Artsplosure This Weekend!!!

What an exciting weekend we have coming up!!! We'll kick it off Friday night with the Banks Road Spring Carnival! I hope to see you there! I'll be in the dunking booth from 8-8:25pm, so come and see if you can knock me into the water!!

Artsplosure the Raleigh Arts Festival will be going on all weekend in downtown Raleigh at Moore's Square. This free festival includes artists selling their work from booths that surround the square. You will see painters, ceramic artists, potters, sculptors, jewelry makers, wood carvers, and much more. Even if you don't plan on buying anything from these artists you can still enjoy looking at their work. Take advantage of the opportunity to ask the artists questions about their work. Try asking them how they created it or why they created it. Ask them how they come up their ideas and what inspires them.

Throughout both Saturday and Sunday there will also be performers creating music of a variety of genres for you to enjoy. In the surrounding area you will also find art displays, an Impressionist Garden with life size sculptures and a sand sculptor. There will even be a stage completely dedicated to activities for kids! Click here to check out the Kidsplsure schedule.

I hope you will take advantage of this wonderful festival that we have right here in our city! Its fun for the whole family and has so much art to look at, listen to and enjoy. I hope to run into you there!

Second Grade Pinch Pot Creatures

Hallway display

Second Grade students learned about pinch pots, their history and how to make them. Pinch pots are created by inserting your thumb into a ball of clay and pinching the walls a little at a time as you turn the clay. We learned that pinching clay was a method of creating pottery before the invention of the potter's wheel but people still create pinch pots today. Just because pinch pots are simple and easy to make, it doesn't mean they have to be boring.

 We took our clay pots to the next level by turning them to create the mouths of our creatures. Students used their imaginations and creativity to create a monster or creature of their choosing. We had a range of creatures from silly to scary, alien to gremlin. To create the additions for making the arms, legs, eyes, etc students practiced rolling coils and pinching and pulling to manipulate the clay to make the forms they envisioned. They then learned to secure the additions by slipping and scoring the clay. After the creatures emerged from the kiln the students used acrylic paint to add color. To display them in the hallway the students created a background that they thought best illustrated where their creature would live.

I was very impressed by our second grade artists and the variety of creatures they created. Each creature had its own personality just like the wonderful second graders of Banks Road Elementary School.

Click here for ideas about creating pinch pots at home.

First Grade Still Life Paintings

First grade looked at work by artists like Vincent Van Gogh and Gustave Caillebotte to examine a style of painting called a still life. A still life is a work of art that shows common, everyday items such as flowers, fruit, glasses, and jewelry.
Students started by creating their table and background. We talked about creating texture by blending different colors with our brush strokes. We learned how to cut symmetrical shapes and used that technique to create our vases which we filled with painted flowers. To add a little
surprise to our still lifes we made some 3D flowers to spring off the page.
Throughout the project, each student was encouraged to choose their own colors and give their picture their own individual flair. Students used the classroom color wheels to help them pick colors that would contrast against each other or blend well together.

Creating Art with a Computer

Beverly Sills, a famous opera singer, once said, "Art is the signature of civilizations."

Just by looking at the artwork of a certain time period or place you can learn a lot about what is important to those people; their beliefs, their culture, the important events happening during that time, etc. You can also learn a little about the resources they had through the media with which they chose to make their art.

Some of the earliest examples of art that we can still look at today are the drawings done on cave walls such as in Lauscaux, France. These paintings often portray animals and hunting, both of which would have been very important to the survival of the people creating them.

Throughout history, as technology has changed and civilizations have changed, artists have continued to create art with the tools and materials available to them. One of the tools that has become popular in the art of today is the computer. There are many programs designed to create art on the computer. Some allow you to manipulate photography, others allow you to draw and paint, stamp, and design.

Using the classroom computers, students have had the opportunity to experiment with some of the free programs available on the internet for creating artwork using a computer. Here is some of what they have come up with.

Check out some of the links in the sidebar to the right to try creating your own computer art!

Just Dance and the Arts

Recently, the specialists collaborated on a project that brought together movement, visual art and music. We hooked up the Wii to the projector and used the huge screen that we made for the holiday program to project the game Just Dance 2.

