Tangled in Mixed Media

Popular children's media and stories often make their way into the studio. One of my favorite things is the re-telling of these stories by children using art media. This young woman began by creating the princess from "Tangled" with clay coils.

More coils add length to her hair.

Until it is SOOO long it extends off the table on one side.

Moving to paint she continued her portrait theme.

This time creating a painted portrait of the princess with long hair extending down the paper.

I wonder at the complexity of the story telling and observation in moving from one media to another. So often when drawing (or in this case painting) follows building the two dimensional image seems to gain depth and detail from having first been modeled in three dimensions. In this case the clay coils were used almost as the lines of a drawing that can be seen here to also be a sort of draft image for this painting.

a@tc Internship: 10.19 Wednesday Drawing Studio

a@tc Internship: 10.19 Wednesday Drawing Studio: At the beginning of each class, young artists are asked to practice drawing their hand. In keeping with tradition, we began class by drawin...

Sometimes you have to do a little drawing

In our evening drawing studio, we spent the third week exploring shape and shadows. The flash of the camera cuts out the shadows of the blocks below but you can get an idea from the drawing that it was a complex composition of shapes and shadows.

Another student used blocks, observing the multiple shadows created by several points of light from our overhead track lighting.

Finally the artists discovered that isolating a single object and single light source made it that much easier to carefully observe the light and shadow on different surface planes. In this case the size of the drawing paper seemed to help too. The artist felt much more satisfied with these little drawings done of a single object which allowed for focus and simplification. They make a lovely series as well.

a@tc Internship: Wednesday Art in the Afternoon 9.21.11

a@tc Internship: Wednesday Art in the Afternoon 9.21.11: Today in art in the afternoon we started by drawing mandalas with oil pastels. We used this time and the drawings to introduce ourselves. As...

a@tc Internship: Big Chalk Draw!!

a@tc Internship: Big Chalk Draw!!

Mobile Making - Using Drawing to Plan and Reflect

In our mobiles class this summer we built with wire, paper, recycled objects, string and ribbons. The challenge for young artists was often as much in figuring out attachment strategies as in creating a design. Tape became a popular media as did bendable pipe cleaners and wires.

We used drawing throughout the 3 days as a way to plan, to reflect on our creations and to think of new strategies and ideas.

Below, the artist arranges found and recycled materials on top of the plan she has drawn for a space-themed mobile.

With the addition of wire attachments, the mobile hangs as a sculptural creation.

The next 4 drawings show an artist using drawing as observation and reflection. The sculptures are shown first followed by the drawings created at the end of class to record our creations.

Notice the different shapes used for different parts and materials on the mobile.

The spy gear goggles seen here are drawn again below.

The goggle plan (below) proved helpful as other artists wanted to create their own gear.

In the sketches below the sculptor depicts the curve of the wire and then the individual beads arranged along it to create this unique small sculpture. In addition to reflecting on his creation, this artist gives us clues as to how it is constructed.

The artist below was careful to match the colors and metallic luster of her materials in recording her sculpture with a drawing.

Finally, this diagram of a moving sculpture with gears inside begins to function as a diagram, adding arrows and views inside to the moving parts. The artist/engineer begins to show and share his understanding of how the device works as he reflects on it through drawing.

Book Making

Our book-making workshop this summer offered a great opportunity for thinking about working in series with our accordian mini-books and for making personal journals to fill with summer drawings, reflections and memories. See images below.