Visual Art

Students will engage with various art mediums to nurture their creativity.

Leslye Correa, Teacher (2022)

Daisy Baeza, Substitute Teacher (2023)

Asya Dubrovina, Teaching Artist (2023)

Robert Zant, Teaching Artist (2022)

Class Information

Grade Levels: 4th - 8th

Class Schedule (days/times): T/Th 3:00 - 5:00

Academic content: Translation, Narrative, Storytelling, History (personal, place-related), Composition

Art forms: Comics, Animation, Stop Motion, Drawing, Painting, Sculpture, Photography and Video

Big Idea: No such thing as a blank page

Inquiry Question: How can we use something old to make something new?

Storyboards

We started off our CAPE class making storyboards about a place called Gocachi, which is a place that's like Chicago but different in many ways. This got students thinking about a place that was familiar yet different. They were able to tweak what they knew to make something new. This activity also helped us create sketches that would later act as a roadmaps or blueprints for longer-term projects.

Integrating analog mediums with digital media

Many of our projects included older media (painting, drawing, and sculpture) and newer media (photography, stop motion, and video). Integrating the two was a really rich exercise, and students really seemed to enjoy hopping between the two forms. Pictured here is a big stop-motion project by Jazyln, who made more than a dozen paintings that became animated when strung together as a stop-motion.

Jazlyn has been painting the beach and the mountains the whole spring. She imagines that is what a place in Mexico looks like. Artmaking is really crucial for the kids to feel connected to their heritage since many can't go back or visit.

How a Flower Grows.mp4

Jazlyn+Austin.mp4

Stop Motions

Our biggest project in the Fall were the stop motions. Students worked collaboratively in small groups to make a storyboard, create characters, create a soundtrack, and take pictures of their stories, which were strung together into short (but very laborious!) stop motion animations.

Rhianna+Xochi+Xochiquetzal.mp4

Infomercials

In the spring our first project was picking an object which would have a power to do something extraordinary. Students worked in 3 groups to plan, film and edit their videos. The objects they chose to have powers are a headlamp that shrinks you, a spray bottle that can make someone annoying quiet and a walkie talkie that is a ghost detector. The students had a lot of fun and acted in each others infomercials.

IQ.mp4

Ghost Detector.mp4

Leecheese.mp4

Naia and Aidan.mp4

Rhianna and Xochitl- bullying.mp4

Film Production

After creating infomercials, our CAPE club wanted to make films!! One group created a story about being bullied and another group made a murder mystery film. The goal for these films was to do preparation before filming such as writing lines and communicating with actors and of course storyboarding. We also wanted the students to have a message at the end of each film. They had a lot of fun and became comfortable with different roles.

Creating a story about being bullied is really courageous for this age. Most of the projects are silly and funny, but being able to have a conversation through filmmaking about a serious topic is really crucial in helping the students develop their voices.

Collaboration

Students worked collaboratively for many of the projects we did throughout the school year. This model of working helped them explore a dialogue about the creative process - the question "what should we do next?" came up a lot, and students were often able to chat through what they wanted the project to look like. This sometimes involved compromise and other times involved having to step outside comfort zones (in using new mediums or technologies, for example). Creative partnerships and even friendships were forged throughout the year.

Throughout the collaboration of film projects in the spring, a 5th grader became a mentor for a 4th grader. In the fall, a memorable afternoon included unstoppable laughter from a new friendship/colalboration between a 7th grader and 4th grader - while building props for a stop motion, one student mistook what was meant to be a table for a cow. The cow-table had everyone in stitches!

Working on a sculpture for stop motion animations

Frotage exercise - finding all the school's textures

:) :)

Don't wear green while greenscreening! :P

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