Patriotic Preview and X-man's Milestone!

"The End" of Alexander's First 18 Months  6/22/12

Someone turned 18 months on Thursday, 6/22/12.  Usually I take a little tush picture on their first birthday, but Alexander's first birthday was first spent on a plane. Then at Grammy's house in Idaho. Then at a birthday pizza dinner. Then back at Grammy's. Then in the car on the way to Wyoming. Suffice it to say, I forgot to get the traditional first birthday tush shot that the other two received. What's worse is I FORGOT I didn't get the tush shot until a couple of months later. So we now have the Alexander 18-Month Tush Shot to celebrate "The End" of his first 18 months.

Loves to put things on his head! 6/25/12

He is a silly one. Loves to dance. Loves to put things on his head. Here is link to his dancing just earlier this week. We can't get enough of him. His laugh is infectious. His personality is so sharp and he notices everything. I can't imagine life without him. Even if we still do get less sleep. Yes, for an 18 month old, he's not following the sleeping "rules". We're still in the kind of sleep patterns of younger babies. But he's cute, so those are the kinds of antics he gets away with!

Patriotic Preview

Moving on to art, tomorrow we'll work on and some will finish the "Three Musicians" project. Next, we look at Jasper Johns.  He is an American artist, who at the time of this entry is still with us and is 82 years old. In 1958, he completed "Three Flags". This is what we're using as inspiration for our project this week. 

However, we're taking what we've learned in this session and combining it.  The first flag (big flag) will be in the form of collage. The one after that (medium flag) will be in watercolor. Watercolor techniques are encouraged as are usage of watercolor pencils and/or watercolor crayons. The small flag is to be done with whatever style or technique the student chooses.

Here is Mikelle's project. She chose marker and pen for her top layer flag. And those back wavy lines on the small flag? Those are courtesy of our X-man.

The steps include making sure you have the right paper for three sizes. Below is a standard piece of white 9x18 construction paper, watercolor paper that is about 9x12 (give or take) and the small piece can be watercolor paper as well. If the artist knows they won't be using watercolor techniques, a standard piece of drawing or construction paper is okay.

Since the first and second flags will be covered up, keep that in mind when working on those steps. Don't put a lot of work into areas that won't be seen. Some overlapping into the "no view" zone is fine, but keep the detail in the areas that will be seen.  A blurry example of my collage below:

For the "medium flag" with watercolor, I'm doing the "plastic wrap technique".  I'll show it to the students and they can use it if there is enough time for the technique to work. That technique requires extra "down time". 

After you put in your color (combinations of colors are encouraged, so since it's the blue portion of the flag, I used lights and dark blues and little blue/violets) , apply an amount of plastic wrap (saran wrap) to the area, and then put a heavy book on top of it. 

 After a couple hours (but if you have all night, that's the ideal time to ensure enough time has passed), take the book off and pull off the plastic wrap.

Since my camera (our Plan B camera) isn't showing it very well, here is an example of how the saran wrap technique looks after you peel it off:

I think I'll use some of my pen and ink doodle techniques for my third and small flag. It isn't finished yet, so we'll see how it turns out! 

As for my two young "beginner" students. I think the above project will be better received if I keep the collage to a simple "one flag" project like I did for my students at this time last year.

American Flag Collage - 8 Year Old Student July 2011

Awesome art to be created this week! I can't wait!