We learned about how dancing is not only a fun way to get your heart pumping, making you healthier but a way that many cultures around the world, and throughout time, have expressed themselves. We also learned about how the design of the video game itself needs an artist or designer's eye to make it the best it can be.

The designers could have just made plain backgrounds with plain people to go with the music and dance and you still could have a good time playing the game. Instead, they brought in more by dressing the characters up in clothes that represent the time period, culture or subject of the song. The backgrounds also help to enhance our experience by providing us with landscapes of other places and even some very famous architecture such as St. Basil's Cathedral and the Taj Mahal.

Sometimes it is easy to forget how important art is in our lives, but if you stop for a second and look around, you will probably notice it all around you. It is in the music you listen to on your way to school or work, in the posters on your walls, the design of your video games. Throughout time art has been a way to add a little spice to life and a way for people to express their feelings and ideas. We can learn about different places, cultures, time periods and even the person we sit right next to everyday through the art they make. Go and leave your own mark on the world! Be creative! Go make some art!

Barnes and Noble Night

Don't miss our Barnes & Noble book fair this Thursday, November 17th from 5:00pm to 8:00pm! It is being held at the Barnes & Noble Cary location directly across from the Cary Town Center mall. The profits will be used to replace lost and damaged books for the media center.
There is a lot going on that night!

Here is a schedule of events:

5:00pm to 6:00pm Shop in the store

6:00pm to 7:00pm Scavenger Hunt/Read to Guido, the therapy dog

7:00pm to 7:30pm Holiday program sneak peek!

Don't miss all the fun! The Barnes & Noble cafe is creating a special drink called the "Banks Road Blazer" just for us! Come out and try it! Remember all purchases that evening will benefit our school media center, including those in the cafe! All you need to do is show the cashier your voucher! If you can not attend, you can shop all day at any Barnes and Noble with our school voucher and we will benefit! Vouchers will be available at the door that evening! You can also shop online from November 17th to November 22nd using the bookfair ID#10542132. Pass the bookfair ID# to your family and friends throughout the United States - online shopping can be done at anytime during that timeframe using that ID#.

The classroom that has the most students attend will receive a plate of cookies from Barnes & Noble! We hope to see you out there for a great evening of fun and friendship!!

Also, check out the Van Gogh inspired landscapes done by our wonderful second graders!!

Banks Road Students have work at the State Fair

The North Carolina State Fair is in full swing from now until October 23rd here in Raleigh. Some of the great things about the fair, other than the food, rides and games, are the diverse displays of arts and crafts from people all over our state.

There are fine art displays from professional artists, amateur artists and student artists from elementary school to high school. In fact, some of our Banks Road artists have work on display, so be sure to go check that out in the Kerr Scott Building!!

Visual fine art is usually defined as artwork such as drawing, painting, sculpture, collage, etc. In the past these are the types of art that are often displayed in galleries and art museums. The "fine arts" are usually art meant to be looked at but not used. Throughout history though, people have used their creativity and skills to make things we use everyday beautiful and unique. This type of art is called craftwork or sometimes just crafts. Craftwork could include pottery, furniture, blankets or clothes (these are often called textiles), needlework, etc and they are just as creative and can express just as much as the fine arts. You can find wonderful craftwork on display in several places around the fair and in some places you can even buy these crafts to take home: The Village of Yesteryear, Commercial Building and Education Building.

Some of the other creative things you might find at the fair but might not immediately recognize as art or using art skills are:
-cake decorating- some of those cakes look more like sculptures than cakes!
-face painting- it takes some creativity to do those elaborate face paintings
-Caricatures- you know, when they draw your portrait but they make your head way bigger than your body and they make you look a little funny

The Fair website has some great, downloadable scavenger hunts to get kids involved and interested in the exhibits and competition displays, so check out the Fair website.

Link to the Fair website:http://www.ncstatefair.org/2011/index.htm
Link to Fairgrounds Map: http://www.ncstatefair.org/2011/General/GetToFair.htm?tab=2#TabbedPanels1]]

Don't forget to click on the highlighted words in the text for links to more info!