simple perspective

In y4 today we looked at perspective. Using the simple format of a box frame with diagonal, horizontal and vertical lines we were able to create different room, land and cityscapes.

A is for ...

Penguins, polar bears and seals! Today in y3 we drew these 'cos it's been snowing and is very cold! They are also, next week, going to be starting a 'topic' all about cold places. We looked online for pictures so we could add more detail.

new book!

Have just completed the dummy rough for a follow-up to my Little Red Riding Hood book (due out in January!). This one is The Gingerbread Man as, hopefully, you can see. It follows the same concept as LRRH in that the story is told from four different points of view - all on the same page! Fingers crossed that LRRH sells phenomenally well and that the publisher will take up this one.

Fruit

In y2 today we ate apples! We also made careful observational drawings as we chomped them away!          

perspective

The y6's have been drawing cityscapes. Previously (last year!) they looked at both tonal and linear perspective and so today they moved on to draw buildings from opposite viewpoints - looking up and looking down.

A is for...

Today in 'Golden Time' ( a reward session at the end of the week that the children 'earn') we drew horses. 
They did 'before' pics ;

and then, following really simple guidelines (starting with a letter 'A'), they drew horses in various poses.   

Bear in mind that these are only thumbnail sketches and not huge.

dinosaur(2)

Another pic drawn by a y2 child yesterday. 

And almost right with the spelling!

dinosaurs

Y2 have started studying dinosaurs so of course today we used a letter 'A' to draw some!

They drew a 'before' picture at the start (top left) before following simple instructions to create lots of different dinosaur.

Some of these are detailed in my book 'A is for Art' along with step by step guides on how to draw almost anything - copies available in my Etsy and Folksy shops.

A is for...

Quick doodle for today. 

Have been thinking about the current 'craze' for adult colouring books - and wondering if perhaps there might now be more of a market for my incredibly simple, but extremely effective, drawing book ('A is for Art')?! In the past I've tried one or two publishers to little effect but have managed to sell nearly 100 copies on the internet with virtually no promotion on my part. Maybe its time to ramp up the effort as there is definitely a market out there for folk who want to improve their doodling to the point of creating recognisable images. Hmmm, food for thought.

illusions

Our Y5's are studying the physical geography of the world, so for art we've flipped the idea on its head and are going to be looking at using art to portray the world in a visually deceptive way ie. not concrete or real - think, Escher, Dali, Magritte etc.
We did lots of drawing today.

rain

Our y2's are learning about 'weather' so today we looked at several artworks. We discussed a japanese print, a Van Gogh drawing, a constable oil study and a contemporary work by Alexander Millar. From these we then had a go at drawing our own comparative pictures - one showing a fine , sunny day and one showing a miserable, grey, rainy day.

Inspired by the Millar painting ("singin' in the rain") I managed a quick doodle.

toys

Y1's theme for this term is toys. Today, using simple shapes they had a go at drawing some traditional ones.

They also added captions.

elephants

Today I showed the y3's a simple way of drawing recognisable images of elephants. They had a go first ( you might be able to spot their 'before' drawings) and then followed step by step instructions to portray elephants from the side, front and rear!

I think they managed - don't you?

Did you spot the 'A' starting points? Similar step by step guides to drawing a whole load of easily recognisable images can be found in my book - 'A is for Art' - available in my 'shops' ( shameless plug! )

doodles

Some 'bot doodles from today. They were originally done on scraps of paper which I then stuck into my sketchbook. The first one is in honour of the Mexican keeper who apparently played a blinder in the game against Brazil.

 

In this one I played around with the same pose to create two different pics.

doodle

'following the catch'

 

 

Ink & pencil in sketchbook.

3D

In y1 (5/6 year olds) today we followed up our observational drawing from last week by creating 3d drawings of vehicles. They were guided step by step and used gridded paper to help get the lines in the right places. They drew vans, buses and lorries using cubes/cuboids as basic 'building blocks'.

 

I know quite a few adults who would struggle to draw a 3d bus as good as this!

more doodles

Some more sketches. This new 'style' is evolving. I might try and paint a few pictures up if I get the time in between teaching and all of the ceramic stuff. Am seriously considering going large!

 

 

sketchz 'n doodlz

Some recent sketches. Yet another slightly different style! The 'girl' ones are possible ideas for ceramic slab sculptures where the patterns will become textures.

 

 

Mind you, the footy supporters would also look good as a sculpture!

up and running

Back at school and back into the swing of things. Have decided that this year is going to be my breakthrough year (again!)!!

This week we are drawing as a gentle lead-in to the topics/themes we will be studying over the next few weeks.

In Y4 today we sketched polar animals - using the now legendary 'A is for....' as a starting point.

Hopefully the animals depicted should be recognisable which is what we were after, rather than a photo-realistic image.

 

 

Here's hoping that everyone has a wonderfully creative year!

(Hmm, not too happy with the photo!)

we have lift off

 

A5, ink & pencil on paper.

 

 

My colleague is back at work, albeit on a phased return to work, but the day when I can get back to just teaching Art (with a bit of Design Tech thrown in) draws ever nearer! Yay!!