Art Curriculum- Update

I spent a good portion of this evening trying to plot out January-March 2015.

January is now has a project for Cubism, Surrealism, and Fauvism.

February is still empty.

March is mostly filled up with projects leading up to Easter and reflecting spring.

For the advanced art curriculum, January is covered but not much else.

(Logging in 2 hours)

Creating An Art Curriculum

A glimpse of my plans... and my Lord of the Rings Marathon. <3

What I'm Working On

The past week I've been working on creating an Art Curriculum for middle grade children and younger.

It will take the kids through 6-7 major art movements in history. 3-4 projects devoted to each movement.

I'm trying to find a variety of projects that involve painting, cutting, and color usage.

Because the kids I'll be teaching (with the assistance of my mother and eldest sister) are an age group of 4-10 there are some basic motor skills that have not developed, as a result what I can do is limited. However there are still many delightful projects that can be accomplished.

This will be my Senior High Project, and so this will work beautifully as a place I can log my progress and hours in a pleasant manner that others might find useful or interesting.

What I've Accomplished So Far:

-Outlined 6 main movements of art + extra "Seasonal Fun" projects
-Figured out how to make a table in Microsoft Word
-Created a physical calendar + outlines in a Word Doc + Lists on my phone (all for project ideas)
-Come up with projects that will take the kids September-December this year
-Created 2 extra Pinterest boards which have proved amazing for pinning projects and ideas
-Gotten a good start on creating a parallel curriculum for my niece who's on the brink of highschool
-Enjoyed the pros of having 2 experienced teachers in the family who have fantastic resources and advice

The Parallel Curriculum

I'm creating a curriculum for my eldest niece who's on a more advanced level. It's following the same structure of artistic movements, but the projects vary from "advanced takes on the kids projects" to different aspects of the art movement itself.

She will be getting more challenges involving pencil, different tools like knives in painting, and photography, etc. She will also have a great deal more freedom with what she can pick and create whereas the Littles will have to be guided step by step for most of the projects.

Because she differs from the main projects and ideas I've created an entire table and list for her that follows the same dates and formula.

Eventually I hope to post the execution of each project and how the Littles (and my niece) handle the projects I pick out.

Basic Outline-

Major Art Movements:
Rennaisance
Post-Impressionism (Fauvism/Expressionism/Pointillism)
Cubism
Surrealism
Abstract Expressionism

Extra:
FALL
WINTER
SPRING

So far this experience has taught me that while I'm a hyper organized person I am not a tidy person. ;)
(Today I'm logging 7-8 hours for outlining, research, and planning)

Sketch- November WIP (update)

This is what happens when I get really into a piece...
Suddenly I'll notice I have 6 different things floating between my hands.

I bring an update on my November WIP! ^_^

Anybody have a guess as to who it is?

Farther along-ish with the hair

Lots of adjustments to the face... :)

Sketch- magical beings

Heyloeth guys,

It's sketchy Tuesday. While watching The Hobbit (again, yes) I worked on a couple pen sketches which I colored with Prismacolor pencils.

Freehand. I used reference photos for their poses. Their arms and hands are definitely strange, but I still like these little pieces. :)

Sketch- Thorin

Today is Tuesday!

Each Tuesday I will try to post a sketch of some kind, old or new. :)

Tonight I sat down and attempted to draw Thorin freehand, with a pen.

In an odd way, it went better than expected, and worse than I would've liked. :P Now someday I'm going to have to sit down for a whole week and come out with a super detailed portrait of Thorin to make myself feel better, but for now this'll do for Tuesday's post.

I added some special effects, which isn't the idea of posting a "simple" sketch, but it does look cooler. ^_^ His facial shape is not correct, and his mouth doesn't carry the right emotion...

No no no... this is a sketch. This was an experiment in the first place, I had no planning beforehand, I had a pen and went with it. I was trying to play with the crosshatching method. For something I don't do often, it went alright.

What do you guys think?

