YIA’s program bringing mentor artists into local classrooms
Mentor Artist Suzanne Joyal is working with four classrooms at Marindale in San Rafael, and students of all abilities are exploring the same Essential Question. In week one, we started with Texture: how can we FEEL things when we create?
An earlier post describes the theater production of the original one-act play lead by YIA Mentor Artist Melissa Briggs in collaboration with students from Mr. Michael Lovejoy’s Marin County Office of Education (MCOE) Special Ed class.
Mentor Artist Donna Keiko Ozawa joined the production in December to work with the students on stage props and sets. Here are some photos of the process.
Some of the students’ characters required props they could carry on stage. These were fabricated from simple materials: cardboard, wood, craft foam, metal hinges, and stickers. Students learned how to drill, and colored the wood with permanent markers.
Mentor Artist Donna Keiko Ozawa assists Tevin with marking holes for the hinge on the cellphone prop.
Tevin loves woodworking.
Maribel enjoys working with tools.
Jake learns to drill holes for a hinge.
Various cellphones, PDAs and camera props for the show that students made.
Students also used rubber stamps on foam core to create a miniature cityscape to represent San Francisco on one side of our large prop of the Golden Gate Bridge.
This process also took into account students’ physical and cognitive abilities to create an aesthetic that worked well with theme of the show. (Spoiler: There is an earthquake involved…)
The cityscape assembled and will be seen off the Bridge (a larger prop not pictured here).
Maggie working on the fascade of a building in the cityscape prop.
Buildings students stamped for the cityscape.
The cityscape prop is light and portable for quick placement on stage.
Can you imagine this cargo ship off the Bay in the distance? (Foamcore, paint, cardboard, hot glue).
Show time is January 12 and 17. Please join us on Thursday January 12th or 19th at 7PM, Tam High’s Caldwell Theatre, 700 Miller Avenue (near the back parking lot) Mill Valley, CA. Box office opens at 6:30PM and advance tickets are available online as well.
"Art To Feelings" Mikyla 11-10-11
The artists at Bayside Elementary and Willow Creek Academy, working with youth in arts mentor artist Marguerite Etemad, made art to music.
First we gathered feeling words, bringing to our minds all the ways that we can feel. We looked at Georgia O’Keeffe’s abstract paintings for inspiration. Then the artists listened closely to the music. As they listened to the music they asked themselves the following questions. How does the music make me feel? What do I imagine?
What is the feeling? What is the Story?
Then they drew with oil pastels while listening to the music. Expressing their feelings and their imaginations in their work.
3rd Grade Bayside Elementary Artists 11-7-11
"The Drum Players" Talia 2nd grade artist Bayside Elementary 11-10-11
The artists listened to “Somewhere Over The Rainbow” by Israel Kamakawiwo’ole and “The Beat of My Drum” by Babatunde Olatunji while making their art.
2012 started off in fine style as art class was welcomed back with a fun “get back in stride” project. Students were given an option to be a interior designers or create their own banging custom taco truck. The energy was fun a upbeat as students were able to individualize their works with fun themes. This project will lead into a more in-depth interior design project-stay tuned!!-Peace Mr. K-Dub – Willow Creek Art teacher 5th-8th grades.
Students started this three day intro to the mural project by discussing a visual essay about journaling. We looked at multiple ways artists use journals, including writers and poets. Below right is an image of one of Walt Whitman’s journals, from 1855.
Artists on the Mural Team started by using collage, watercolors, and colored pencils. Personal thoughts and voices immediately started flowing from the students, who were thrilled to make the covers entirely of their own design.
Students use old magazines and collage papers to create layers of images on their Art Journal covers.
A collaged cover at the end of Day One
While working I asked students to describe for me their thinking process:
“This is going to be dark and myseterious and the back is going to be light and colorful.” Elena
While looking for collage images: “I’m finding things I find interesting, like the car lights. I like how on one side [of the highway] they’re all red and on the other side they’re all white.” Sonia
“I like making it all colorful and different and random. That’s how I always work, with random drawings, and by scribbling.” Rosvin
At the end of each session students gather for a reflection and critique in which we discuss what we NOTICE, THINK, and WONDER. In preparation for the mural we talked about color, composition, texture, layering, and more.
