OUR LENS OUR WORLD
I came across you as a small, new and developing school.
I believe it was because of these factors and a part of my background that I had the opportunity to teach small groups of you, visual art classes under the International Baccalaureate (IB) program.
In short, I liked the IB program because the learning was very holistic.
In terms of Visual Arts, students could step into a world of creativity alongside critical thinking, history alongside the hippest happenings in today’s world.
They are empowered to create their own journeys, researching and traveling through the old gold classics to the contemporaries. They get to learn, critique and honour the stories of these characters and artists, as well as crafting their own personalities and uniqueness into the works of art.
I will share a couple of amazing topics and art pieces here with you, done by the little and big ones.
Yayoi Kusama
Artist Dots Infinity Nets Pumpkins
Erin would execute her original and independent ideas onto her artworks, often coming out with pieces that were surprisingly different from her mates.
By Erin, G3
By Chloe, G4
Chloe was a sweet and dutiful girl who was also very good at sketches and shading work.
I would remember Gerari as a really helpful girl with the classroom set-ups and her cheerful personality.
By Gerari, G6
Students learnt about the artist, then drew and colored Yayoi Kusama's portrait as well as her iconic pumpkins using basic lines and shapes. They also made the iconic infinity net by using straight lines to create geometrical shapes of different sizes, and then connecting the shapes in order to fill up the entire background. Finally, they cut out colourful paper dots, arranged and glued them onto the background.
Keep going. Be original. Be you.
Your little innovations today will inspire and soar tomorrow, creating solutions to make our planet a greater home to all.
Abstracting Nature
Understanding what abstract art is through the eyes of nature.
A few of the exercises (formative assignments) we did for a learning unit on Abstracting Nature was to begin with and to explore drawing our human eye with peacock's feathers rising from a desert landscape.
Here, I would like to highlight a couple of good works done by a diligent student Arina, who was exploring and executing her passions for the arts when we first met. We had the chance to share a bit more in the classroom, while other students were in still transit or getting ready to start their classes here in Singapore.
To begin with, Arina created the artwork in the middle, inspired by an image I found from online. We started off with color pencils.
For the image on the right/next, we explored a version with an eye, rays of the sun, the desert landscape, as well as geometrical elements. This time, using color pencils, watercolors and technical pens.
The biggest image seen below was another version explored, with animal prints incorporated onto a desert landscape. The grade 9 and 10 explored this with colored pens, hatch and cross-hatch lines as well as tonal values by exploring compact and hard lines, sparse and light lines. We did so within an A5 size paper and over a couple of classes.
For the desert dunes, Arina was inspired by the wing of butterfly and the skin of giraffe. For the setting sun, she used leopard print.
Each place on earth has its own identity and narrative. It is unique in its visual representation.