IB Visual Arts Artist Project Criteria and Checklist

The Artist Project is HL-only and is externally assessed out of 40 marks. Students submit three mandatory files:

One PDF file (up to 12 screens) containing visual evidence and supporting written material (maximum 2,500 words)
One video file (maximum 3 minutes) documenting how the artwork was realized and presented in its chosen context, accompanied by a 100-word statement of finalized artistic intentions
One separate text file listing sources used

The PDF submission must be organized into clearly labelled sections:

Project proposal – up to 3 screens (500 words)
Connections – up to 4 screens (1,000 words)
Dialogues – up to 2 screens (500 words)
Project evaluation – up to 2 screens (300 words)
Ideas for further development – 1 screen (200 words)

The portfolio must present curated visual and written evidence demonstrating how the project developed from initial idea to final realized artwork, including research, dialogue, refinement and evaluation.

Generative Statement:

"A photograph captures reality. Painting is where you decide what matters."

You have two missions!

Plan the exhibition of you "Artists Project" Artwork on May 20th.
Start your "Last and Final Artwork" use your photo essay as refeeance, use the elementa of art and principles of design to make a painting not just a copy of a photogaph.

IB Art 10 Photos

Post 3 to 10 of your photos from your photo essay in this google slide deck. You need to include your theme or statment, title and your name on the slide.

3 thumbnail painting ideas

(must be DIFFERENT, not just rearranged)

You can use any painting material, including mixed media and drawing materials.

How can I transform personal photographic documentation into a painted work that intentionally shapes meaning, emotion, and viewer response?

in process:

select
manipulate
distort
emphasize
omit
situate

Curate • Investigate• Generate • Refine • Resolve • Situate • Synthesize

Technical skill is developed through investigate, applied during generate, improved via refine, demonstrated in resolve, and brought together in synthesise. Knowledge is gained through investigate and applied through situate.

Final Painting Prompt

Using your 10-photo essay as source material, create a painting that does NOT document your life or a story, but instead reveals what your life or stroy feels like.

Requirements (frame as challenges, not rules):

Combine, crop, or distort your photos
Use the formal elements to make desision on how to change your photo.
Remove something important OR exaggerate something uncomfortable
Alter color intentionally (not realistically)
Use space to create meaning (not just background)

Include at least one moment of tension, contradiction, or ambiguity. This creates a juxtoposition.

The Artist Project - This is a REAL IB Assessment that mean TEST!

Take out a device pull up your screens for your Artist Project
Take out your Artist Project Art Project and supplies.
Make sure you have at least three people fill out a Critique Discussion Worksheet
Finalize your art project and justify your decision based on the critique discussion of your artwork.
Finalize your 12 Artist Project screens based on the template below.

Artists Project Example from the IB

Artsist Project Template

You MUST include the discussion in your Artist Project Screens!

Critique and Discussion Questions for the Artist to answer:

What is my core idea?

What question am I investigating?

What risks am I taking?

What is unresolved?

Who are your artsist?

Critique and Discussion Questions for the Viewers:

1. Conceptual Clarity

What feels clear?
Where does the idea get confusing?
What feels generic?

2. Alignment

Does this feel connected to their inquiry?
Does it feel like part of a sustained project?

3. Risk + Ambition

Is this interesting to you?
Where could they push further?

Hope Rizzo - VAJ #14 Altered Surface Project Final Reflections

Exhibiting Forgiveness - Titus KapharEXHIBITING FORGIVENESS Roadside Attractions Takes André Holland & Andra Day Sundance Pic ‘Exhibiting Forgiveness’ André Holland Leads an Acting Master Class in the Wrenching Drama ‘Exhibiting Forgiveness’ ‘Exhibiting Forgiveness’ Review: An Artist Comes to Grips With His Lout of a Father in a Forceful Drama Free of Feel-Good Fakery ‘Exhibiting Forgiveness’ Review: Art, Emotion And The […]

www.moma.org/calendar/galleries/5663

IB Visual Arts: The Altered Surface & Artist Project

TED Talk: Titus Kaphar | Can art amend history?

23 Curtis Altered Surfaces Painting Project

Preparing_for_digital_assessment

Copy of Florence Lundborg WPA Murals

The_Quest_for_Knowledge_vs_F-111_Mural_Comparison.pdf

Make one for each artwork:

Your Name

Title of the Artwork

Medium Used: Acrylic on Canvas

Exhibition Text: No more than five sentences.

IB Visual Art Assessment Info Seniors 2025/26

New Sketchbook assignment: 100 Figures & 100 faces that we are working on today!
How will you display your Charcoal Portrait for the viewer?
What is the situation you will be displaying?
Does the "situate" change the art?

