Hello Friends of Art with Korb! Mr. KORB welcomes you!
We have created cityscapes and interiors, portraits, and movies that are entertaining to everyone. The skills that have been learned have been many in all of the Artmaking experiences and in each class. Watercolors and markers are the heavyhitters in 6th and 7th grade so far AND we brought in watersoluable materials in the 7th grade portraits also. The use of a lot of materials is what middle school art is about. YES the products are important and so is the process (perhaps process is more important – YES – process IS more important – ALWAYS).
6th Grade has moved into the digital lab and begun working with Camp Snap Digital cameras. FOCUSING (haha) on the close up, some fun with animals and the environment, ALL of the elements (and maybe we will incorporate the principles), and approving life and photography from a different point of view. We will be making photographs for the next few days and then uploading them in the MAC lab, editing them with Apple Photos and then moving along to the next work. ALWAYS having a solid crit at the end to remind them of the successes and challenges they had.
7th graders have learned all about the soft pastel and created some wonderful landscapes or floral drawings and now have made those into soft pastel prints. We took the drawings and laid them on the 1970’s printing press, laid dampened watercolor paper over the top, and then ran it through the press. The pressure of the press and the dampness of the paper transferred the pastels (lightly) onto the watercolor paper (in reverse). This was a GREAT experience and the first time many of these kids (all of them) have been in the driver’s seat with a wheeled vehicle… maybe.
The 8th grade artists are jumping out of their skins to get a hold of clay and the potter’s wheels. THIS is the event for many of them. They have been looking at the wheels for that past 2 years and are itching to get onto them. I do not blame them, the wheel is SO COOL! We are going to be working on developing some skills in centering, opening, pulling them up, trimming, and then the hard part starts… waiting for things to dry so we can fire and glaze. We are working on a specific set of PRODUCT GOALS as well as the experience here – this is a departure from the past years. In addition to the wheel, they are ALSO going to be working on a slab built bas relief sculpture of their homes or another work of architecture. This is a challenging set of artworks for the kids and I am just about as excited as they are.
What are YOU doing in your studio?
Here are all of our Studio EXPECTATION
6th Grade: Photography
Here are the 6th-grade semester Lesson Plans to show you what our day will look like.
Photography with the Camp Snap camera allows us to make photos and not worry about the results until we upload them. This is going to be a new challenge as well while we log into the Apple Computers in the digital lab and work through Apple Photos to do our editing and uploading. This is going to be FAST and FURIOUS! Looking back at last week, the biggest challenge we had was learning our email addresses and remembering the passwords. SPACES and CAPITALIZATIONS COUNT!
This is not one of my kids works but this is the direction we are goin. Toys and putting them in a place where we could believe it is happening (right, like Darth Vader would actually push a Storm Trooper – he would use the FORCE!). One point perspective is a great use of a lot of the art vocabulary – this is another goal this year. VOCABULARY!
Here is the assignment for Photography
7th Grade: SOFT PASTELS and PRINTMAKING as we wrap up the Neurographic Portraits and Color Schemes
Here are the 7th-grade semester Lesson Plans to show you what our day will look like.
We are wrapping up the printing and the editiopning this week – mounting and naming, hanging and critiquing are all a part of the upcoming studio time. Thanks for the hard and dedicated work artists. Some colors work better than others. That’s part of the process. I think the look on the faces for some was a bit of a surprise as to how the images turnedout. I was a bit surprised as well.
What can you do with SOFT PASTELS? We are going to be working on landscapes or floral drawings and then we are going to make MONO PRINTS from them – assuming it all works for us – AND FOR THE MOST PART IT DID!
This was new to us last year and the CRAYONS did not work out (cheap and not as good as the ones I have used int he past) so we are switching to SOFT PASTELS – MUCH BETTER! We will also take a look at Wolf Kahn’s pastel works! He was a contemporary artist who did landscapes in soft pastels – the colors are great! The Soft Pastel drawings are WONDERFUL and the Printmaking comes up this week. I feel like it is going to be ONE PRINT and that’s it. This was a GREAT experience – and it CAN open up a whole new direction for the making of art.
Ok. Above is NOT one of the middle schoolers, it is Mikey one of the Waterford 7+ artists I work with over the summer. We did not make prints but we DID work with Soft Pastels and BOY oh Mikey did they do a great job! Thanks for the hard work 7th graders (and Mikey).
Soft Pastel Assignment is HERE.
What do YOU remember about Soft Pastels? Here are some techniques to explore.
8th Grade Sculpture: Wheel Throwing and Slab Building
Here are the 8th Grade Sculpture semester Lesson Plans for you to see what our day will look like.
As an artist for my entire adult life, this is what I have landed on for the past 5 years. This is how I start my day and end my day. My life and business partner do this work together and keep our little potter up and running in Korb Pottery. What the artists in the studio will be doing is the same… but maybe not as much or as large.
Starting with one pound of clay and working to pull up a cylinder is the goal. How hard can that be right? Yeah – right! The biggest challenge is going to be the centering, then the opening, then the pulling, and don’t forget to keep the arms locked and the hands in place, and don’t forget to breath. Wedging? No way am I going to try and teach that – well maybe a little. One pound of clay kids…
AND at the exact same time we are working on SLAB constructions of a work of architecture. Their homes otr another work of architecture that is important to them. Maybe I’d choose a work of Brutalist Architecture from our nation’s capital – I LOVE that work. Basic techniques will be revisited AND the work will be on their own. Solve some problems, work it out, don’t let it dry out. Ugh. All that one has to remember.
- BELOW are the ceramics assignments
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