Drawing
September Instruction: All students have ongoing assignments in drawing with letters, line, shape, texture and special projects.
October instruction: Learning about drawing in the previous month, students completed a range of projects
involving the art elements of line, shape, texture, pattern and the illusion of 3-dimensional space depicted on a flat surface.
October units are using all the above concepts and skills to learn about Renaissance perspective, landscape drawing and
imaginative semi-abstract drawings. The delineation of representational forms will be introduced in conceptual forms (ie: cartooning etc)
and then in perceptually based, studio drawing activities (ie: object drawing, landscape drawing).
Painting
Painting class features several units throughout semester 3 and 4.
The initial assignments deal with using limited color selections of 2, 4 and 6 colors
using the elements of line and shape with the chosen colors..
Basic color theory outlines the relationships of contrast and harmony between primary, secondary and tertiary colors.
Digital Photography
January Instruction: Exploring the controls of digital cameras as a primary lesson leads to students
downloading 1st day photographs to their server accounts, flashdrives and other storage
devices. From there Adobe Photoshop Elements is explored as an image editing and creation software.
Alexis Vallaincourt
Rebecca Stone Julia Finkle
Photography
September Instruction: All students have ongoing assignments in photographic drawing, photogram creation and critical analysis papers on photograms. Pinhole photography begins the 18th.
October instruction: Pinhole photography has concluded and was exciting and dynamic. Students made a variety of photographs while learning how to
manage exposure times and lighting contexts in order to create photographs using only a cardboard box and a pinhole aperture made from a soda can.
On the 10th we began our introduction to 35 mm slr cameras. Learning all the parts of the single lens reflex camera is the springboard experience in this unit with the main emphasis placed on acquiring the ability to understand and use the exposure meter in the slr camera to create photographs with balanced exposures. Students are asked to bring in lab material fees so that they can get their film and photopaper as soon as possible.
Students will learn to mix chemical solutions in order to process basic black and white silver gelatin 35 millimeter film so they may print their own
pictures.
Graphic Design
September Instruction: All students have ongoing assignments in calligraphy, researching aphorisms, and constructing collages from magazines using themes they pick (ie: sports, food, etc.)
October instruction: Abstract art and the art history of artist Piet Mondrian are being explored by students to learn about the influence of modernity
on the fields of fine art and graphic design. Mondrian was influenced by the Impressionist painters and by the work of the great painter,
Pablo Picasso. Mondrian's art and influence have had a major impact on all aspects of visual culture in Western Society since the early part of the 20th century. Students have created monochromatic and polychromatic abstractions using Mondrian as a reference point. These moderninst
painting conceptions are being integrated into typographic and hand-drawn word illustrations expressing the meaning and feeling of a word as interpreted and expressed creatively by individual students. Theories of semiotics and signs and symbols via the ideas of Charles Sanders Pierce are being integrated into students' understanding of meaning in visual communication to complete the word illustration projects.
Introduction to Fine Arts
September Instruction: All students have ongoing assignments in written comparative analysis papers of Native American Pictograms in contrast to their own picture stories. All students are urged to find and imagine interesting ideas for creating "ancient rock art" from carved foam.
All students are instructed to bring to class any images of animals they like. One student mentioned scorpions.
Students will be using these images to create a "totem animal" drawing.
October instruction: Students are concluding foam carving and faux rock painting textures on their "cave art sculptures". A variety of images have been created including an elephant, hand axes, a deer head and a six rawhide string "rock" guitar.
Concepts of cave culture are explored around prehistoric perceptions of the meaning and values of animals and how art was used 30,000 years ago to communicate about these realities.
Students all chose "totem" animals with symbolic meanings and are using a variety of art skills to compose a 12" by 18" painting which integrates cave culture ideas, patterning, representational forms of animals using design and drawing skills, and watercolor techniques. After this project, students will be introduced to the art and culture of Ancient Egypt including such notable personages as King Tutenkamen and his funerary architecture.
School Publications Class
Creation of the Yearbook is the central learning theme of this class. Areas of instruction include
all tasks (graphic design, photography, writing, typography, sales, business management, technology)
connected to producing this popular high school publication.
At the beginning of the year in the Fall, the emphasis is on:
1) organizing and implementing the business of the yearbook,
2) creating and acquiring photographs
3) developing and implementing marketing strategies
September activities: students organized sales strategies and presentations and began selling advertising.
Photography responsibilities involved studying and using digital cameras. Students have begun to create
photographs for sections of the yearbook beginning with student life and athletics.
October activities:
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