Chocolate Cherry on a Spoon

I have been given the honor of representing Minnesota at the NAEA Leadership conference. Jessica Jones and I are joining 150 other representatives at a National Convention of how to better run the state and local chapters by learning from each other.  The invitation was tasked with two fun activities right away.  40 gifts for the other representatives in the Western Division and a raffle gift to share with the group.  Jessica and I decided to divide and conquer. I took the mini gifts and she took the raffle.

I wanted to represent Art and Minnesota and what better way to do that then with the Cherry and the Spoon Sculpture by Oldenburg so proudly displayed in the Walker Sculpture Garden. I tried to seek candy makers to help with this task, but no luck... So I chose to take it on myself.

I looked up a lovely receipt from Taste of Lizzy T for chocolate covered cherries.  I'm not going to lie, it took me the whole day but once the cherries were done, the rest was a bit of a breeze...

I used melted chocolate on spoons my son so meticulously bent and placed the cherry's on. I had to tip the spoons up until they were cooled. They stuck... I was shocked :)

Then I packed the spoons up with a little plastic bag.

 

Finally, I signed it from us in Minnesota but did a little printmaking in the process. The spoon was carved out of an eraser, the cherry was a dab of a pencil eraser and the stem was a marker line on top.  

So, to all my new friends who got a cherry on a spoon, it was so nice to meet you and we learned a ton! Thank you. 

Clay Coil Design

The 5th-grade district standards say that we should teach coil method and most of the time, clay is the perfect medium for this. This project was created to be exploratory and students had the option to add a hole in the flat piece to hang the projects as well. They are decretive pieces that really taught a ton of skills.

Tracy Hare, our visiting Artist, had tons of pre-recorded videos and handouts to help the 5th graders understand how to create so many wonderful shapes using the coil method.  These works of art were created on a foam plate while making them, however, the end result was a variety of shapes and sizes. They only had the one hour to create with clay, so every Artist got done what they could get done.

Students were asked to decorate their fired work with oil pastel and a mixture of 1 part water and 1 part acrylic black paint. Take a look at the video to fully understand the process. The decorating of the clay works took one and a half class periods (60-minute classes). For one class... I tried it all in one day, I was rushed and short with the kids because of it. Live and learn, I would suggest all the oil pastel one day and as students are working on a second lesson, pull back small groups to add the black paint and rinse the work as it shows in the video.

I think this lesson was a hit with my 5th graders.  They seemed to really like the magic of rinsing away the black paint to reveal the color again.

To see all the lesson plans that Mrs. Hare worked on without students at Prairie View Elementary and Middle School, please click here.

Underwater Clay Sculptures

This 4th Grade, Underwater Sculpture is not nearly as amazing in the photographs as they are in real life.  I adore this project that Tracy Hare created with our students this year for Clay Week 2018. To see all the projects, please click here. 

Tracy and I are from Minnesota and both of us went to Florida for Spring break with our families (not together). She must have been inspired, and so was I. I had plans to do some observational drawing with shells and she had plans to make this sea life sculpture with our 4th grade. I was able to share my shells and some texture tools with her as she instructed this lesson plan. 

Again, the base of this project was a pinch pot... Oh, the many things you can do with a pinch pot. The additive sculpture on top was what set this work of art apart from the rest. She had them creating seashells, seaweed, starfish and even mermaids.  There was so much choice within the theme that every one of these projects looks different. 

The finishing steps were once again similar to the younger grades work, (see previous post). We used the semi-moist tempera cakes to add the color and a pearl or a glitter finish (videos can be found on the 1st and 3rd-grade clay week posts) to seal their project. The students have lot's to be proud of. The projects are turning out amazing.  

Clay Lilly Pads

It is really hard to pick a favorite with these awesome projects this year... this is just another amazing project from Tracy Hare and our 3rd grade, our Visiting Artist for the 2018 clay week, feel free to see all the projects from this year by clicking here. I'm not going to get into how this clay project was created due to the fact that I wasn't there, and it's Tracy's lesson... Let these images be an inspiration for you rather than a lesson plan. What I can share about is our finishing techniques.

We looked at some images of Monet's waterlilies to show that he doesn't always use just green when creating his painting and it would be OK if we used more colors than just green as well for our creations.

Again, we used tempera cakes, explained in the K's, 1st and 2nd-grade lessons from this year (click here). I thought it was interesting how the students used this little lily pad to express a mini ecosystem. Some just had a flower on the pad, but others placed frogs, snails, snakes, and one even had an American flag on it.  It created a lot more work for the painting, so for this project, the decorating took the whole hour.

When finished, I placed them in the mixture of 3 parts water and 1 part pearl medium. See video. 

Take a look at some of their work... 

Clay Succulent

What an awesome project!! I love succulents! Tracy added onto the skill of the pinch pot by adding a sculpture within the pot.  See the scaffolding of these lessons, shown on this blog post.  From what I understand, Mrs. Hare had students create a pinch pot.  They then rolled coils or manipulated the clay to look like succulents to put in the pot. She showed them examples of succulents and showed techniques, but I think students also developed their own style when given the chance to design their clay plant. 

This was the only project that I glazed this year with the kids... and really, only part of the project was glazed.  I had the students only add glazed to the 'pot' portion of the plant. This did not take the whole hour so I had the students do an observational drawing with their plants when they were done. I only have one color of glaze for each class. This allowed me to separate the classes from each other. The glaze gave a different texture and feel compared to the plant, and this just furthered the illusion of an actual plant. 

Students used semi-most tempera cakes for the plants. I wish I would have pulled these out earlier.  I found them to be less chalky when dried than the other tempera cakes I used with the 1st and second grade (see the previous post). As I had done with some of the other projects, I gave it a quick dip in a bath to help seal it.  I used 3 parts water and one part pearl medium (or thereabouts).

These plants are adorable and I couldn't wait to send them home with students to share with their families.

To see what other projects PVEMS created with our visiting Artist, Tracy Hare during Clay Week 2018, please see this previous post.