Untitled document

Visual Rhythm figures and symbolism

3 Types of Rhythm you can plan...

Regular rhythm

Flowing rhythm

Progressive rhythm

Alternating rhythm

Random Rhythm

3 Ways to take action an make patterns...

repetition which creates patterns through predictability

alternation which creates patterns through contrasting pairs (thick/thin, dark/light)

gradation which creates patterns through a progression of regular steps

WINTER ARTS FESTIVAL SETUP & Critique TOMORROW!

What do you need?

(2) Finished artworks (2) Exhibition Text (1) Charcoal Drawing (1) Your Name Displayed

Charcoal self portrait or other charcoal portrait ready to hang.
MP1 painting and/or Independent Project ready to hang with text written or typed.
Visual Rhythm Project ready to hang with text written or typed.

New_2025 Curriculum.pdf

Untitled presentation

Preparing_for_digital_assessment

Copy of Shared Visual Art: Word Bank 2024

Forms_and_Strategies_AIP sample 1

Finding Your Personally and Culturally Relevant Starting Point.pdf

shadows of the head and face .pdf

DRAWING-PORTRAITS-FACES-AND-FIGURE-Giovanni-Civardi.pdf

google sesarch of Amy Sherald

Exhibition Final Assessment

Amy Sherald: American SublimeThis exhibition includes a billboard across from the Museum’s entrance on Gansevoort Street. Amy Sherald is a storyteller. She creates precisely crafted narratives of American life, selecting, styling, and photographing her sitters as the foundation for her nuanced paintings. Thus, while Sherald (b. 1973; Columbus, Georgia) bases her works on specific people, they are more than traditional portraits. They center everyday Black Americans, compelling in their individuality and extraordinary in their ordinariness, inviting viewers to step into Sherald’s imagined worlds. In this exhibition, paintings of such ordinary Americans join her iconic portraits of First Lady Michelle Obama and, heartbreakingly, Breonna Taylor, to produce a resonant ode to the multiplicity and complexity of American identity. Sherald also makes the images she wants to see in the world. Although she considers herself an inheritor of the American Realist tradition of artists such as Edward Hopper—a genre that was central to the Whitney’s origins nearly a century ago—those artists focused on the lives of everyday white Americans. Instead, Sherald privileges a population that has historically been omitted from art history and wider visual representation. By doing so, she challenges us to think more broadly about American Realism, suggesting an additional lineage for it: one born from the art departments and galleries of Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), where she first trained as an artist, and one that includes such underrecognized figures as William H. Johnson, Archibald Motley, and Laura Wheeler Waring, among others. Across Amy Sherald: American Sublime, Sherald’s contemplative subjects appear most concerned with their own interiority, prioritizing their own peace and self-realization over how others might perceive them and the shackles of history, though they are inevitably impacted by both. Her audacious project highlights what she has called the “wonder of what it is to be a Black American,” rendering a rich and unconstrained Black world in vibrant Technicolor. Amy Sherald: American Sublime is organized by San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. This exhibition is curated by Sarah Roberts, former Andrew W. Mellon Curator and Head of Painting and Sculpture at SFMOMA. The presentation at the Whitney Museum of American Art is organized by Rujeko Hockley, Arnhold Associate Curator with David Lisbon, curatorial assistant. Amy Sherald: American Sublime is sponsored by Major support is provided by Major support is also provided by Judy Hart Angelo, Nancy and Steve Crown, Agnes Gund, Hauser & Wirth, the Kapadia Equity Fund, The KHR McNeely Family Foundation | Kevin, Rosemary, and Hannah Rose McNeely, Nancy and Fred Poses, and Anne-Cecilie Engell Speyer and Rob Speyer. Significant support is provided by Marcia Dunn and Jonathan Sobel, The Holly Peterson Foundation, and Dana Su Lee. Generous support is provided by Sarah Arison, Alexandre and Lori Chemla, John and Amy Griffin Foundation, Ashley Leeds and Christopher Harland, Deepah Kumaraiah and Sean Dempsey, McCallum Family, Jonathan M. Rozoff, Todd White and Cameron Carani, and an anonymous donor. Additional support is provided by Suzanne and Bob Cochran, Sheree and Jerry Friedman, Barbara and Michael Gamson, the Girlfriend Fund, Alice and Manu Sareen, Barbara Karp Shuster, and George Wells and Manfred Rantner. New York magazine is the exclusive media sponsor.

Generative Statement: "The gaze between artist, subject, and viewer determines the story a portrait tells.”

Lines of Inquiry:

How does Sherald’s calm, direct gaze from her subjects shift power between viewer and sitter?
What strategies can artists use to control or complicate the viewer’s gaze?

How do lighting, framing, and expression affect the perceived relationship between subject and observer?

Generative Statement: "Portraits do not show who we are they show who we choose to be.”