Music I listened to: The Voice was on... *shrugs* :)

For non-Tolkien fans - Thorin Oakenshield is a character created by JRR Tolkien and is a major character in The Hobbit. What you see here was done from a reference photo of Thorin as portrayed by Richard Armitage in Peter Jackson's film (soon to be) trilogy, The Hobbit.

Life Drenched Stars- a poem

Pondering Rain

Every Friday or Thursday, depending on my the happenings in my fascinating world, I will try to share a piece of my writing with an illustration. Anything from a poem, short short story, or just ramblings.
 

Life Drenched Stars 

Let us bide our time
in empty windows
in shafts of time 

Let us watch for love
in all its glory
before it fades away 

Let us gaze upon ice
and falling stars
In hollowly stained skies 

Let us dream of them
with moonlight in their skin
and Life drenched upon their faces

This was inspired by a talk with a friend and influenced a bit by The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. A beautiful book. The illustration was created from a drawing of mine from over a year ago.

Méav Ní MhaolchathaFormer singer from the Irish group Celtic Woman

Pixlr- Online Photo Editor

I've discovered a delightful photo editing program. For free, online. They offer apps for your phone also but I have yet to try those. If they're as fun as the online programs then I'd love to have them.

The photo editor, Pixlr, has 3 different editors: Advanced, Efficient, and Playful. I chose to go with Playful tonight.

Advanced offers you the chance to start from a blank canvas, choose your dimensions, etc. while Efficient has the option of creating a collage with the ability to change all of the sizes of the pictures to your exact specifications.

Playful allows you to add effects and borders from a vast variety of choices. Vintage, classic, city, snazzy, girly, faded, etc. You can spend hours just clicking through all of them and mixing styles because all of them look good. :)

Link- http://pixlr.com/

Two Steps From Hell was my inspirational music. Heavy and dramatic.

First Experiment- a drawing of mine. This is drawn from the cover of "The Children of Hurin" by JRR Tolkien, illustrated by Alan Lee. I do not own this character, or the illustration. I drew this for my pleasure and out of my admiration for all things Tolkien.

Before

                                         after1

after2

I love the mix of textures and color in "After1" though the spiderweb in the corner almost spoils the "cool/fantasy" effect.

In "After2" I get the feeling he's looking into a fire, or is about to enter something fierce and terrifying like a war. Considering this particular characters story, that might be the most accurate message.

Second Experiment- Next I took a piece from my photography stash, the flower was already blue and the background was solid black from previous edits. I decided to take it a step further. I really really like this one.

This was all for fun, because I love to mess around with creations even after I've scratched and shaded and erased them to almost perfection.

Wishing you all the best,

~Bright

"smoky blue"

9/11 Statistics



copic markers, gel pen

9/11 Statistics
The piece I bring today is in memory of 9/11.

It’s a compilation of a few of the vast statistics and a diagram of sorts for the 4 flights.

I put the information I used into a semblance of order below, these are very limited, but I hope they convey something of the tragedy of “the worst day.”

I connected each flight to its destination. The red words on the curving lines are words I saw repeatedly when I read a transcript from “Voices Inside the Tower.” I had the last letters falling off to allude to those who jumped.

All statistics are garnered from here (check it out for a far more wholesome list):
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/aug/18/usa.terrorism

Facts:
Year the World Trade Center was built: 1970
Daily visitors on an average day before 9/11: 140,000
Number of companies housed: 430

Distance from which burning towers were visible: 20 miles

Flights:
American Airlines Flight 11: 92 dead (Crashed into the North Tower)
United Airlines Flight 175: 65 dead (Crashed into the South Tower)
American Airlines Flight 77: 64 dead (Crashed into the Pentagon)
United Airlines Flight 93: 45 dead (Crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania)

9/11:
Number killed in attack and aircraft that crashed into them: 2,823
Number killed in the Pentagon: 123

Aftershock:
Number of children left orphans after 9/11: 1,300
Number of bodies found intact: 291
Number of days workers searched for body parts: 230
Number of victims identified: 1,102
Number of people still classified as missing: 105

Underground fires that still burned after 9/11: 69

Survivors of Ground Zero: 0