Art Fair Sneak Preview

Our first annual Student Art Fair is coming up on Thursday, December 8th. We have been hard at work on many truly amazing projects. This week, we are putting the finishing touches on our "masterpieces" and I couldn't wait to share what we have been creating. I hope to see all of our SGP families in attendance for this wonderful celebration of art!


Pre-K has been working on a Family Portrait. First, the students drew a simple line drawing of their family. I let them spend quite a long time on the drawing piece to ensure they included lots of details. They were very engaged as they worked to draw their family portraits. Finally, we did a color mixing wash on top of the line drawing using two primary colors to attempt to create some secondary colors on the works.

Kindergarten created these adorable hand flower gardens. Students traced their hands three times at various heights on the page and colored them in with oil pastels. We then drew white clouds and did blue watercolor washes for the sky. I love the colors and variety of patterns the students came up with as they worked. 

First grade learned about artist Gustav Klimt (1862-1918). We learned that Klimt was well-known for realistic portraits of people set against highly patterned warm colored backgrounds. The students drew a self-portrait and a portrait of their best friend. We then created a patterned background in Klimt's style and added warm and metallic watercolor washes on top of the drawn pattern design. Finally, students added color to the people with colored pencil and watercolor markers. 

Second grade worked on their own versions of The Starry Night (1889) by Vincent Van Gogh. These were drawn with oil pastel on black paper. We typically do not do too much line-by-line kinds of drawings, but because of the complexity of this work, the tree and swirling sky were drawn together. The rest of the composition was done by the students after watching a demonstration, including the village and the stars. These are simply amazing works from our second graders!

Third grade learned about Spanish abstract painter Joan Miro (1893-1983) and created these wonderful abstract fantasy multimedia pieces using some of his symbolism merged with their own unique style. First, students created pencil sketches of their design. We washed the background with watercolor and when dry, traced on top with permanent marker. Students then filled in the shapes with acrylic paint and when dry, we used metallic crayons and markers to add some shine. These came out so great!

Fourth grade created these awesome abstract controlled scribble resist paintings. First, students created a controlled (slow) scribble and filled it in with patterns in various areas. They then chose a palette to work with--either warm or cool colors--to paint over their drawings to create a resist. They were instructed to choose the opposite palette for the background. When dry, students drew some minimalist designs on the background with metallic crayon and then cut and glued the scribble resist on top. We glued them a little bit raised from the surface to really make them pop. I love the colors and lines in all of these pieces! So much movement and rhythm. 

Fifth grade learned about artist Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997), American Pop Artist and creator of comic book style paintings. They then created these awesome "halftone print" self-portraits. First, students drew themselves with pencil after a lesson on using a grid to draw a face. They were to choose a sentence to include in their speech bubble about themselves. We then traced everything with permanent marker and used primary colored markers to create halftone dots and solid blocks of color to fill everything in. Finally, we did a simple watercolor wash in the background to really make the colors come forward. I love the personality in these pieces!

*We are working with Kids Art Fairs to sponsor our art night. They really make things so easy for art teachers to create a framed and matted display of student work. They provided a few of the above art lessons (but bear in mind, I cannot help but tweak and adjust to suit my own students). Kids Art Fairs even brings an art supply store to your campus the night of the event, all at no cost to your school. It is a great fundraiser! Please click here if you would like more information. Both of our art programs receive free student art supplies for referrals, so please let them know I sent you.