As part of our commitment in the last two years to raise the profile of art within the school, we decided to hold an ‘Arts Week’. We based the week on the theme of nature and wildlife. We developed a series of lessons for each key stage, utilising teachers’ strengths and specialisms. We also brought in a practising artist to work with different classes who brought a refreshing and different approach to each session! We rounded off the week for key stage 2 with organised visits to various art galleries within the Midlands. The week was a tremendous success with the children enjoying a relaxing, yet stimulating atmosphere.
Read on and find out what each year group has been up to!
Following the arts week theme of 'Nature', Mrs Payne chose butterflies as a focal point for upper key stage 2. Butterflies have survived for 70,000,000 years. There are 18,000 species worldwide, 400 species found in Europe, 65 species in the British Isles.
Butterflies are under threat; poor summer weather conditions over recent years and a loss of natural habitat have had a huge impact with many species close to extinction!
To highlight the importance of butterflies we embarked on the following topic:
To model butterflies out of clay, to design its wings imprints and paint and glaze the finished item.
To use paint, oil-pastels and coloured inks to create a brightly coloured profusion of uniquely designed paper butterflies.
We have done lots of artwork this week. The first activity was where we cut feather shapes out of coloured paper and made a large bird picture with it. After we had finished it looked like a robin.
The second part was to draw a bird using chalk onto black paper. It was very difficult. The third activity was to draw a bird over a waxy piece of magazine. The final activity was to make a peacock out of tissue paper.
In the afternoon we made large pictures of birds. We collected things from the school grounds to make our pictures and we also used large pieces of material.
Writing by Jeevan Kandola (pupil)
Mr Townsend's art groups created art work based on the painting called ‘Tropical Storm with Tiger’ by Henri Rouseau 1891. We looked with great detail at the painting, noting how the artist had conveyed the storm: dark sky, rain, lighting and high winds, and at the tropical foliage.
Using sketching guides the children practised drawing: lions, tigers, monkeys, leopards and elephants. The most successful sketch was selected and was drawn very carefully taking special note of size, shape, proportions and angles. This was then coloured carefully using vegetation collected from the environmental area.Then the background of the art work was arranged. The children considered perspective by placing small pieces of flora at the top of the background and large pieces at the bottom or foreground. The finished animal was then stuck within the foliage of the art work.
Some excellent pieces of art were produced all based on
‘Tropical Storm with Tiger’.
Y2/1 learned about camouflage and found out how various minibeasts and other creatures camouflage themselves in their environments.
They painted abstract backgrounds using a careful selection of colours. They then drew and painted creatures using the same colours and patterns.
The creatures were cut out and mounted onto the backgrounds producing very effective camouflage pictures.
During Arts Week, Year 1 and 2 looked at Vincent Van Gogh’s ‘Sunflowers’ and we used it as inspiration for our own works of art. We used a range of techniques to create our individual masterpieces.
We used a thin colourwash to paint the background then added detail of the vase and flowers in either thick paint or paint and tissue paper. The results were very impressive and the children were very proud of their work.
We also decided to create a giant vase of sunflowers as a class. We sponge-printed the vase, stems and leaves then used lots of different materials and fabric to college the individual sunflowers.
I hope you’ll agree that the final displayed result was stunning!
On Thursday 19th June all the year 3/4 pupils went to the Birmingham Art Museum as part of the art activities undertaken during Arts week.
The children took part in several hands-on and audio activities as well as looking at and discussing modern art pieces from the 15th - 19th Centuries .
This was an enjoyable day where the children learnt about art and experienced new activities which were art-related.
All of key stage 1 had a go at modelling clay birds and nests. Above are some of year 2 pupils getting their hands dirty!
During Art week year 1 have been making baby chicks and ladybirds.
The chicks were made by sticking one big and one small yellow pom pom together.
The eyes and beak were cut out of felt and stuck on. It took a long time to make the pom poms. It gave us time to have a chat and relax while we were making them.
Making the ladybird was lots of fun. First we painted a paper plate red. Then we cut out 6 legs and 6 spots out of black card and black paper. We glued the spots on and sellotaped the legs onto the side of the body. We cut out circles from felt for the eyes.
We enjoyed making our chicks and ladybirds. We can have a go at making them again at home in the Summer holiday!
On the Thursday and Friday all of years 5/6 pupils went to visit the Wolverhampton Art Gallery to get some inspiration!
Children were divided into 3 groups and visited selective exhibits.
The Georgian room.
The Sculpture room
(Children had the opportunity to have 'hands on experience')
The Pop Art display.
Even though this was a short visit, hopefully it will make the children curious enough to want to visit again to explore the other exhibits!
During Arts week, to follow on from looking at the rainforest pictures, Reception created 3D rainforest pictures with an artist called Craig.
Craig helped us create a background which consisted of trees and branches. Then we had to think of an animal that lives in the rainforest which we made out of cardboard, thinking carefully about colour and patterns to decorate them. We then attached our animals onto folded card strips to make them appear 3D.
Above are reception making clay birds and nests and
camouflage pictures.
All the children in years 3/4 made a card with Mrs Steele. The front of the card needed to be filled with flowers and leaves. The lesson started with the children looking at flowers in magazines and discussing the shape, colour, texture and size of the petals
and flower heads.
The children were amazed at just how many different types of flowers there are and how they all differ. After finding two flowers the children liked, the flowers were cut in half. Half of the flower was stuck on the paper and then the children drew the other half of the flower trying to make both halves as alike as possible by drawing accurately and shading carefully. The rest of the paper then needed to be filled with as many different types of flowers and
leaves as possible.
All the children enjoyed making a very attractive card, and learning about detailed drawing, shading, colour matching and texture.
During Arts week the children in year 3/4 spent a day in Miss Williams' classroom where they were looking at improving their local environment by planning their ideal playground.
The children made a 2D plan from which they produced a 3D model, made from old boxes and other pieces of junk.
In art week 3/4 Sl designed and made a lavender bag. They used a variety of decorative materials to sew or glue onto thin gauze, then sewed the edges together to make the bag.
Threading needles was a challenge in itself! At least the lavender scent was extremely calming!
They then made a decorated paper gift bag to put the lavender bag inside as a present for someone special..
During art week every child in the school contributed their portrait, using a template, to a backdrop to be hung in the hall as a semi-permanent display to commemorate 2008.
