Color is one of the seven basic building blocks of art along with Line, Form, Shape, Value, Space, and Texture. Learn how different colors have different impacts on how emotions are conveyed through art.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Sanaz Mazinani is an artist with a background in political activism who uses art to inspire dialogue about perceptions of cultural identity. In the latest episode of Art School, she describes her current art practice. Using online media focusing on world news and pop culture as her source material, she creates symmetrical photo collages and videos that abstract familiar images and invite viewers to reconsider visual culture and its meaning and influence on public opinion and social justice. In this episode of Art School, she describes her current art practice and the intentions behind her recent installation at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco. In the second video Mazinani expands on the intention of traditional of Islamic ornamentation.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
In this episode of Art School, visit Paccarik Orue in the studios of Rayko Photo Center where he is currently an Artist-In-Residence. Tag along with Orue as he makes photographs in the Iron Triangle neighborhood of Richmond, California. From 2009-2011, Orue photographed residents and structures there for his book titled, There Is Nothing Beautiful Around Here. Orue also introduces us to his latest body of work, which is centered in the city of Cerro de Pasco in his home country of Peru. Cerro de Pasco is one of the highest cities in the world, perched atop the Andean Mountains. Even though he has returned to his homeland, Orue feels like an outsider. In the second video, learn how to scan, clean and color-correct medium format film, as Orue demonstrates the necessary steps for digitizing color film negatives.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Jane Kim has painted hundreds of species of animals as a scientific illustrator who creates large scale installations and murals, “inspiring people to love and protect the earth one work of art at a time.” Take a trip to the California Academy of Sciences with Jane Kim as she draws inspiration from their collection and talks about an early obsession with teddy bears that led her to a life of using art to give the natural world a stronger voice.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Nigel Poor is a photographer who spends time documenting everyday existence, exploring the meaning of the traces of ourselves that we leave behind. She focuses on ordinary objects and materials, researching what makes an object “worthy of preservation,” in her words. This KQED Art School video was created in collaboration with SFMOMA, who commissioned art-making activity ideas from Nigel Poor for their Open Studio project.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Artist Evah Fan makes drawings, zines and more in a style that is influenced by wordplay and folk art techniques. She tells visual stories through her interpretation of words she finds tantalizing with their multiple meanings. She emphasizes that style is not a skill that can be found overnight, but rather developed over years and realized in retrospect.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Chad Hasegawa paints portraits of bears and notable artists, and his style is influenced heavily by the Abstract Expressionist movement, and a thrifty approach to materials. He has created murals throughout San Francisco and shown his paintings and sculptures in galleries. His work balances between abstract and figurative art, with dense, wild brushstrokes that are often pieced together to create recognizable forms.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
San Francisco's Ben Venom creates punk quilts for everyday rockers who want to be cozy, as well as quilts that are a little less functional and sit more comfortably in a framed-art context. Venom takes his inspiration from the historical and social aspect of quilting, and particularly the Gees Bend community of quilters in Alabama, who are highly regarded as some of the most significant contributors to African American art history.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Elisabeth Higgins O'Connor creates poignant, larger-than-life figures that are seemingly cobbled together with reused scrap materials including wood, textiles and newspaper.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Ranu Mukherjee creates "Hybrid films" using layers of video, paintings and collage to create moving images. In the latest episode of Art School, Mukherjee unpacks the narrative and details behind her newest piece, Home and the World, which examines cultural hybridity, the aftermath of colonialism, and feminist questions. Inspired by a scene from a film by Satyajit Ray, as well as the composition of traditional Indian lithographs, Mukherjee combined these influences with her own visual culture to create a subtle but complex moving image.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Ever wondered how comics are made? How about how to draw your own? In this video, Thien Pham, a graphic artist from Oakland, CA, will show you step-by-step how to create your own comic, from writing the plot to drawing the four-panel itself.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Watch as portrait artist, Jeremy Sutton reveals his inspirations, from historical art masters to the passionate subjects of his portraits. Portraits were historically commissioned by either members of the Church or the absurdly wealthy, but Sutton chooses to focus his portraits on the complete opposite -- everyday scenes from everyday members of society, almost as an act of rebellion.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Learn how Lynn Ferris uses watercolor materials and skills to create her works of art.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Learn how monotypes are created by examining the work of artist Susan Carney.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
About the Arts, Care & Connection Lesson Collection: Arts for Learning Northwest collaborated with Oregon teaching artists on this collection of arts integration modules designed for K-5 students, with integrated social emotional learning content in the areas of dance, visual arts, theater, and music.
Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan
This unit, developed by Northshore School District in Washington, contains four days of lessons with suggested extensions that connect with SEL Standards 1, 2, 4, and 5 and Music Standard 2, 3, 4 and 11. The class will create the verses to the song “Floating in Space”. Students will engage in activities where they analyze emotional characteristics of music, practice emoting without words, review “song form” and rhyming patterns, and review space vocabulary words.
Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan, Teaching/Learning Strategy, Unit of Study
Students will learn about an artist's sketchbook that includes drawings of ballet dancers. They will practice two ballet steps and discuss how an artist uses line to depict dancers in rehearsal. Students will make a sketchbook and produce a series of quick sketches of dancers.
Material Type: Diagram/Illustration, Lesson Plan
Artists are often particularly keen observers and precise recorders of the physical conditions of the natural world. As a result, paintings can be good resources for learning about ecology. Teachers can use this lesson to examine with students the interrelationship of geography, natural resources, and climate and their effects on daily life. It also addresses the roles students can take in caring for the environment. Students will look at paintings that represent cool temperate, warm temperate, and tropical climates. In this lesson students will: Identify natural resources found in particular geographic areas; Discuss ways in which climate, natural resources, and geography affect daily life; Apply critical-thinking skills to consider the various choices artists have made in their representations of the natural world; Make personal connections to the theme by discussing ways they can be environmental stewards; Identify natural resources found in particular geographic areas; Discuss ways in which climate, natural resources, and geography affect daily life; Apply critical-thinking skills to consider the various choices artists have made in their representations of the natural world; Make personal connections to the theme by discussing ways they can be environmental stewards.
Material Type: Activity/Lab, Assessment, Diagram/Illustration, Lesson Plan
Students create different versions of a known song and listen to contrasting recordings for musical differences and similarities.
Material Type: Activity/Lab, Assessment, Lesson Plan
Students explore expressive qualities in music through listening, singing, and moving.
Material Type: Activity/Lab, Assessment, Lesson Plan
