Class Discussion 15 minutes

Transcription

1 Class Discussion 15 minutes POWERPOINT # 1. I have a question for you all. What is this a picture of? (A newspaper) How many people have this same newspaper? (Lots of people) If your parents get the (say the name of the paper Tribune Buffalo Grove etc.), did you know that everyone who gets this paper is looking at an exact copy that their neighbors all read? This is because if a process called printing. Who knows what printing is? (The process of reproducing letters, drawings or patterns.) If you look around you, can find many examples of things that are printed? Newspapers, books, worksheets, posters of (name of a celebrity children would know.) For hundreds of years the only people who were able to have books, letters or any artwork were the very rich. Even if you had a copy of anything like a book or artwork they were copied by hand. In other words all of those reproductions had to be done by re-writing every single word or hand painting every color. The invention of being able to print made it possible for more people to have access to information and it was used in artwork as well. POWERPOINT #2 One of the world s most famous graphic artists and printmakers is a man by the name of M. C. Escher. His work is enjoyed by millions of people all over the world and you may often see prints of his art in many math classes and science rooms. M. C. Escher is famous for using patterns, shapes and math to create woodcut prints. Through his art, he liked to make our minds do something called brain gymnastics and help us see things in new ways. The print you see here is called Relativity. What do you see happening? How many staircases do you see? What shapes do you see? What do you notice the most? What is interesting about the people? How does this print make you feel? Why? Prairie School Art Awareness

2 POWERPOINT # 3 Woodcutting is one of the oldest ways of printing and was used to make book pages and images. In order to create Relativity, M. C. Escher carved into a block of wood using a tool called a chisel. Once the block was carved, he then carefully used another tool called a brayer to roll ink over the carved parts. After the carved block was covered with ink, he pressed it onto special paper. It was important to get the right amount of ink on the block too much ink would fill in the lines and spaces and not enough ink would make the print lines look broken. POWERPOINT #4 M. C. Escher Dutch, Butterflies, 1948 Woodcut Print This is another print made by M. C. Escher called Butterflies. M. C. Escher used the same woodcut printing technique to print the black outlines and then used watercolor to paint inside the borders. POWERPOINT # 5 M. C. Escher Dutch, Sky and Water, 1938 Woodcut Print Now let s look at another one of M. C. Escher s prints called Sky and Water. What do you see happening in this picture? What shapes do you see? Why do you think it is called Sky and Water? Do you think color on the print would look better than black and white? Why? Which print do you like best? Why? Prairie School Art Awareness

3 Project 15 minutes Materials in PTO room: Stamps White index cards Wipes Newspaper to protect the desks Materials in classroom: Colored Pencils or crayons Markers Materials from Home: None Activity Background for Parents: Each student has made their own hand-stamped, hand-colored post cards from index cards. Each student needs one large stamp and starts out with 2 pieces of paper. Explanation to students: Take your stamp and use a dark colored marker to ink your stamp. Hint to kids: use the fat side of the marker not the tips. Stamp your paper 1 or more times to make a nice design. Color in the empty areas of the paper with colored pencils or crayons. Switch stamps with a neighbor and try it again. (Parents depending on how much time you have left, go ahead and give the children one or two more cards to allow them to make 4 post cards total) When you are done you can take your personalized postcards home and ask your parents to help you send them to someone special. Prairie School Art Awareness

4 Artist Background: This is reference for presenter supportive material so you know more about the artist. Picture #1 Relativity 1953, Woodcut Print M. C. Escher s (born Maurits Cornelis Escher) artistic style is one of the 20th Century's most easily recognized. He was a very humble man, and insisted he was neither an artist nor mathematician. Although he had no formal mathematical training, his work was and still is respected and studied by mathematicians and scientists worldwide. Escher s greatest joy came from creating prints that challenged the mind and caused the viewer to look at the world in new ways. He enjoyed making people perform what he called mental gymnastics. His work helped pave the way for the Op Art movement, which uses precise patterns and geometrical shapes painted in vivid colors or blackand-white to create optical illusions of movement to fool the viewer's eye. The print Relativity is one of Escher s most recognized works and is studied for its artistic and scientific complexity. It depicts a world where normal laws of gravity do not apply. The architectural structure is at the center of a community, with the inhabitants casually going about their day. There are a total of six stairways, with the three most prominent staircases arranged in a triangle. The staircases are seen from many different viewpoints, with several people simultaneously climbing or descending them in an impossible way, defying the law of gravity. There are windows and doorways leading to park-like outdoor settings. All the figures are dressed in identical attire and have featureless bulb-shaped heads. Many of Escher s other works also feature these faceless characters. The world shown in this print has three sources of gravity, with sixteen characters spread between each center of gravity. The print plays tricks with the mind because all three gravity sources are shown in the same space. For example, on the top stairway, two people use the same staircase in the same direction and on the same side, but each are using a different face of each step; thus, one descends the stairway as the other climbs it, but they are moving in the same direction almost side-by-side. In the other stairways, characters are shown climbing the stairs upside-down. Picture #3 Sky and Water I 1938, Woodcut Print Sky and Water I is among M. C. Escher s most famous and meaningful works and shows one of his best-known concepts of metamorphosis (a change in physical appearance from one form to another). As the birds and fish move to the center of the picture, they become more and more simple. When the birds and fish meet, they are flat and made of made of only a few light and dark lines, with no definition. As the images move out from the center, they become more defined and three dimensional. The birds become free and fly away as the fish dissolve into sky; the fish sink into the dark and swim, as the birds melt into water. Sky and Water I also represents the concept of opposites: sky and water, birds and fish. Also, each bird is placed exactly opposite a each fish. Escher wanted his work to tell a story to those who viewed it and many believe the forms Escher chose for this print are meant to provide a clear message to the viewer. The fish and birds are turned Prairie School Art Awareness

5 into air and water via the metamorphosis, creating a powerful metaphor for the inseparability of life from the elements it needs to survive and interdependent relationship between the Earth's ecosystems. Prairie School Art Awareness