Hey, y'all! Last year I shared this super fun printmaking and collage project over at the AOE Art Ed Now conference. I'm excited to be able to share the video I created for that conference with you now. Here you go:
I teamed up with Gelli Arts to create the video because I love using their printing plates in my art room. They are a wonderful plate to use with kids of all ages and allow for so much exploration. In this video, I take you through a TON of different printmaking methods. Check it out!
What I love most about printmaking is being left with SO MANY FUN PAPERS once complete. But what to do with them all? In the video, I share a favorite lesson of mine: making them into collage sushi. But, really, the possibilities are endless.
Thanks so much for letting me share. If you have any questions about the processes shared in the video, just ask. AND if you have any suggestions on printing, please drop a line in the comments. I know everyone loves to explore this medium with their kiddos and it's always fun to try out new techniques.
I have been oversharing this lesson so much on my Instagram because I LOVE IT! My second graders learned so much in the making of these kindness prints: how to create a printing plate, make marker prints, pull ink prints, burnish their printing plate with spray paint, steel wool and aluminum, use Model Magic to mix colors and create a heart and...last but not least, pick a word of kindness that best resonates with them. DID I MENTION THAT THIS LESSON PACKED A PUNCH?! Holy cats! But, y'all. I'm in LOVE.
So, how did we create these masterpieces? I created a video to share the process. I thought I'd break it down class-by-class what we worked on. Keep in mind that I have 30 minute art classes with my 2nd graders...so I'll be breaking down my lesson in baby bites for those of you that have hour long classes. Just combine my two days and you'll know what you can accomplish in one class of an hour.
Day One: Chatted about Robert Indiana, looked at his LOVE sculpture. From there, we switched gears and began drawing the designs on our printing plate. First with one color ink pin and then a different color to insure that we made the lines deep enough. Day Two: Continued tracing and then started coloring our designs with water soluble markers. Early finishers pulled the first of the marker prints.
Day Three (week two): We spent the class pulling marker prints. Once you print one, you simply recolor and print another!
Day Four: EVERY ONE'S FAVORITE: INK PRINTING! These kids loved ink printing...and pulled a million amazing prints. The key is having a tray that is rectangular (so the kids only roll up and down; I'm using the lid from my tempera cakes) and using ink. Sorry, no skimping here, paint just won't cut it.
Every two kiddos shared an ink tray and a brayer. I used the same ink and brayer for two classes, back to back. No issues with the ink drying...prints pulled were still beautiful!
Day Five (week three): I've had the idea of the kids doing something with their printing plates for some time now...and I really thought they would be great embossed. Here's the key: the prep is a little on the heavy side. I laid all of the plates on a large sheet of paper, gave them a shot of 3M spray glue and covered them with inexpensive foil. Then I sprayed them all with the $1 a can matte black spray paint from Home Depot (this is the ONLY paint to use when doing this kind of project, it burnishes off the easiest!). Then the the kids burnished off the spray paint and they were amazed with the results. Some even wanted to add color:
While pretty, I would recommend skipping this step. It just about killed my Sharpies as the tip of the marker was ruined by the spray paint particles.
Day Six: We made Model Magic hearts! The kids could pick any two primary colors and white. They rolled them, twisted them until they got their desired color/design. Then they shaped them into hearts. They had to also decide upon their word of choice...so they would know where to place their heart. Their heart would act as the dot to the I or the O.
Day Seven: LAST DAY! We used strips of 4.5" X 1" pieces of paper to create our words. They were glued down. Then the kids picked a construction paper frame and decorated it with sparkle tape I found at the Dollar Tree! A long project? YES. Did they learn a lot of new styles, methods and techniques? YES-YES! I would definitely do this again...I can't wait to hang these in the hall!
I'm excited to share with my students and y'all another installment in that series of videos that I'm calling Field Trip! I got the idea to visit contemporary artists and film them in action to share with my students. The goal is for them to see living artists creating and know that creating art takes many forms from mural painting to folk art to...printmaking. Which brings me to these two good lookin' folks, Chris Cheney and Nieves Uhl of Sawtooth Print Shop.
They are seriously so much fun!
I met Chris and Nieves at a workshop hosted by The Frist Center for Visual Arts. We had so much fun that when I was dreaming up artists to visit, their studio immediately came to mind. Not surprisingly, they were totally open to the idea and were gracious enough to carve time (see what I did there? "Carve"...get it?!) out of their busy schedule to show me just how they create their prints. They were so thorough in their explanations that I believe kids will understand their process.
Personally, I just loved exploring their space and snapping photos for their vintage typeface. I was told most are purchased from former printmakers who no longer have a means to print or a desire to do so.
