In the Art Room: Self-Portrait in a Kimono

Konichiwa, ya'll! 

My second grade students have been wrapping up their Self-Portraits in a Kimono collages this week and I just had to share. Because, well, look at 'em. They are, like, totes adorbs (so sorry. With my {gulp} 39th birthday approaching in a month and a half, I've decided to hit mid-life crisis mode and talk like a 13 year old. Mostly because I still act like a 13 year old.)

We covered so much with this project from traditional Japanese clothing to portrait drawing to collage techniques.  We even learned how to write a couple of Japanese characters! It was a whole lotta stuff crammed into one masterpiece and the kids are so excited with the results.

One of my favorite things about displaying these pieces together is that they often appear to interact with each other...like Capt. Spiky Hair and Samurai Scar Face. Scar Face doesn't look too enthused. Maybe the scar is from a bad run-in with a certain spiked hair dude.

Students could create a fan to include in their collage or not. Some students decided to get all FANtastic and spring for two fans. Notice the one tucked into the obijime (which is that little yarn belt).

Now, ya'll might recall that our theme for the school year is Asia (even if we did take a wee detour to Norway to study all things Viking when my student teacher was with us). You can catch a glimpse of my Asian-themed art room here. I've worn this kimono a couple of times and chatted with the kids about the different elements of the outfit. This really piqued their curiosity and got them excited about creating a mini-kimono of their own. Now the boys did take a little convincing...that was until I showed them examples of samurai in their kimonos. Then they were totally on board. 

BY THE WAY...if you are attending the Art of Education's online conference this Saturday, this here is one of the four different costumes you'll get the chance to see. Please BYOC (Bring Your Own Crackers) because my presentation is full of some serious cheesiness.

The first thing we did was create our kimonos. We chatted about the tradition in Japan of having four different kimonos, one for every season. I asked the kids to pick their favorite season and color two coffee filters with colors that reminded them of that time of year. Once colored, these filters were placed on a styrofoam plate and painted with water. NOW, this project was delayed a bit because I did switch gears and have them use their painted coffee filters for a temporary installation for International Dot Day (see here). Once that installation was down, coffee filters were returned and we were back to work.

Our next order of business was creating the body. The children were given a template that was about 3" wide and 9" tall with a round head shape at the top. After selecting their flesh color, they traced the template for the head portion only and began drawing out the features of the face.

We did chat quite a bit about the placement of facial features. The children drew their portraits in pencil, traced with thin sharpie and then erased their pencil lines. Color was added with colored pencils. We then worked on the kimono. The children learned that a collar called a eri sugata is often worn under a kimono. They created one with a small piece of origami paper. Next we folded the kimono over the body...in just the right way with the left side first, right side on top. Folding the kimono the opposite way is how it is worn when buried.

Hair was added with a choice of decorations for the ladies. Arms were created with the second coffee filter folded just like the kimono. Hands were made with the aid of a template. Then came the belts: the obi, which is the large belt and the obijimi, the small cord that goes around the obi. I happened to have some snazzy fabric for the obi and some funky monkey yarn for the obijimi.

Here's a group of first grade creations before arms were added.

Because white toe socks are usually worn with the wooden clogs called geta, the students were given white paper the same width of the body. They were told to draw two curved lines, cut out and slip inside the bottom of the kimono. The top of the geta clogs were created with the letter "V".

I really wanted the background to be interesting but not take away from the awesomeness of the self-portrait. For that reason, the kids used Mod Podge to adhere a piece of tissue paper to white drawing paper and then proceeded to cover that with Mod Podge I had added glitter to.

Once the sparkly background was complete, the kids added their self-portraits. Then they were to write some Japanese characters that best described them (based on a handout that was on their tables) and glue to the bottom of their piece. Once complete, I have the kids my "red stamp of approval": a stamp I had created in Japan that has my name on it. 

Whew! I'm exhausted just explaining all the elements of this lesson...I know the kids are happy with their work. And probably even happier still to move on to something new. Next up: Sumi-e Brush Painting! I'm excited to share this art with the children. Have you taught sumi-e before? Any tips?

