I had the great pleasure of attending a lecture from Gary Groeneveld at teacher convention this week. A recently retired teacher from Lord Beaverbrook High School, Gary is a very talented Wildlife a Photographer. Most of his photographs are taken in Alberta. Every photo he takes, has a story behind it and it is obvious when you see his work that there is a lot of love and passion behind every photo. Gary does not just "walk out the door" and take a great nature shot- he has to know what to look for and where to find it. He has back packed for two days through the forest and slept in -20 Celsius just to "get that shot". He is patient. He watches and waits and that is what makes him so successful. I am inspired to try some nature photography this summer!
Out of My Comfort Zone
Drawing is something I don't like to do. Sure I draw things to paint, but that's where it ends. After watching a performance drawing from Zarah Abraham, I was inspired to try a self portrait in charcoal. Yikes!
I surprised myself. The process was emotional, physical, exhausting and I was completely satisfied after I had finished!
What More Can I say?
Mail Art
What do you love about where you live? Art club students made a creative postcard that I sent to Canton Ohio. It will be displayed at the Museum's World Fair Celebration Event on 2/10/2018.
"Us" by Kinga
Count your blessings, name them one by one.....
1. My Health- Last year, on this very day, I was in the hospital getting back surgery and I was still recovering from hip replacement surgery. Presently, I am fully recovered and I feel great. I will never take being able to move/walk for granted ever again!
2. My Family- They love me unconditionally! What more can I say!
3. My Friends- They have stood beside me, supported me, played with me and laughed with me!
3. My Job- I have the best job in the whole world- I actually get to teach art, create and inspire all day long!
I have a good feeling that 2018 is going to be a great year and I am super excited to live every day to it's fullest!
Double Image
I was sad that my images from the Fuji disposable underwater camera didn't turn out, so imagine my surprise when Michelle ( my swimming friend ) offered me her Olympus camera to retake my shots. They turned out amazing!( I posted them in the photography section) I printed out a few at school to show my students and then came up with an idea- what if I put the image that I had just printed back into the printer and reprinted a picture overtop of it? The results were very interesting!
It's Harder than It Looks!
Today in Art Club, we took on the challenge of learning how to do Henna Tattoo's. "Easy Peasy,"I thought to myself. Wrong! I have a new found respect for the artists that can freehand on those beautiful designs with such precision. My apologizes to Ghazal for having to have wear a shaky and blobby design for the next three weeks! Hopefully practice will make perfect:)
Western's Best Kept Secret
Today the Art Club was lucky to have a tour of the tunnels that run under our school. A hundred years of history we were able to experience and I feel that it is something the students will never forget! ( I can't give too much away of what we saw because then it would not be a secret anymore!)
Pinterest Worthy
My big plan was to take great swimming pictures of my friends at the pool last Saturday. Full disaster. The taking of the pictures was a lot of fun ,but the film from the Fugi underwater camera was terrible. The quality was terrible. No, it was not me- the pool was bright, above and below the water and I did not go deeper than 4 feet. It cost me a small fortune to develop the film and all my husband could say was, "Throw them all in the garbage"! I had to agree with him but before I could toss them, I thought that maybe I could give them a face lift. I punched hole's into one of the photo's and applied white and black marker to it. I then realized that our Art Club challenge was to take pictures through "holes" and had an epiphany! The pictures below are pictures of Kaitlyn taken through one of my swimming pictures. The effect was surprising!
Color Your World
In Art Club this week, we decided to paint each other with tempera paint and then photograph each other. We got some great shots as well had a lot of laughs!
Mama Mia!
The challenge in art club last week was to produce and photograph "Inedible Art". For the life of me I could not think of anything- luckily, I was awake at 2:00am last night and I had an epiphany! Next weeks challenge is to paint a picture using only mono chromatic colors and "Shoot One Street Corner for an Hour".
Gallery Walk
The Art Club took advantage of a beautiful day and we went on a art walk to the local galleries close to the school. The first gallery we visited was the Gibson Gallery of Fine Art- Sheila Kernan, a Calgary based Canadian artist had on a show called "The Stories We Tell". Sheila explores the Canadian landscape and cityscape genre through her abstract paintings. Her work is a mixed media that has bright colours and is highly textured with the use of oils, acrylic and watercolour. She also uses an air brush and hand created stencils to create her layers. It is obvious from viewing Sheila's work, that you can see her attempt to share her journey's with us in a unique and vibrant way, her passions and love for life!
