Unit Two: What's It All About?

The previous unit encouraged students to explore where ideas for art expressions come from, and to make decisions about ideas for their own expressions. This unit, "What's it all about?", deals with how art expressions can be ordered to best suit the original idea.

All art works have their own sense of order and composition. All artists make decisions about how to compose their ideas, whether they work formally or rely on random occurrences. This unit focuses on how artists put things together for a purpose. Through interaction with art and the study of art works and visual images, students will begin to understand and use ideas from other artists and art forms.

Mini-unit 1: A Sense of Order

Suggested Activities	Possible Resources
Sample Theme: Mirrors Realistic Proportion The students will: continue to discover a variety of sources of inspiration and consider the sources as starting-points for personal expression reflect on and examine the intentions, development and interpretations of their own and their peers' art works.
Discuss what is important to each individual in becoming an adult. Have students write in their journals a short description of a role model and explain why they selected that person. Have students read their entries aloud. As a class, look for qualities which are similar. Discuss balance and proportion as they relate to everyday living.	Courageous Spirits: Aboriginal Heroes of Our Children by J. Archibald, V. Friesen and J. Smith
View artists' sculptures of people and discuss the methods and techniques used in creating a likeness and an impression of the individual. Have students create a realistic bust of the individual they described in their journals. Use clay or some other sculpting media. Be sure to insist upon that the students create a base for their bust. They will have to consider the size of the head and the intent of the message when designing their base.	Books, calendars, posters, etc. with examples of busts
Teacher Note Remember that clay should never be thicker than an inch and that it must be completely dry before firing. Students should hollow out their form when complete and when the clay is still damp.
Have students use a mirror to create a realistic self-portrait. Look at Ernest Lindner's "Self Portrait" and examine literary writing for sources of inspiration. Around the outside edges of their portraits, have students include information which will give insight into each individual. Look at examples of patterns on borders before starting, such as V. Cicansky's "Saskatchewan", G. A. Siwek's "Under the Hill" and M. Bolen's "Spring". Some ideas that could be used are demons, muses, fears, etc. To add interest and variety, use different drawing styles in the background and the foreground. Discuss the finished works. Refer to the section "Adapting the Viewing Process for the Discussion of Student Work" found in this guide.	Looking at Paintings Series -- Self Portraits by P. Roalf Saskatchewan Art Works slide #63 Saskatchewan Art Works, slide #5, 18, 24
Distortion The students will: continue to develop an understanding of the various ways artists acquire and transform ideas (feelings, experiences, social and political positions, etc.) into visual form.
Look at how people's lives can seem to be "out of proportion". Examples could include working constantly, unemployment, divorce and homelessness. What choices do people make which affect their lives? Examples could be poor planning and choices, decision to quit school, fate, risk, etc. How much are we the cause of our own "fates"?	Newspapers and magazines for examples of peoples lives
How do you feel about taking risks or chances? Students could play games which involve taking risks; for example "Masterpiece", "The Price Is Right", Indian hand games. Discuss people who have taken risks and succeeded; for example, successful entrepreneurs.	Board games and hand games which involve risk taking Books about people who have taken risks; for example, Helen Keller
Distortion for a Purpose The students will: gain understanding about values, beliefs, ideas and traditions of various cultures through the study of the cultures' visual art works identify and explore the various functions of visual art; for example, art as entertainment, adornment, humour, etc. begin to understand the use of the principles of design in the work of others and increase the variety of ways they use the principles in their visual art expression continue to perceive, describe, analyse and interpret art works and make informed judgments about art works using increasingly appropriate vocabulary increase their understanding of the contributions of various artists, past and present, to the field of visual art. Look at visual art works for examples of exaggeration and distortion; for example, D. Hall's "Self Portrait with Black Mounds" and R. McLellan's "Consumer". Determine some of the expressive qualities that can be achieved through exaggeration and distortion. Have students design their own image again in clay and cut it into pieces which can be rearranged or pushed up or down. Discuss the expressive qualities of the changes.	Saskatchewan Art Works slides #59, 64
Examine the art works from other cultures and times to discover how people used exaggeration and distortion to express certain ideas, experience, propaganda, etc.; for example, gothic architecture, poster design ("Uncle Sam Wants You"), or African and Aboriginal masks. Have students research one of these topics to discover how the works mirror the culture that created them, and present their findings to the class.	Art reference books for examples of exaggeration and distortion
View films which have a great deal of exaggeration and distortion, for example, Charlie Chaplin's comedies. Discuss how he uses these techniques to achieve humour. Have students, in groups, prepare skits of a domestic scene, a marriage proposal, etc. Have them try to mix humour with a message by exaggerating the events. Videotape the groups' efforts. Ask the students to evaluate each group's presentation for content, presentation, effects, etc. and have them provide ideas for how they could have presented differently.	Films with exaggeration and distortion; for example, Charlie Chaplin's comedies
Examine editorial cartoons for examples of exaggeration and distortion. Have students use the techniques discussed and observed to design an editorial cartoon about an issue which is important to them. Reflect upon the interpretations and techniques used in the student works.	Newspapers for examples of editorial cartoons Cartooning: The Art and the Business by M. Gerberg

Unit Two continues