Lines of Inquiry:

How does Amy Sherald use color, clothing, and pose to construct identity rather than record it?
In what ways can artists manipulate realism and symbolism to express chosen identities rather than likeness?

How do social, cultural, or historical contexts influence how we present or conceal aspects of ourselves in portraiture?

Generative Statement: "Rhythm in portraiture shapes how we move through a face, a body, and a story.”

Lines of Inquiry:

How does Amy Sherald create visual rhythm through patterned clothing, repeated shapes, and controlled color fields?
How can rhythmic repetition guide a viewer’s eye across a portrait to reveal or emphasize meaning?
In what ways can artists disrupt rhythm to create tension, pause, or emotional impact in a figure?

Zuaro intermediate_AIP_submission_blurry_movement

Expressive Self Portrait Drawing Using Grid

Leonardo da Vinci Drawings to Print.pdf

My underpainting is done now what?

What was the main ingredient for your underpainting?

What's our next main ingredient?

Next Week: Meetings with Ms. Z about Artist Inquiry Portfolio & "Figures in an Environment" painting.

AcrylicBasicsColorMixing.pdf

"About the Art" you made...

Explain your purpose: Clearly state the intent behind your experiments and artworks.
Describe your process and challenges: Detail what you tried, what worked, and what didn't. Discuss technical problems you encountered and how you solved them.
Connect to influences: Explain which artists or cultural movements inspired you, what specifically you liked about their work, and how these influences shaped your own artistic decisions.
Show personal and cultural connections: Reflect on how the work is connected to your own life, your attitudes, and broader social or cultural issues.
Evaluate your work: Critically assess the outcomes. What is working well, and what could be improved? How will your reflection guide your future work?.
Make explicit links: Cross-reference pages and connect ideas across different parts of your journal to show how your thinking has developed.

Take all of this information and make at least two google slides with photos of your artwork, process photos and photos of your sketchbook. No good slide templates!

Christina's World - Wikipedia

Generative Statement:

Artists use the relationship between the figure and their environment to construct narratives that reveal identity, emotion, and the human condition.

Lines of Inquiry:

How can the environment function as a character in a narrative artwork?
- Students investigate how surroundings—natural, architectural, or symbolic—communicate emotion, mood, or context beyond being a backdrop.
In what ways do artists use the figure-in-environment to express identity or social commentary?
- Students explore how placement, context, and symbolism around the figure reveal personal, cultural, or political narratives.
How can composition, color, and spatial relationships between the figure and setting create psychological or emotional depth?
- Students experiment with formal elements to amplify narrative tension and the viewer’s emotional engagement.

Figure and Environment

Option 1 – Storytelling Focus

Generative Statement:

“The spaces we inhabit tell our stories as clearly as our faces do.”

Line of Inquiry:

How can an artist use environment, setting, and atmosphere to reveal emotion, character, or narrative?

Option 2 – Psychological Space

Generative Statement:

“Every place is a portrait of the person who occupies it.”

Line of Inquiry:

How can setting function as a psychological mirror, reflecting the inner world of a figure?

Option 3 – Presence and Context

Generative Statement:

“A figure without context is a ghost; space gives them meaning.”

Line of Inquiry:

How does an artist bring a figure to life through interaction with the surrounding environment?

Option 4 – Time and Memory

Generative Statement:

“Our environments hold the memory of our movements.”

Line of Inquiry:

Miles Krajnak - VAJ #13 Draw 100 Figures

Hope Rizzo - VAJ #14 Altered Surface Project Final Reflections

Exhibition Final Assessment

Sherlyn Trujillo - VAJ #5 Ideas for the Figure in an Environment using Symbolism Project

Asha Rou Rivera - VAJ #5 Ideas for the Figure in an Environment using Symbolism Project

Reagan Maldonado - VAJ #5 Ideas for the Figure in an Environment using Symbolism Project

Week 3 – Sep 26-

Draw 2 experimental sketches using your reference photo in your sketchbook. Be sure to use two different drawing materials even different paper but it needs to be in our IB sketchbook.

DUE MONDAY:

2 sketches in two different drawing mediums.
Photo references and inspiration references, printed or saved to a school issued device.
ALL your materials and "ground" in class for your identity still life final project.

You will be committing to a STILL LIFE today and the materials you will explore. Each student confirms with Ms. Zuaro on our shared google sheet and print their photo.

