6/7/8s Paint Cigar Boxes

Claude Monet

Picasso's studio

Joseph Cornell

Sol LeWitt

                                                                                             Diego Rivera

 Researching in the library

 Painting on the gesso

Preparing the edges as well as the lid

 Beginning to paint

 Painting the image

After "The Scream" Edvard Munch

 A nod to Mark Rothko

From a Cezanne

Figuring out the composition

 Working from a James Whistler landscape

 Sol LeWitt hard edge painting

Looking at Picasso

What to do with stacks of lovely, empty cigar boxes? That dilemma was solved when I happened upon the work of Ray Nolin in Provincetown, Ma., who paints beautiful impressionistic landscapes on cigar boxes. The middle school students have each selected an artist to research. Their research will go in the cigar box and a work inspired by or copied from that artist will be painted in acrylics on the lid. They began the research in the library and prepared their boxes with a coat of gesso.

2/3s Make Pop-Ups

 Here's a lion taking shape

Working on a mouse in the grass

A finished dog

The 2/3s learned about cutting and folding paper to make areas pop out. They created animals with opening mouths and something inside them!

Middle School Helps Out

 Sign production

An origami lesson

The middle school students helped paint green arrows for trail markers for the upcoming 5K Trail Run and they made origami lilies for the May auction.

K/1s Make Paper Mache Birds

 Adding strips of newspaper

 Getting the shape right

Wiping the excess glue back into the container!

Covering the tails and wings

  

 Painting the nuthatch

 

painting the red-winged blackbird

Some finished birds 

 Three finished birds

The finished blue jay

To round out their knowledge of their particular birds, the K/1s sculpted them out of paper mache. The glue was gooey, but they did a great job.

K/1s Draw Birds

 The robin looking strong

Working on the chickadee

 The red-tailed hawk and the bluejay taking form

The barn swallow and the goldfinch getting finishing touches

The K/1s have begun their study of birds of the Northeast. Each student is researching a particular bird,  drawing and then sculpting it in art class.

2/3s Assemble Hudson River Book

 Gluing the fish in the river

 Adding the dragonfly

 Putting in the crayfish

Assembling the pages

Poetry, research, observational drawing and watercolors all went into the 2/3s book on the Hudson River. After months of work, the book was assembled and sent off the Scholastic in the hopes that they pick this beautiful book to be published!

4-8th Graders Begin Their Self-Portraits

 A 4/5 Portrait

Another 4/5

The fourth through eighth grade students, after several years of working on their images in the younger grades, do these portraits in colored pencil. The middle schoolers tend to use more graphite shading with just a touch of color, while the 4/5s color the whole image with colored pencil.