Reflection and critique
On days two and three students were encouraged to use acrylic paints to layer on top of their watercolor paintings or collages they had already created.
A student uses the primaries to mix colors and paint on top of her collage.
Students were extremely proud of their journal covers and wanted to share with everyone their thoughts and ideas. During the third class the kids interviewed each other—even coming up with their own questions. Videos to come! Here’s a transcript of one of the interviews.
Sonia: So, why did you join Youth in Arts?
Kathleen: Because I always love art but I don’t have a lot of art supplies at home and my mom doesn’t like the mess so I came here and it’s really fun. I get to hang out with my friends while doing art.
Sonia: What are you painting right now?
Kathleen: I am making the back cover of my art journal right now, using collage and painting.
Sonia: And why are you painting what you’re painting?
Kathleen: Because I like having different themes on all my pages. This one is like Hawaii and this one is mainly animals and arctic things, and then here is like the sunset and African animals.
Sonia: Are you excited about painting the mural?
Kathleen: Yes, because I want to be on TV and I want to be famous, because this could be the beginning of my stardom. And we get a plaque with our names on them and so I can say I made that to my grandchildren and it’s still there.
For more blog posts on the Davidson Mural Project, click here and here.
To get involved in the project Email Mentor Artist, Brooke Toczylowski, at brooke@youthinarts.org. We are looking for volunteers to help organize, paint, provide snacks, prep boards, and more.
Youth in Arts thanks Jerry Tallman of MinuteMan Press for donating the paper utilized in the journal process here and at many other sites.
Something exciting is happening in Mill Valley! Students at Tamalpais High School are collaborating to write, direct, produce and perform their own play for the school’s Winter One Act Play Festival in January 2012.
Youth in Arts Mentor Artist Melissa Briggs is leading this joint effort between students from Mr. Lovejoy’s Marin County Office of Education (MCOE) Special Ed class and the school’s excellent Conservatory Theatre Ensemble (CTE). This arts integration program is the first of its kind in the district, created as part of YIA’s Arts Unite Us program, which aims to bridge gaps between students of differing abilities. Click to continue »
Kindergarten and 1st grade students at Short School worked with Mentor Artist Angela Baker and assistant Gracie Von Glasenapp to create a mixed media mural. Over the course of 10 weeks students worked with a variety of art media such as sharpie markers, tempera paints, watercolor and collage to explore ideas of family and neighborhood. They also developed art making skills that would contribute to the creation of a 4′X8′ collage and watercolor mural of the neighborhood surrounding Short School.
Students began by sketching family portraits which were painted in tempera paint.
On November 21 friends and families gathered to hear a reading of two plays written by students at the Novato Youth Center! First through fifth grade playwrights collaborated to write Sucked In and Sparkles and Sugar. Playwrights sat onstage in front of a packed house and watched surprise celebrity guest actors (their teachers from the center!) read their work. It was thrilling to watch the young playwrights’ faces as they experienced their own words brought to life.
Crazy creative at the Novato Youth Center!
This exciting evening was the culmination of a ten-week Youth in Arts residency at the Center. Mentor Artist Melissa Briggs led the young theatre artists as they learned the elements of theatre and playwriting through improvisation, drama games and imaginative writing. Melissa’s program (inspired by the Playmaking curriculum at the 52nd Street Project in New York City) is designed to publicly validate the children’s creativity, maximize awareness of their bodies, voices, senses and feelings, and ensure a positive experience expressing their own authentic voice.
Twelve weeks of printmaking with Mentor Artist Suzanne Joyal culminated with cookies, cider, and sharing of projects. The second- through fifth- graders in Lynwood’s after-school LEAP program began the residency by learning the fundamentals of printmaking:
Our line search turned into a MONOPRINT. Students inked their plates, then gently placed paper on top, and drew their designs onto the back of the paper.
Colographs are made up of layers of stiff paper cut or torn, and then glued into interesting patterns and shapes. Our choices of ink and paper color made the possibilities endless. Click to continue »
Subscribe to YIANews