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Tag Archives: contemporary art

Bucky Badger Designs by Kids

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A collage of colorful, hand-drawn Bucky Badger designs dressed in various themed costumes, featuring playful designs, displayed vertically.

This past summer, there were painted Bucky Badger sculptures all over our city.  The Badger is the mascot of the University of Wisconsin.  I wrote all about it in a previous blog post which you can read here. I shared already the large collaborative Bucky Badger puzzle designs we made.  After we made the large group Buckys, each student made their own smaller Bucky design.  They had the opportunity to design it however they wanted.  Take a look at some … Read more… →

Yayoi Kusama Dotted Pumpkins for Kids

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A stylized yellow pumpkin with dots and lines on a colorful, patterned background, inspired by Yayoi Kusama.

I love the results of this dotted pumpkin project inspired by the dotted pumpkins of Yayoi Kusama.  I did this art lesson with 3rd/4th grade. (Amazon Affiliate links have been used, at no extra cost to you.) I based our project after the lesson taught on the blog Plastiquem.  First, I read the book Yayoi Kusama, From Here to Infinity, which is an inspirational book about her artwork and life.  This is on my list of top 10 favorite books … Read more… →

Abstract Paintings Inspired by the Art of Shinique Smith

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Abstract Paintings Inspired by the Art of Shinique Smith

Have you heard of the artist Shinique Smith?  I just love her artwork!  It’s very gestural, colorful and it just draws me in to look at more closely.  I love the use of fabric with graffiti-like painted marks.  Her art combines traditional art media with non-traditional materials like clothing and stuffed animals.  She is influenced by street graffiti and Japanese calligraphy.  She works in paintings, drawings, installations, wrapped bundles, sculptures and videos.  There was an exhibit of her artwork in … Read more… →

Hybrid Machine-Animal Drawings

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Illustration of a tree figure and a green bear with a water gun, labeled "Hybrid Machine-Animal Drawings.

After looking at the art of contemporary artist Nicolas Lampert, my students combined two or more different objects or creatures to create hybrid drawings.   Here are the steps to this lesson: 1.  Start by discussing the machine animal collages and the machine insect collages by Nicolas Lampert.  Ask questions such as” How do you think Nicolas made these pictures? How do they make you feel? Why do you think he combined animals or insects with machines? How would these … Read more… →

Contemporary Art in the Elementary Art Classroom: A Blog Round-up!

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A collage featuring various contemporary art pieces and the text "Contemporary Art in the Elementary Art Classroom.

This year my professional goal was to learn more about contemporary artists and to create art lessons inspired by these artists.   I taught about William Wegman and Justin Vining.  We looked at contemporary artists inspired by microscopic things and living artists that used Disney as inspiration.  At the end of the year, my students learned about Shinique Smith, Nicolas Lampert and various artists that used stuffed animals as a theme in their art (blog posts to come soon about all … Read more… →

Easy End of Year Art Project: Collaborative Banners

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Easy End of Year Art Project

Are you looking for an easy end-of-year art project?  On the last days of school, I had some students that needed to finish up art projects and others that really just wanted to be done with the school year.  This was a fun and easy collaborative project that many students opted to participate in. I got the idea from Romero Britto’s word artworks, like this one and I think I may have seem *something similar* somewhere at some time.. but … Read more… →

Inspired by Artist Justin Vining: Abstract Whimsical Landscapes

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A whimsical landscape with swirling roads, trees, houses, a sun, and various colorful patterns.

This may have been my favorite unit we studied all year!  We looked at the whimsical landscapes of contemporary artist Justin Vining.  Here is one of his paintings: We watched videos of him talking about his influences, watched time lapses of his paintings and emailed him some questions about himself.  He responded to our questions in this interview I posted previously.  This was a perfect artist to study for us because Justin lives in Indiana in a rural area and … Read more… →

An Interview with Artist Justin Vining

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A colorful abstract painting by Justin Vining depicts a house on a snowy hill under a starry sky with constellations.

Back in September, I posted a huge list of contemporary artists.  One of the artists, Justin Vining, saw that I included his artwork in my post and left a comment on my blog.  We exchanged a few emails and I decided to use him as a resource in my classroom.  I was excited that one of the artists reached out to me through my blog and I thought it was especially cool that Justin used to be an elementary art … Read more… →

Disney Spirit Day at School

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Disney Spirit Day at School

We had Spirit Week at school this week.  Since I am no longer the Student Council adviser (I had a few extra classes added instead)  I was able to relax and actually think about how I might tie in Spirit Week to my art classes.  This year I am having the kids do a 5 minute silent art warm-up at the beginning of class.  I write a prompt on the board and the students draw in their art journals that … Read more… →

Huge List of Contemporary Artists

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Collage with text "Contemporary Artists" and images of various contemporary artworks in different styles.

Are you looking for some new contemporary artists to teach your students about?  On the Facebook Art Teachers group, members suggested LOTS of contemporary artists that they teach their students.  These are now all compiled into ONE HUGE LIST on Google Docs!  I added websites and short descriptions to most of the artists so it is easier to use.  Thanks to all the teachers who collaborated to share their ideas and add artists.  This huge list has about 130 artists … Read more… →

  • Banner with colorful artwork promoting an art shop featuring kindness coloring pages, artist activities, and resources for teachers.