This week in Art, 8th graders have been taking a look at Zentangles - a drawing practice that emphasizes pattern and visual textures as well as focus and relaxation. If you've ever spent time "just doodling" you might have noticed how it can have a calming effect. Zentangles are kind of like thoughtful doodles that can turn into meaningful designs.

To prepare for a more final artwork, 8th graders practiced drawing Zentangle patterns in their sketchbooks. Many created their own original patterns and visual textures, occasionally incorporating personal symbols and imagery. Can you spot some hidden symbols that might have deeper meaning within these sketches?

Using various drawing materials and techniques, students created a charcoal drawing of their own favorite shoe.

Shoes are a difficult drawing challenge - they feature both simple and complex shapes, as well as details like rivets, laces, and logos. To appear accurate and three-dimensional, students must also pay close attention to proportions, highlights, and shadows. Using a light coating of compressed charcoal and a cotton ball, students toned their paper to prepare for the drawing. Using observational drawing techniques, students observed the basic shapes and forms found on and around the shoe to create an outline drawing with vine charcoal. With a variety of charcoal pencils and a gum eraser, students added a range of values from light to dark to show three-dimensionality. 

The 8th graders did an excellent job with this task - check out the students' artwork below!

After our unit on bilateral symmetry with the Day of the Dead Calaveras, 6th Graders looked at radial symmetry found in nature. Things like flowers and snowflakes have very unique and intricate radial symmetry. We also took a look at Wycinanki papercuts - a Polish folk art incorporating colorful radial designs. 

To create their own radial design, students chose one word that was personally meaningful. On one slice of the design, they drew this word using creative lettering and decorative elements to match. Then, they used a special folding and tracing process to repeat the image 7 more times! Lastly, students used mixed media and a color scheme to really bring their artworks to life. Take a look  at their stunning work below!

Can you tell which word each student started with?? 
Click on the image to make it larger!

8th Graders used patterns and visual textures to create designs called Zentangles. These types of patterns are characterized by the repetition and movement of lines. 

Students also worked with specific cool and warm color schemes to give their landscape ground and sky. We worked with watercolor pencil and tissue paper painting to achieve these effects. Click on any image to view it larger!

6th Graders took a look at Russian nesting dolls (also known as Matryoshka dolls) as inspiration in the creation of their own nesting bowls. 

Using clay techniques, students worked from their own sketches to build three nesting bowls - small, medium, and large.

In honor of the 100th year anniversary of the cherry blossoms being gifted to the United States by Japan, 8th Graders created Japanese brush paintings. 

We took a look at traditional and contemporary uses of the bamboo brush, and experimented with three key brush "holds" (ways you hold the brush to create a specific stroke): the horizontal hold, the 45-degree angle hold, and the straight hold. 

Students also practiced writing Japanese Kanji (Chinese characters used in Japanese written language) with the bamboo brush. To complete the paintings, each student carved a chop, or signature stamp, as a way to "sign" their painting in the traditional style.

By looking at the artworks below, see if you can figure out which hold was used to create each image! Click on any image to see it larger.