Assignment Title: Artist’s Inquiry Portfolio – Topic Exploration
Instructions: Narrative Still Life: Brainstorm potential topics. Identify personal interests. Create exploratory sketches.
Due: Sep 19
Generative Statement: Your personal experience is the only valid source for meaningful art.
Resources: None

Personal Narrative Still Life Drawing Easy Middle High School Art Project

Week 2 – Sep 19

Personal Narrative Still Life Drawing Easy Middle High School Art Project

Week 0 – Sep 9

Assignment Title: Welcome & Course Overview
Instructions: Introduce yourself to IB Visual Arts. Organize your sketchbook, review materials.
Due: Sep 12
Generative Statement: How much of your humanity are you willing to give up to gain comfort and ease. This is the question we have for AI and tech in the future.
Resources: None

2027_VA_info_presentation

Week 1 – Sep 12

Assignment Title: Welcome & Course Overview
Instructions: Introduce yourself to IB Visual Arts. Organize your sketchbook, review materials.
Due: Sep 12
Generative Statement: Art is only worth doing if it shocks someone, or gets a large emotional response.
Resources: None

Finding Your Personally and Culturally Relevant Starting Point.pdf

Week 4 – Sep 26

Assignment Title: Research & Concept Sketches
Instructions: Research 3 artists or movements. Create 3–5 concept sketches inspired by your research.
Due: Sep 26
Generative Statement: Research is irrelevant; instinct matters more than knowledge in art.
Resources: Leonardo da Vinci – Met (Renaissance)

the exquisite corpse

Prompts for your creation:

"The embodiment of boredom”
“Happiness wearing a disguise”
“A walking dream”
“Chaos turned into a person”
“Technology come to life”

The "exquisite corpse" (from the French cadavre exquis) is a collaborative creative game originally invented by Surrealist artists in the 1920s. It is a group activity where participants contribute a piece of a larger creation without seeing what the others have done. The final result is an often absurd, surprising, and dream-like composition that taps into the participants' collective unconscious. The classic drawing gameThe game was first adapted visually from a parlor game called "Consequences". How to play:

Start with a paper. Fold a piece of paper into as many sections as there are players, with each section representing a part of a figure (typically head, torso, and legs).
Draw the first part. The first player draws a head on the top section of the paper, making sure the neck lines extend slightly into the next section.
Fold and pass. The first player folds the paper to conceal their drawing and passes it to the next person.
Draw the next part. The next player uses the few visible lines as a guide to draw the next section (the torso and arms).
Repeat. Players continue to fold and pass the paper until the figure is complete.
The reveal. The group unfolds the paper to discover the strange, mismatched creature they have created together.

The creative philosophyFor the Surrealists, the exquisite corpse was more than just a game; it was a way to explore spontaneity, chance, and the creative potential of collective authorship. By suppressing rational control, the artists were able to create an entity that none of them could have imagined alone. The name itself came from a phrase created during an early literary version of the game: "Le cadavre exquis boira le vin nouveau," or "The exquisite corpse will drink the new wine". Variations and influenceOver the decades, the exquisite corpse method has been applied to a wide range of creative media:

Literary: Writers follow a sentence structure, such as "adjective-noun-adverb-verb-adjective-noun," to create a surreal poem or story.
Film: In 2012, the comedy group Olde English created The Exquisite Corpse Project, a feature film where each writer could only see the last five pages of the script before writing their section.
Music: Composers John Cage and Lou Harrison created pieces by writing a bar of music and passing it on, with only one or two notes visible to the next person.
Comics: In 1995, Art Spiegelman and R. Sikoryak co-edited The Narrative Corpse, a comic book with contributions from dozens of artists.

The game has been played by notable artists including Frida Kahlo, Salvador Dalí, and Man Ray. Its enduring legacy continues to serve as an icebreaker and a source of inspiration for creative minds today.

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IB Visual Arts Artist Project Criteria and Checklist

Generative Statement:

"A photograph captures reality. Painting is where you decide what matters."

You have two missions!

Plan the exhibition of you "Artists Project" Artwork on May 20th.

Start your "Last and Final Artwork" use your photo essay as refeeance, use the elementa of art and principles of design to make a painting not just a copy of a photogaph.

Final Painting Prompt

Make one for each artwork:

Your Name

New Sketchbook assignment: 100 Figures & 100 faces that we are working on today!

3 Types of Rhythm you can plan...

Regular rhythm

Flowing rhythm

Progressive rhythm

Alternating rhythm

Random Rhythm

WINTER ARTS FESTIVAL SETUP & Critique TOMORROW!

My underpainting is done now what?

What was the main ingredient for your underpainting?

What's our next main ingredient?

Next Week: Meetings with Ms. Z about Artist Inquiry Portfolio & "Figures in an Environment" painting.

"About the Art" you made...

Take all of this information and make at least two google slides with photos of your artwork, process photos and photos of your sketchbook. No good slide templates!

Generative Statement:

Lines of Inquiry:

Option 1 – Storytelling Focus

Option 2 – Psychological Space

Option 3 – Presence and Context

Option 4 – Time and Memory

Week 3 – Sep 26-

Week 2 – Sep 19

Week 0 – Sep 9

Week 1 – Sep 12

Week 4 – Sep 26

the exquisite corpse

Prompts for your creation: