Magazine Dogs

These dogs were inspired by artist George Rodrigue, who is famous for his Blue Dog painting.  They are also inspired by Samuel Price an artist who uses magazine pieces to produce the most amazing dog artworks.

We started this lesson when all the magazines were out for our magazine fish artworks.

What you need:

• Old Magazines to cut up
• Glue
• Scissors
• Black oil pastel
• Paints
• White A3 paper

 How to:

• Speak about both artists
• Read George's book "Why is Blue Dog Blue?"
• Draw the dog in black oil pastel (I had a handout to help them draw blue dog if they were a little stuck)
• Choose what colour the dog is going to be and start ripping / cutting up magazine pieces in that colour and gluing onto the dog.  
• If the child is finding it hard to get enough pieces to "fill" their dogs with magazine pieces I gave them the option of using paint to fill in the remaining white bits.
• They had the choice of doing the background with paint or more magazine pieces

The Results:

Cheers
Fiona

Near and Far Houses

This was a lesson I learned as part of my e course with Deep Space Sparkle  a few years back.

It was a great lesson to have on hand as it further illustrated what the children had just learned in our Poppy Field Paintings.   Objects that are close to you are large.  Objects that are far away from you are small.  As an object gets further away it gets smaller and smaller.  We applied the same technique we used for poppies to houses.

What you need:

• A3 white paper
• Tempera cake paints
• Black oil pastels

How To:

• Draw three houses getting smaller as they get further away with the black oil pastel
• Paint

The Results:

Cheers
Fiona

Painted Fields of Poppies

These lovely fields of poppies artworks were inspired by these two paintings:

Van Gogh:


Monet:
 

At the start of the lesson we talked about the artists and their style of painting.

As always I had to do a search for other art lessons on poppy fields and I really liked the one by Splats, Scraps and Glue Blobs so this lesson also took inspiration from their lesson.  Thank you!

I like to mix up materials as much as possible during the term so for these paintings we used Canvas Paper (I like the Monte Marte one) that I taped to pieces of MDF.  The texture of the paper also adds to the lovely final product. It's not evident from the photos below yet by taping around the paper the final product has a white frame which looks great.

I'm really happy with how these worked out and I'm going to frame my children's for sure.

What you need:

• Canvas paper taped onto wooden boards (you could use normal paper instead)
• 3 different Green acrylic paints
• 3 different Blue acrylic paints
• White, Yellow, Red and Black acrylic paint
• Paint brushes
• Oil Pastels
• Photographs of real poppies and poppy fields

How To:

We worked on these over three weeks, doing just a little each time.

Week 1: 

• Ask the children to draw a horizon line across the paper about one third down.
• Paint the grass making sure they use all three greens (grass is painted vertically)
• Paint the sky making sure they use all three blues (sky is painted horizontally)
• Paint in clouds using the white paint
• Paint in yellow flowers using the yellow paint

Week 2:

• Using oil pastels (I had three green and three different blues again) ask the children to add further lines to their works remembering that the grass runs vertically and the sky runs horizontally.
• They could also use white and yellow pastels to add more clouds or yellow flowers
• Using the red paint,  paint in the poppies (We practised drawing poppies using perspective with the big ones at the front and the little ones at the back in our visual diaries first).
• Using the black paint,  paint in the middles of the poppies

Week 3:

• Using oil pastels again add highlights to the poppies using red and orange 
• Add yellow centres to the poppies or anything else that is missing

The Results:
Stunning!

Cheers
Fiona

Paint and Oil Pastel Jellyfish

These are inspired by this pin.  Thank goodness for Pinterest hey?  I think that sentence is how I've started my last three posts.  Not that I'm a Pinterest junkie or anything (ahem....).

What you need:

• White A3 paper
• Cool Colour Paints (I just used a set of 6 cool colour Tempera cakes that I have)
• Big Paintbrushes
• Oil Pastels (ensure there is white)

How To:

• I asked them to paint their backgrounds by using every colour in the paint pan.  This ensured there was a mix of colour in the background.
• Leave to dry (we left it to the next week)
• Draw on jellyfish using a white oil pastel 
• Use coloured oil pastels for further details if they wish

The Results:

Jellyfish can be so pretty....

If you have any children away for week one when you paint the backgrounds, this lesson also works really well on black paper - check this one out:

Cheers
Fiona

Oil Pastel Bubbles

 There have been a few pins floating around Pinterest lately with bubble pictures.  See here and here and here

They look great and what an excuse to have some fun with bubbles before class!   I also used this lesson as the perfect excuse to buy a bubble machine and bubble gun...we are all children at heart!  I'm trying to keep them for myself yet my children seem to want them too!

What you need:

• Black Paper
• Oil Pastels
• Lids of different sizes

How To:

• Blow / use machine to produce bubbles and get the children to observe them (not pop or chase or bump into them....good luck with that!).  Ask them what colours do they see? Are they all the same size? Are some joined together? Can you see where the sun hits them? Can you see through them? Do they all have the same colours? 
• Then ask the children to trace the lids with a white oil pastel.  Encourage them to do some half off the page, some overlapping and to use different sizes.
• Add colour with coloured oil pastels

The Results:

Bubbles are so cool!

Cheers
Fiona

Easter Holiday Challenge

I can't let a holidays go past without a challenge these days.  It breaks my heart to think of my little artists missing out on art class and not creating for 2 whole weeks....

So with the shops full of these cute little chicks:

The challenge hatched from an egg (or my head so to speak..).  This challenge is open to all existing students of Sunnyside Art House.

