Designing with Teenagers
I’ve just started teaching an 8 week after-school art class to a group of teenagers. We’ll be making glued fabric collages and also learning about some basic art principles.
Last week, I did a kick-off Show and Tell with an interactive demonstration. Beforehand, I QUICKLY prepared a small background composition, with just sky and grass. To make it portable, I worked on one of my travel (i.e. small) black design walls. This is what it looked like when I took it in.
Click on any image for a larger view
(I was very happy with my quick sky, but I could see the grass would need some reworking. No worries. It suited my purposes.)
The students helped me make decisions about the addition of the first few pieces – only about 8 of them.
I was quite happy with this start. Those rough cut red/orange fabrics were definitely showing promise as flowers, and I think it was a good start to the composition.
But, I HAD to work on the grass. It was a little awkward to work on a portable design wall, since I had it propped on a table. This was my set up as I auditioned better grass fabrics.
I got rid of some of the darker and muddier fabrics, as well as some of the VERY yellowy greens. Plus, I added some more high contrast fabrics and interesting patterns. As you can see, I referenced two earlier pieces with grass in them.
And this is what it looks like now, with (I think ) all pieces pinned in place. I’m very happy with it.
When stitching the flowers I’ll use black thread and turn them into poppies. But it’ll be a while before I get to that: I’ve got to plan next week’s lesson!
Ellen Lindner
That sound like fun teaching teenagers! Better you than me. Nice explanation of how you made different fabric choices.
Chris
Hi Chris. It IS fun! (Although I had my doubts after the first two classes.) Now, we’re settling in though and I think it’s going to work out well.
Also, I’m gaining a new respect for all the prep work that art teachers (and all teachers) do!
Love your flower collage and you used such interesting fabrics. The sky is alive and it all blends so nice. Hope soon after more surgery that I will be able to do that too. Am still seeing double with my one eye. Am not giving up . Thank you for sharing how you made it. Love your work. Yoka
Thanks, Yoka, for your compliments and for noticing all the details. It IS fun to include a wide variety of fabrics and prints!
I hope you’ll soon be back to creating quilts!