nylon, wire, & clay - oh my!

student work.

My art room is back in full swing as we ride on into the start of the second semester.  And although I have many new projects starting up, I wanted to share the 3D Sculpture projects my 5th grade group created just before winter break. (Because, well they're awesome)

Half of my 5th grade classes, worked on creating Picasso-inspired wire/nylon abstract forms, while the other half transformed simple pinch pots into very wild creature sculptures.  

Both going with my districts' assessments standards - It was great to see the two completely different projects in action and let students' observe the many differences that sculpture art really are!

The Picasso-inspired nylon sculpture was yet another gem found during my lunch break Pinterest fix. (check it out - http://splatsscrapsandglueblobs.blogspot.com/).  I began by showing students how to manipulate a wire hanger to create an abstract form by stretching a nylon carefully around the hanger and base.  Intentionally, I DID NOT show students my example or introduce the "Picasso-theme".  Instead, I wanted students to focus on their form and not on the final product.  Then after introducing Picasso's Cubist work and having some fun on picassohead.com - students created sketches of their already completed wire form and how to transform that into a Cubist inspired work of art.

What really helped with the sketching, was giving students guidelines of what to include (i.e. two eyes, 2 mouths, 4 facial features, etc.)

Projects were then given a solid coat of white gesso - followed by using acrylic paints to transfer students sketches onto their final three-dimensional form.

The next group, got to explore the art of ceramics to complete their 3D project for the semester.  Even though working with clay is a big load of work, it was so worth it to see all of these crazy creatures come from my students' imaginations.  Personally, I think pinch pots are boring, and when I'm bored, so is everyone else.  So to take that one step farther, my students were challenged to take the pinch pot they created and develop a fun creature from it.  Like most of my lessons, this sort of non-structure/structure balance is where the most unique adaptations come into play.  Students used the pinch pot shape in various ways either creating mouths, turning them over, and adding plenty of details through scoring and slipping!

Check out the slideshow for some more great works!