SUNNYSIDE ART HOUSE – EASTER HOLIDAY CHALLENGE

Keep creating these school holidays by entering the Sunnyside Art House Easter Holiday Challenge……

All you need to do is create a piece of artwork that involves your Easter Chick (I attached those cute little guys above to the top of the challenge page)

Some ideas are:

•  Do a drawing and glue your Easter chick into the scene 
• Make a nest or home for your chick out of recycled materials
• Use items from nature to make your Easter chick a home
• Use your Easter chick as a drawing prompt and do a painting of him / her 
•  Use plasticine or clay to make a scene for your Easter chick or make him / her some new friends
• Finger knit a scarf for your Easter Chick 
•  Use material scraps for a nest, clothes, blanket for your Easter Chick
•  Draw, make or decorate the Egg that your Easter Chick came from

Let your imagination go wild and think up other ideas.  

A mini chocolate Easter egg for everyone who enters and there will be prizes for the three best entries.

Here are a few quotes to inspire you:

Creativity is inventing, experimenting, growing, taking risks, breaking rules, making mistakes and having fun – Mary Lou Cook.

Art is not what you see, but what you make others see – Edgar Degas

I dream my painting and then I paint my dream – Vincent Van Gogh

Art is as natural as sunshine and as vital as Nourishment – Mary Ann Kohl

Have a great creative, relaxing holidays!

Cheers

Fiona

Magazine Fish

This lesson was inspired by this pin I viewed on Pinterest.




What you need:

• Tempera paint in light and dark green, light and dark blue, yellow and red (in squeeze bottles - I use recycled tomato sauce bottles)
• White A3 paper
• Magazines
• Glue
• Scissors

How To:

• Ask each child to draw a horizon line along the top of their page
• Go around and squeeze the blues and greens onto the bottom half of the page in squiggles
• Ask them to paint these around not mixing them too much (this was a great way to ensure they had a variety of colours in the sea and it was exciting for them as we had not painted this way before)
• Repeat the previous step with the yellow and red on the top part
• Leave to dry 
• The following lesson have a good stack of old magazines available and ask them to cut out fish and sailboats to add to their pictures.  I also had out some oil pastels and black markers.

The Results:

The children really seemed to enjoy cutting the fish out of the magazines.  Most were food magazines so I think they were all a little hungry at the end of it (me too..)  See if you can spot the flower fish, the parrot fish, a chocolate fish and a car fish.....

ChCheers
Fiona

Mini Mosaic Stars and Flowers

My Monday art class had a lovely excursion down to the Patterson Station Mosaics on the first lesson of the year.  There is a wonderful display of over 650 mosaic faces that were created and /or coordinated by Pamela Irving, a local mosaic artist.  We are very lucky to have the mosaics and Pamela's gallery just a short walk from the studio.  We were also very fortunate that Pamela was able to meet us at her studio and show us around.  She was our artist of the week the first week of term and it was so wonderful to actually meet the artist in the flesh!

With mosaics on the mind I decided that each child should do a small mosaic.

What you need:

• Plywood cutouts (I purchased them at Bunnings Warehouse)
• Small mosaic tiles (purchased online and some at Bunnings Warehouse) and glass gems (from discount shops)
• PVA or Weldbond glue
• Grout (I used black - a messy choice I had black nails for weeks yet I do quite like the result)

How to:

• Drill hole in wood for hanging
• Glue on tiles
• Let dry
• Grout
• Attach ribbon

The Results:

A pile of pretty mosaics ready for ribbons and hanging

Cheers
Fiona

Mix it Up!

When I first saw the book "Mix it Up" by Herve Tullet I knew I just had to base a lesson on it.  It is so addictive and fun and perfect to teach colour theory.  I had planned a different colour theory lesson yet then I purchased this book and was running this lesson the very next week.

If you haven't heard of Herve Tullet, he is a French author, illustrator and artist who has written over 60 children's books.  His best known one here in Australia is "Press Here". His books are very interactive with the reader.



The kids really seemed to enjoy this lesson as it was lots of smudging colours together (no paintbrushes) and it was a little messy...

We just followed the book page by page...

What you need:

• Paint (we used Tempera) in Blue, Yellow, Red, White and Black 
• Additional paint colours for final page (they could make their own yet it was easy to just give them a lid with all the colours on it)
• Lots of Paper (I just used A4 office paper)
• Wash cloth for each child

How To:

• I didn't read the book to them first as I didn't want them to have the answers. 
• We just started on the first page and went from there.  
• The first page asks them to tap on a grey spot so I got them to tap on an imaginary grey dot on the desk in front of them.
• We kept tapping until we got to the magic hand page.
• They put their own hand on a piece of white paper, traced around it and cut it out.
• This "magic hand" sat next to them for the rest of the lesson
•  I then handed out the paint on lids with a blob of each of the primary colours
• Each child also got a wash cloth to clean their finger with after dipping it in each colour
• From here we just followed the book page by page, making a few small variations if required.
• The children put each page created on the drying rack with their name on it and then grabbed the next piece from a pile on the bench.
• Once it got to the adding white or black, I walked around and added a small squirt of colour to their lids.
• The final page was made by using the additional colours to add fingerprints all over a page and then they glued their "magic hand" on top.
• They also created a front cover for their books
• When all the pages were dry I assembled them in order and stapled down the side, creating a personalised "Mix it Up" book for each child to take home.

 Here is an example of one of the books:

Colour theory at its best.

Cheers
Fiona