they pick up a new crayon. This is not an exercise in observation – rather encourage the learners not to draw anything specific – they should be exploring the properties of the crayons, mark making and layering colour. You may ask them to think up creative titles for their artworks once finished. Conduct a class criticism of the artworks they have produced.

To see download a document related to this lesson click here.