I loved how clearly they explained the reasoning behind carving backwards. I know I would mess that up ALL.THE.TIME. I don't know how they do it.
Both artists did their internship at Hatch Show Print which must-see if you are ever visiting beautiful downtown Nashville.
I felt like I learned so much from this field trip as well! Seeing the process of how their posters are creating was like taking a step back in time. I think that showing this Field Trip! video will be a great introduction to any printmaking unit.
Since we're talking about printmaking, I thought I'd add some of my favorite printmaking projects and videos to this post.
You don't need fancy printmaking supplies to create great prints with your students. In a pinch, you can use styrofoam sheets, markers, paper and a damp sponge. If you've never tried marker prints, they are a game changer! First grade created these lovely prints with that method. More details here.
Last year, third grade tried their hand at printmaking with these beautiful cityscape prints.
For that, we did use ink but markers could have been used as well.
Today my second grade friends started a new printmaking project that I thought I'd share with y'all. In our 30 minute session together, they were able to watch the first half of the video, discover a little about Andy Warhol, learn some new vocabulary, work with printmaking tools and complete about two sets of prints (one positive and one negative). Whew! Next time, we'll print again to insure that we have enough crisp prints to pick from to create our own Andy Warhol Flower-inspired collage. Lemme show you how we are creating these pop art beauties:
Here's what you'll need: * Colorful copy paper. I found mine super cheap in the Back to School section of Walmart a while back. * Fake flowers. I tried real sunflowers in my experimenting and found that the petals kept falling out onto the printing plate. Fake flowers from the Dollar Tree were my best find. * Acrylic paint. I tried using tempra and it didn't work on the Gelli Arts printing plate. * Brayers * Printing plate. I used Gelli Arts but you could also use this recipe to create your own gelatin plates. * Scissors and glue * Those two little words that get everyone excited: PUFFY.PAINT.
After the kids have created their prints, we'll proceed on to the collage and puffy painting portion of the video. I'll keep you posted in a follow up on just how these colorful beauties turn out. In other news, I kinda sorta totally wanna wallpaper my entire house in these. Who's up for a flower printing weekend?! Party at my house, you bring the flowers, I'll bring the brayers. I'm telling you, this project is so fun, just ask Andy...
I mean, doesn't he look thrilled?! Ha! Love that wonderful Warhol, y'all.
This lesson is going to be followed up by a flower painting project by our next artist inspo: Vincent van Gogh. I thought printing the sunflowers would give the kids a good opportunity to see them up close, check out those textures and better prepare them to recreate them in paint. I'll keep you posted.
Until then, have a super happy and colorful week, kids!
Hey, y'all! I'm in the middle of lesson planning for some upcoming fall-themed projects in the art room. Since my third graders are getting ready to embark on the above printed leaves project, I thought I'd share the lesson video with you as well as my fave printing projects. By the way, I often update my YouTube channel before sharing here. So if you wanna see some art teacherin' videos as soon as they launch, you might want to subscribe here.
Every since I learned about marker prints from my art teacherin' buddy Don over at Shine Brite Zamorano, I have been in love. The technique is so simple and yet so impactful. I think my third graders will have so much fun creating their leaf collages. We are going to be tying in science by discussing just why leaves change colors. The background will be a lesson in glue resist and watercolor techniques. I'll be sure to share the complete lesson when we are finished. Until then, here are some of my very fave printing projects!
Last year, my first graders explored printmaking with these LOVE collages. They did both marker and ink prints and had a great time doing so.
In this video, I share with you some more tips on marker prints as well as printing with ink. When I first started teaching, printmaking was a daunting teaching task for me. Over the years, I've come up with some things that work for me...maybe you'll find 'em helpful as well.
I love the powerful impact of these positive and negative leaf prints. The amount of prep time needed to make these printing surfaces is well work the results they produce.
Last year, third grade got their toes wet with this printmaking project that explored cityscapes, depth and watercolor techniques. I created a couple of videos to walk the kids through the processes.
By the way, I create these videos for the following reasons: 1. my sanity; 2. so that all of my students can see my demos and 3. for anyone else who wants to use them! Seriously, feel free to play my videos in your art room. It's the reason I share them on my YouTube channel.
Last year, I was super smart and did printmaking with all grade levels at once. That meant all supplies were out and ready for the entire day. No switching visuals, supplies, etc. It really made printmaking a snap for me. Second grade worked on these sweet printed winter selfies.
Fourth grade created these amazing Egyptian god portraits a couple of years ago. So much in one project: drawing, printing, metal tooling!
