city prints

If you're reading this and have yet to spend hours of your life on a little gem of a site called Pinterest, you need to get out from under that rock you've been hiding in and get yourself a Pinterest account right now.  I am, like thousands of others, completely addicted to this virtual pinboard full of images just perfect enough to let my never-resting mind go clicking away at endless pictures all night.  So go, get going, and you're welcome.

Now I told you that story, to tell you another story about a printmaking project recently completed with my fourth graders. Being my first year, I was a little nervous about creating a printing project.  It's a tricky medium, and I wanted a project where every student would have fun and have success with a print.  Well I turned to my buddy Pinterest to help me out.



Sure enough this rockin' project from in clutch; http://pinterest.com/pin/93097917266590948/ from the blog laughpaintcreate.blogspot.com - Truly awesome idea.

Using very basic materials with the foam paper for the print stamp, I had students create "cityscapes".  Like all of my projects, I like to leave open what a "cityscape" meant, which is why you see a variation from the realistic to the wacky in their designs.  Backgrounds were created using watercolors when we discussed warm vs. cool colors.

Lastly, printmaking opened up some very interactive discussions.  I used the following websites to demonstrate and show students how vast the art of printmaking is which they found fascinating.  

http://www.moma.org/interactives/projects/2001/whatisaprint/flash.html

http://edu.warhol.org/silkscreen/main.html