Spotlight: Favorite Visual Art Residency Projects

Four Favorite Art Lessons from Young Audiences Teaching Artists

Calder Sculptures, Stacie Greene

Learning Objective:Differentiating between freeform and geometric shapes, use those shapes to build a freestanding sculpture.

Brief Description: Looking at examples of Calder’s Stables, discuss what a sculpture is. Talk about geometric shapes vs freeform shapes. Have the students draw 3 freeform shapes and 3 geometric shapes on a sheet of card stock. Cut out the shapes and assemble into a sculpture.

Teaching Artist Response: This project is one of my favorites. The students continue to surprise me with their creativity. It is exiting to watch them get frustrated, not give up and solve the problem. They get so excited. The classroom teachers have also been inspired by the project and start thinking of ways to repeat it as an extension to their lessons.  

Starry Night and Sunny Day, Leo Francisco

Learning Objective: Painting

Brieft Description: Students create their own versions of Van Gogh's Starry Night.  Some classes made two 9x12 pieces: Starry Night one week, and Sunny Day in the next. Other classes made a 12x18 Starry Night piece in two weeks. 

Teaching Artist Response: Olivewood Elementary's grade 3 teachers were very interested in having students make a painting. I was a bit apprehensive as I am more comfortable with dry media and I considered the additional material management (brushes, paint trays, paint, the greater risk for mess, the clean up, ugh).  I was happy to come up with a concise lesson plan that addressed my challenges and resulted in proud artists with beautiful paintings.

Geometric Solids, Leo Francisco

Learning Objective: practice and application of 3D shapes in a drawing


Brief Description: A one-class introduction to drawing 3-dimensional shapes (Grade 3 Geometry standards). In the first half, students practiced spheres, rectangular prisms, cylinders, and cones, and discussed characteristic shape qualities (vertices, edges, faces). In the second half, students applied these forms in drawing Pinocchio. In some classes, we added extra details, transforming our subject into the Tin Man.

Teaching Artist Response: Teachers appreciated the creative application of math lessons. I loved hearing students respond to their own artwork. One commented with sparks in his eyes, "Ahhhh, It looks REAL."

Sculptural and/or Functional Clay Project (2^nd & 3^rd grade), Christina Thurston

Learning Objective: Students solve complex, open-ended problems as they experiment with methods making and joining pieces of clay together to make sculptural and/or functional objects of their choice.

21^st CENTURY SKILLS: Students use various types of reasoning to think and reflect critically and solve problems in both conventional and innovative ways.

Brief Description: This is the third and culminating lesson in a series of three lessons that introduce students to the kinesthetic experience of natural clay. In the first lesson, students experiment with clay (pinching and pulling), and discover for themselves what they can do with it. As they gain experience in making clay change its shape, the second lesson introduces them to construction and decoration methods (rolling slabs, making joins, reinforcing with coils, stamping textures, etc.). In the third lesson, students create objects from their imaginations/experimentation using their choice of the techniques they have learned so far as well as innovative approaches.

Before they get started, I ask students what sorts of things they have already made out of clay. I then write on the board, without telling students why, three lists from their contributions: one for functional objects, one for sculptural objects, and one for objects (if any) that are both. I then ask students to ponder what each item in a list has in common with its list mates. This leads them to discover the relationships of functionality verses sculptural qualities of the pieces. We discuss functional vs. sculptural possibilities for clay. Can an object be both?

Students then share ideas they have for making an object. (If students do not have an idea, this is very helpful.) I suggest that if students have already made a functional piece, they might try a sculptural one, and vice versa. We review methods learned so far: pinch/pull, stamping, coil, slab roll. All methods are options as well as combinations and new approaches. What they make is of their own choosing.

Teaching Artist Response: Never Underestimate the Power of Intention!

One student proclaimed that he wanted to make the Golden Gate Bridge. ”Wow buddy, that’s pretty ambitious!” I said, and caught myself about to dissuade him from such an arduous project. He had just returned from San Francisco with his family and was clearly taken by the famous bridge.

As Teaching Artists we strive to facilitate positive experiences for our students. There was a time when I would have ensured this would happen by instructing the student in a process I felt would direct him to create a “successful” bridge. But true learning, as we know, is in discovering the process for yourself – your own process.

This time, I just said: “You know, I’d like to see that!” And off he went with his chunk of clay. Later in the class period, I checked in with him to see how the bridge was coming. He was well on his way and all that was needed was a reminder to reinforce his connections with coils.

After drying the clay pieces for a couple weeks and then firing them in the kiln, the pieces were painted with tempera paint. I set out lots of colors, but had substituted magenta for red (I did this on purpose for a couple of reasons: the first was because magenta, in tempera paint, is a better mixer. Red makes muddy, dull mixes. The second reason was because I have lots of magenta.) Our bridge builder came up to me a few minutes later and insisted that magenta would not do. He needed red. After rifling the classroom teacher’s cupboards, I came up with a bottle for him. 

Here is the The Golden Gate Bridge: