Art Clast 4 – BBC News School Report – Music Special

BBC School Report Day

Well, it’s BBC School Report Day, the Art Clast podcast team created a report for the event, though they were let down by poor correspondence from the BBC and the linking and broadcast of the report was not completed. It’s such a pity, as the report is one of the few that would have focused on how young people perceive art and culture around them. You can watch the report on Youtube  below.

With/Without

The above video is the final edit for Notre Dame High School’s entry into the Young Brits at Art competition. The film is based on the competition’s theme ‘a world without prejudice’. The film has had to go through several edits to make it suitable for myself, the school and the competition, though I’m really happy with how it’s turned out. The most exciting thing for me is the music created by Rosie B and Rachel W who actually win my ‘Artwork of the week’ this week. Their improvised score really is a work of art. It suits the feeling and mood of the short film and fits into the intro and credits perfectly.

The Destruction Of The Poppies

This week’s ‘Artwork of the Week’ is not from a secondary school pupil or even a teacher, in fact, it’s from three primary school pupils. Josh K, Bismah H and John M (P7 from St Paul’s) have been working on their stop animation set and characters based around WWII and the ‘folly’ of war. The idea involves a stomping Hitler bringing destruction to a beautiful field. Hitler will walk across the landscape changing it from green fields and blue skies to rubble and dust.

The P7 A & B classes have been working on creating posters and short films that reflect upon the war as well as teach us a lesson to never let it happen again. It’s a great project to be involved in.

The Primary Teachers have brought their animations and their assistance to St Paul’s to let the pupils have a try at making and editing a short, and looking at some of the sets and characters, they could well better their teachers’ attempt.

Table Numbers

I’ve been working on a nice set of artist/painter table numbers for my classroom. Table numbers help pupils remember where they first sit when starting a new class, they also help when allocating materials (especially dangerous items like sharp scissors or scalpels). Table numbers help keep the classroom organised, help you learn pupil’s names and help teachers, who may have to take over your class when you are off, allocate materials and be aware of where pupils are suppose to sit.

These table numbers will not only brighten up a classroom, but they can also be used for quizzes about the artists, a resource for the artist, the style or elements of the work and will help pupils become familiar with each artist name/style/image.

I advise printing the images out full size (A4) and in full colour. I would trim each artist number square out, leaving whatever space around you desire and then laminate the squares in fours leaving space around each. Trimming and then laminating will seal the edges and corners of the number for longer lasting life. Numbers should then either be temporarily blu-taced to the tables or fixed more permanently with double sided sticky tape.

The table number sheets can be downloaded from ‘The Box’ app which is featured at the bottom of the right-hand column.

Warmonger

Assisting Primary School Teaching Students through their design unit, I was asked to fulfill the brief of not only creating a short stop animation, but also designing a poster portraying the folly of war.

I had come up with several ideas centering around the idea of ‘your country needs you’ etc, though I was really interested in Russian propaganda posters and also portraying actual facts. My idea was to show that the scale of wars was getting larger and more incomprehensible as we move forward. Technology and military progression has meant that war has become ridiculously easy.

After researching the death count that occurred in each of the World Wars, I had decided that I was going to create a disturbing bar chart made with human bodies, though an idea popped into my head; are the size of weapons relevant to the amount of casualties or deaths that were produced?

Below you will see the final production for my ‘folly of war’ poster design.

The Wonder Of Brooks

The self proclaimed ‘Artist Extraordinaire’ and quite rightly too, Mrs Brooks is a Virginian Elementary school teacher who moderates the blog Wonder Brooks. Her writing style is friendly and involving and I couldn’t help but browse through most of her blog, each post seemed to invite me in to read it. There’s a great range of diversity with some lovely unit examples from pupils including those you see posted. Check it out and maybe even bookmark her, you’ll want to keep going back.

Primary Examples Of WWII Animations

This week I’ve had the chance to work with a group of enthusiastic Primary School Teaching Students. Their project of work involves making an exemplar World War II animation aimed towards P7 pupils and to arrange a unit of work around it for teaching in class.

It’s interesting to see the differences between the Primary and Secondary levels in teaching. Secondary School Teachers are required to be specific and a master in their field, Primary Teachers are required to be good at everything, which can be stressful, I’m sure. So, I was surprised at the overall standard of artistic skill among the teachers.

Above, a train collage is trimmed from sugar paper, details are added with a fine black pen. Below, a queuing man is sculpted in plastercine, storyboarding panels can be seen behind the figure.

Above, a well dressed girl is created from a pipe cleaners wire frame surrounded by modelling clay. Below, a similarly dressed girl is created from the top down.

Below, Two great examples of background creation using printouts and paints.

These were elements created within a 3 hour crash course to stop animation, they are aimed towards a primary level and remain unfinished, though the storyboards, characters and scenery being developed looks very promising and I can’t wait to see the next stages.

Sharing At Halloween

I share all my stuff day after day, the blog is so close to receiving 10,000 hits and being a year old, I feel it’s about time I got something back. I would like photos of your carved pumpkins, your costumes or your Halloween Art to feature on the site. Is it so much to ask? No… So Email them, comment link them or Twitter them to me and share a little over Halloween. (Yes, that is my pumpkin eating an orange.)

Perfect For Halloween – Pupil Horror Film

What better way is there to celebrate Halloween than to watch to the Pupil horror film, putting you in the mood for the weekend. You will never look at school or your classmates the same way again. (WARNING: Not suitable for young children, contains scary moments, flashing imagery and blood and gore)