OH! And thanks to all of you that have joined in on the Artsy Book Club! If you've not done it already, you can join our facebook page here. And you can join this blog's facebook page here! 

Chat with you soon!

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In the Art Room: Royal First Graders

 Well hello there, your majesties! Long time, no bloggie'ness. I know you might have been expecting some Parisian photo-heavy post but, to be honest, I'm kinda overwhelmed by just the thought of downloading all two million of the photos that I snapped. And that was of the Eiffel Tower alone! So you're gonna have to wait for the European Vacation Slide Show and check out these amazing first grade self portraits. Cuz they're royally awesome, dude.

 This project involved many mini-lessons as most of my projects do. I just can't seem to do a weaving project or a lesson on symmetry. No, it's gotta be a self-portrait-drawing-, symmetrical-crown-making-, textured-paper-weaving-, analogous-color-mixing-, and pattern-designing- kind of montage.

 Wanna attempt a project that involves that many steps? You sure you can handle this kind of party? Cuz it ain't for the short attention-spanded. But if you and your little friends are up for the challenge, here's how we went about mastering these pieces:

• Week 1: As you may recall, as it's mentioned every blog post, I only hang out with my wee artist friends 30 minutes, twice a week. So I'm going to break this down by week. Now this lesson was apart of our unit on the United Kingdom. After a chat about their monarchy and a close look at several paintings of royalty of the past, the kids were introduced to the idea that they'd be portraying themselves as kings and queens. This was met with the usual squeals of delight that one only hears when teaching the littles. To start, we used 8 1/2" X 11" sheets of paper, traced a head shape in pencil, added a neck and ears and proceeded to paint using colors that matched our own skin tone. Once those dried, we used oil pastels to create out likeness. That's after a pretty extensive how-to-draw-a-self-portrait chat, of course.

•  Week 2: Once the oil pastel self-portraits were completed, they were cut out of the small sheet of paper and glued onto a clean sheet of 12" X 18". Once glued down, the kids used mirrors to check out their 'do and painted hair onto their self-portraits. For the boys, hair painting, as we called it, took all of two seconds. But for the ladies, well, let's just say we enjoyed the beauty salon time. During the second half of our weekly art lesson, we used metallic paint to paint and add texture to small 6' X 9' pieces of colorful construction paper.
• Week 3: With our fancy paper, we created a loom for weaving. To do this, I have the kids fold the paper in half and fold a small crease at the top open edge. We have a mini-math lesson that involves cutting the paper almost in half, making sure to stop at that top crease. We then proceed to cut the paper almost in fourths and then eighths. Once the paper is unfolded, it creates a loom. The following art class was spent weaving on our looms.

•  Week 4: Crown making! This proved to be a bit hit with the kids...and it also helped me empty out some contents of my storage closet. After cutting out their preferred crown shape (the kids were given three different crown shapes to trace from), they added foamy shapes to create their design. They were informed that they only had two rules to follow: the crowns had to be symmetrical by shape and they could not stack more than three shapes on top of each other. Once complete, crowns were spray painted gold and more foamy shapes could be added on top.

•  Week 5: We began the process of putting it all together. Crowns were glued atop heads. Weavings were glued under chins. Sleeves were added with rectangles of paper embellished with metallic oil pastels. Fancy collars were coffee filters folded in half with the center circle cut out. And necklaces were created with construction paper and metallic doilies found in my storage closet.

•  Week 6: Finally, we began to approach light at the end of the tunnel. The kids were given water soluble oil pastels. They were asked to use two analogous colors and create lines that radiated from their self portrait. The following day, water was painted over their line drawings and their masterpieces were complete. Finally.

 I don't know if you noticed, but some of the kids took liberties with the coffee filters, creating fancy sleeves. And some of the ladies added earrings with the metallic doilies. Who am I to deny royalty of their magnificence?

I do believe the kids fave part of this project is when I passed their work back. I called on the kids as "Your Royal Highness" and "His/Her Majesty" to which they always giggled, curtsied or bowed. And who can blame them? After all this hard work, they are most definitely Kings and Queens of the art room. 

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