A fun variation on traditional printing are floating chalk prints. If you've not tried this, I highly recommend it, so fun, easy and beautiful!
Why not print on fabric? My third graders not only enjoyed the printing process but also stitching their fabric pieces together.
Making your mark with untraditional materials like cardboard is fun too. My third graders learned about the history of the Eiffel Tower while creating these beauties.
And, of course, I've been sharing these fun radial prints that my fourth graders just wrapped up.
Kids love printmaking because it's good, messy fun. I love teaching printmaking because it is a wonderful medium that allows the kids to see that art is not just a one-n-done. But it is all about trying over and again to create something awesome.
I'm always looking for fun printmaking projects for my students as well as helpful tips and tricks. If you've got 'em, please share 'em in the comments below!
I love art teachers because they have the best ideas and are super sweet about sharing them. This idea comes courtesy of art teacher Jeanna Pena (who you can follow on Facebook and Twitter for all of her art adventures). When she shared this lesson in the Art Teachers Facebook group, I immediately decided to scrap the lesson I had planned for my fourth grader's Dot Day project and go with this one. And I'm so glad I did. It was such a smash hit of a lesson (with still one more round to go as we'll be covering these printing plates and burnishing them next week, a la this project) that I just can't thank Jeanna enough for sharing. So, with her permission, I'm sharing my version of her lesson here!
But first, a word about Jeanna. She's pretty stinkin' awesome. I noticed from a wee bit of Facebook stalking that she seemed to be quite the adventurer. Here's what she had to say:I came up with this idea after I traveled to Cuba last fall. I was attempting to translate the radial tile patterns that I saw in some amazing old buildings.
I applied for the Grosvenor Teacher Fellowship with National Geographic and Lindblad Expeditions and it has been a whirlwind! They are sending me to Antarctica in December. They brought our group together in DC and we had photography lessons at NatGeo HQ, naturalist updates, and classes with the Google Educational Engagement folks. I'm the only art teacher. They're looking for adversity in content areas! I highly recommend it!
How awesome is Jeanna?! If you have a moment to show her some love in the comments for this awesome lesson, please do so. AND if you have any questions about her travels, you can find her on those social media links above.
Now, let's talk about this project. It was our first for the new school year, right after we wrapped the Escape Game and the Monochromatic Selfies. Jeanna had mentioned she did this project with her older students...so I wasn't sure how my kids would do being brand new fourth graders and all. But they knocked it out of the park! Here is the video they viewed on the first day.
Supplies: * Cardboard. We used cardboard rounds because of our Dot Day focus which were purchased from Amazon. However, any cardboard or mat board would work.
* Foam Sheets and/or Shapes with Adhesive Back. I found that Michael's had the best selection where Joann's fell short. I did purchase foam sheets because I knew some kids would want to explore creating their own shapes. Some foam sheets were not adhesive backed so the kids glued them on. Those we found did not stick super well when it came to printmaking. When they came off, I just had the kids bring their board to me and I hot glued them back on.
If you follow me on Insta then you've seen our progress. I had my early finishers recreate their design on scratch paper (also purchased via Amazon) and write about what they learned.
The following art class, we printed! And, with about 35 fourth graders in the room it was, well, busy. We'll just call it busy.
* Printing Ink. Y'all. ALWAYS buy water soluble Speedball. I have had the same jars of ink forever. I just keep adding water, stirring and it still works great. Unlike the "house" brands that the art supply vendors sell which harden in the tube. * Inking Trays. You can purchase these through your art supply vendor. However, with this many kids, I did run out so I simply cut my Gelli Arts plastic containers in half and used those. I'm sure something could be found at the Dollar Tree for this item. * Paint. We used tempra paint for rolling on texture/color on the background. * Brayers. I happened to have one per kid so there was no wait time. * Paper. We used 14" squares that I had cut down from large paper.
Day two's video: honest speaking, I didn't show the entire start of the video to my second group of fourth graders. Knowing that they are a group that likes to move, I knew I'd need to get them working right away. So I started the video just before the demo portion.
And then they went to work! They had a BLAST.
And the prints turned out so colorful and fun just like the artists.
A little "before" action. Don't ask me what the aftermath looked like. I've blocked it out.
I had a couple of kids double stack their shapes which I wasn't sure just how that was going to turn out...but I really dig it. Check out the triangles.
I can really see so much potential with this printing project: a lesson on architecture, a portrait project, floral creations...the possibilities are endless!
Yeah, ya did.
For now I'm just gonna keep taking them off the drying rack and saying Ooooooh and Aaaaaah. Stay tuned for what happens next with these beauties.