The second gallery we visited was the Herringer Kiss Gallery-Jason Fizzell, a RDC faculty member had on a show called "Worn Out Shoes and Back Page News". Jason explores undefined narratives and uncertain relationships that are made in a 1:87 scale. His sculptural dioramas show imaginary environments and architectural spaces that explore themes of isolation, transition, denial and discovery. One of my favourite pieces was "We Dig and Fill These Holes." It is made of high density foam, paint epoxy putty and acrylic paint. You can see from the picture below, that the details were amazing and I can't even imagine how much time it took him to complete not just this piece, but his whole collection!
Of course I cannot end this without telling you what our art challenge is this week- it is to " Create and Photograph Inedible Art. It will be interesting to see what they can come up with! Enjoy the examples below!
Ghazal
One of the projects we did in Art Club today was the experiment with two different types of photography. The first one was to get the effect of our model Daniel, to look like he was underwater when really he was under a sheet of plexiglass with water squirted on the top. As you can see from the photo, I don't think I achieved the result I was looking for, but it defiantly produced an interesting shot. The second one was to take photo's using Christmas lights. I asked my beautiful, beautiful student Ghazal to pose for us- stunning!
Crystal Clear
I have a mobile that hangs in the window of my art room at home- it consists of shells, glass and crystals. The sun was shining in leaving a dazzling light on the walls of the room. What would the snowy outdoors look like through the eye of a crystal? The results were surprising!
Gainz
I finally got the chance to try silkscreening in Art Club today. I am happy and not happy with the results. My stencil turned out great but the colour not so much. I should have went with my gut feeling and added some white to the yellow to make it "pop" more. My students wanted to know why my son would want a t-shirt with a chicken/roster that had muscles. Well, the answer is simple. Eating lots of chickens and eggs gives you GAINZ!
Dirty Pour Painting
When someone firsts mentions doing a "dirty pour" you might do a double take. What exactly do they mean by that term? Why is it dirty? Do they mean that the paints are dirty colours, or that there is something "dirty" about it; like they'll be pouring paint while wearing their underwear or is it some kind of fetish painting that you don't know about? I admit when I first heard the term I did not know what to think, it didn't sound like an a attractive way to paint but I sure was intrigued and could hardly wait to try!
Dirty pour is simply a term used for mixing more than one paint colour in the same container before adding it to the canvas. The paints are mixed in serperate cups with some pouring medium and drops of alchohol. You then add two, three or four paints into one cup and pour them onto your canvas in a single puddle. The paints mix as they leave the cup blending colours and creating interesting and sometimes unexpected colours. The canvas has to be tilted back and forth to move the paint.
This amazing painting below was completed by my student Kaitlyn Popoff. She used this technique to create an abstract painting of a horse and has submitted it for the Stampede Poster Competition. If I was a judge, I would give her first place!
Longo Inspired
If your not familiar with Robert Longo, he's an American Artist who first gained widespread fame with his "Men in the Cities Series". He's gone on to do an incredible amount of impressive work, generally large-scale and done in graphite or charcoal. The story is told that Longo would hire models, ask them to dress in informal wear and throw objects at them as hard as he could. If your look at his drawings, it makes sense, right???? So, the Art Club decided to try some Longo inspired photography. We used nerf balls to throw and each student they got the chance to "dodge the ball". The results we spectacular and I could not stop laughing!
Oh What Fun!
The photography group in the Art Club did some experimenting today with open flash photography. This is a technique employing a flash fired while the camera shutter is open. Usually shutter duration is unimportant since the available light is much dimmer than the flash. The results were amazing and we plan on trying it again next week!
Mumble Tease
I spent the most amazing day learning how to do silk-screening on t-shirts with artist and Heather Reinhardt. She has been printing t-shirts for the last seven years and sells her work all over Western Canada. I might be biting off more than I can chew, but I eventually would like to introduce silk screening to my grade 12's and the Art Club. I am super excited and can hardly wait to get started!
A Beautiful Autumn Day!
Our first outing with the Art Club was a walking trip to the Glenbow Museum. Despite the fact we could not see all of the exhibits ( three new ones were opening up this weekend) we had a wonderful time!
Art Challenge for the week: Use materials from nature as your visual language.
Photo Challenge for the week: Choose to photograph things, people, or places you are grateful for.
