Art Newsletter
Mrs. Powell’s Art
Goals:
 The student will develop her/his awareness
of & skill in a variety of
media and techniques.
 The student will
explore God and faith
through art making and
art-related discussions.
 The student will engage
art history in order to
become an informed
art viewer and maker.
SilverGraphics
Fundraiser
With your overwhelming support, we raised
$2500 to buy a kiln
and kickstart the clay
program at Eden! I am
so thankful for the
support the Eden families have offered the
art department and I
believe this will be an
excellent investment in
your children's artistic
education.
2015-2016
Eden Christian Academy
PreK4 Builds a Strong Foundation
Over the course of the
year in art class, I will
introduce the four-year
-olds to the Elements
of Art: line, shape,
color, form, and texture. These are the
building blocks of art,
so they are the ideal
place to begin in PreK.
Preschoolers explored
shape and color by
creating Secret Shape
Paintings. First we re-
viewed all the shapes
we knew and practiced
making shapes with our
bodies. Then we drew
“secret shapes” on watercolor paper with
white oil pastel. When
the students
painted with
watercolors,
the shapes
appeared!
painting provided an
opportunity for the 4yr-olds to explore different media and ideas
through artistic practice.
This oil pastel resist
Mondrian in Kindergarten
Mondrian, an early
20th century artist,
believed that painting
should be composed of
the most fundamental
aspects of line and
color-- straight vertical and horizontal
lines and the primary
colors with white and
black. The kindergarteners created
Mondrian– inspired
paper collages. In
addition to learning
about Mondrian’s
use of line and color,
we practiced good
craftsmanship by using the right amount
of Elmers glue-- Dot,
dot, not a lot!
Art Newsletter
For we are what God
has made us,
created in Christ
for good works,
which God prepared
beforehand to be our
way of life.
First Grade Paint like Kandinsky
After looking at the
work of Vassily Kandinsky, the first graders discussed how
Kandinsky believed that
music could elicit an
emotional response. He
believed art could also
make people feel emotions. Kandinsky
thought that because of
this emotional response,
art and music had the
power to connect painters and viewers to
God.
to a loud, fast, intense
song and we moved our
brush quickly with jagged motions. Painting
to music produced two
very different paintings
even though we just
painted black lines both
times. The next class
we added COOL
To make these paintings
we listened to two
songs from Wagner’s
opera, Lohengrin
(1850). Kandinsky said
this opera inspired him
to become a
painter. The first song
we listened to was slow
and calm, so we moved
our brush slowly and
smoothly in swirly
lines on the paper. Then we listened
Ephesians 2:10
Second Grade Parfleches
Page 2
A parfleche is a rawhide
carrying case decorated
with geometric designs.
These “suitcases” were
made and used by nomadic Plains Indians to
hold clothing, valuables,
personal items and
tools. This lesson connected with the 2nd
grade core curriculum in
two ways. It relates to
the Native American
Unit in Social Studies
and to the math curriculum through an emphasis on symmetry.
COLORS (blue, purple,
green) to our paintings
from the first song and
added WARM COLORS (red, orange yellow) to our paintings
from the second song to
evoke the emotions we
felt during those songs.
Eden Christian Academy
Fourth Grade Designers
The fourth graders are
delving into graphic design by studying what
makes a logo effective. It
should be simple, memorable, timeless, appropriate, versatile, and unique,
and they evaluated familiar logos with these criteria. With this in mind,
they are inventing their
own drink brand– considering everything from the
flavor and ingredients to
the market/audience and
logo. They will create
their drink logo and
adhere it to a pop can
along with the nutrition
facts and a bar code.
They are almost ready
to hit the shelves! Not
only is this a fun, creative
project, it also introduces
students to a possible art
career field.
Third and Fifth Grade Illuminators
Illuminated manuscripts
were magnificently
decorated books that
brought beauty, light,
and understanding to
the words of God,
translating the powerful
life-giving words into
splendid visual forms.
Borrowing from the Medieval tradition of manuscript painting, the third
and fifth graders tried
their hand at illumination.
work of art is a whole
page dedicated to the
name of Jesus!
The third graders focused on the oversized
letters ornately decorated in Medieval gospel
books. One of the most
intricate (and most famous) is found on the
Chi-Rho page of the
Book of Kells. This
The third graders chose
an initial and illuminated
it with interlace– a knotted or wrapped pattern
of lines common in Medieval art– and other
designs. They added
color with watercolor
pencils.
The fifth graders selected a scripture from
their memory verse
and illuminated their
chosen verse. The students developed skills in
graphic design by laying
out their page and verse
using Google Drawing,
then they used colored
pencils and metallic
paint markers to add
brilliant color.
Art is much less
important than life,
but what a poor
life without it. Robert Motherwell
Page 3
Sixth Grade Photographers
Kate Powell
Visual Arts Educator
E-mail: [email protected]
Photography is an everyday part of most of our
lives. We are bombarded with selfies, cat
pictures and celebrity
photos. But having a
camera phone does not
a photographer make,
so the sixth graders are
doing a photography
unit this year.
We started off by debating whether photography is an art or a science. One insightful student explained the relationship by saying photography is “art through
the medium of science;”
it uses technology to
create art. From there
we moved on to the
question of whether
photographs capture
reality. Through a lively
debate we came to the
conclusion that a photograph represents one
person’s viewpoint of
reality. These discussions required some
serious and exciting
critical thinking!
Our first shoot focused
on camera angle. I gave
the students iPads and
we went out to take
photos of something
familiar, like the playground. By capturing
images from unexpected
camera angles, the students explored the way
viewpoint alters our
perspective of the
world.
Photograph by Isaac Wick
Art Explorations
My goal with this elective art class is to provide unique, engaging
artistic experiences for
students who want to
make art.
One of these experiences is silkscreen printing. Most students wear
silkscreened t-shirts, so
this project connects
their everyday life to an
artform practiced by
many artists, including
nun and screenprinter,
Corita Kent.
Students will work in
groups to create a se-
ries of silkscreen prints.
Each group will design a
set of stencils for an image which they will print
together. Each student
will also print their design on a t-shirt and
leave with some wearable art!
CORITA KENT,
only you and I, 1969