Grade 3 Imaginative Animal Collages

Grade 3 artists with Mrs. Engles learned about collage, or art made with paper and glue. They learned there are many ways to change paper with both their hands (ripping, tearing, folding, etc.) and scissors (cutting various types of edges, making geometric and organic shapes, etc.). Artists looked at the wood sculptures by contemporary artist AJ Fosik and were asked “If you were to create a symmetrical collage of an imaginary animal’s face, what animals might you choose as your inspiration?”  

AJ Fosik

Students then spent several classes creating the features of their animal face through the collage techniques they learned (arranging shapes, layering, overlapping, etc.). To finish their collages, artists considered textures they see on animals (fur, feathers, scales, etc.) and considered how they might create these textures on their animal collages (adding textured paper, cutting various edges, ripping, etc.).

Please enjoy these fierce and friendly imaginary animal face collages inspired by the work of AJ Fosik!

PTA Art Workshop

On January 8, Mr. Seligman and I led a PTA meeting Art Workshop! Parents of Post Road students, as well as our principal, Mrs. Ossorio, learned about a growth mindset, or learning to embrace mistakes and retrain your brain to take on risks/challenges so that you can grow! In the art room, this means that we try things we might not be able to do and use mistakes to help us learn. We read the book “Beautiful Oops” by Barney Saltzberg, then each person was given a piece of paper with either a yellow, blue, green, orange or red “mistake” shape glued onto it (a few people each had the same shape). Attendees considered how they might turn this mistake into a picture. They learned how they might change paper with their hands (tearing, folding, ripping, etc.) and scissors (cutting various edges, shapes and textures) in order to create their work of art incorporating the original “mistake” shape. 

At the end, attendees shared their work and discussed successes (things they were proud of in their art/during work time) and struggles (things that were hard for them), and also noticed the different ways others transformed the same shape they were given.  

Please enjoy these beautiful collages and allow them to remind you that we can learn new things, embrace our mistakes and challenge ourselves at any age!

Grade 5 Original Emojis

5^th graders began this project by looking at the art of contemporary artist, Yue Minjun. They noticed his use of line, shape and exaggeration to express emotion in his artwork. 

Yue Minjun

They compared his work to emojis, or small digital icons. They noticed that emojis also use line, simple shapes, a limited color palette and exaggeration to convey an emotion or idea. 

Students then brainstormed ideas for their own original emojis and picked two to sketch in their sketchbooks. Next class, students picked one of their original emoji ideas to create in collage, which they worked on for several classes. They learned how to cut paper in a variety of ways, layer pieces and compose a basic composition with background to make these beautiful collages. 

Students finished by reflecting on their artistic process and choices in writing. 

Please enjoy these excellent emoji collages!!

Angel, 5Red

Phia, 5 Bennett

Miguel, 5 Bennett