alt-J - Tessellate | Music Videos in Art Classroom

Welcome to Part III Tessellations and Alt J | Using Music Videos in the Classroom

 If you haven't read parts I and II, I encourage you to do so before watching the video below. 

Without any backstory, the students watched (at the time, many had not heard of this band yet) and I opened up the floor with one question. A question that seemed necessary to ask considering the snickering and comments being whispered in class. 

"Would your parents have approved of this video being shown in class?"

Which led to, "Would they think it is educational? Why or Why not?"

They were in two clear camps. My parents wouldn't "care" (their chose of words not mine) camp and "Uhhhhh-NO! They wouldn't think it was classroom appropriate!"

Teacher:  Why not?

Students: I don't think they would like that kind of dancing and that you were showing it in class.

Teacher: Dancing or swaying? How many people were dancing?

Students: A lot. Most of them.

Teacher: I only saw a couple. Were they male of female?

Students: All of them were dancing.

Teacher: Perhaps it was the filming they would be opposed to not the actual movement? The close up shots, the pace to imply movement,  etc.?

Students: Exactly.

But that is not exactly what they said. I find their communication skills to be inferior to what they actually want to express (The students have a lot to offer. They think there is one "right" answer so they avoid giving possible suggestions) OR they haven't really LOOKED, therefore their opinions are vaguely informed.

Keen observation and critical thinking plays a major role in understanding the role of art; either as an artist or as a person appreciating art. Art cannot be observed quickly and reap its benefits. We are working on slowing down in the studio to improve our skills as well as our thinking. We need time to develop our thoughts. Here is link to the video I use for the opening lesson of the year that embraces the concept that "creativity takes time".

The simple dialogue above expresses quickly that I expect the students to really look and draw conclusions based on what they have observed--not judgements they have assumed to quickly.  Basically, we started with a Who, What, Where, When, Why approach to reveal the multiple layers happening in this video.

Let's start with the video's setting, Raphael's School of Athens, one of the most treasured frescoes in Italian art history.

A Brief Description of the Fresco

The fresco is the second of four representing the four branches of knowledge: poetry, philosophy, law, and theology.  The characters are the leading thinkers of the past and present time. The central figures are Plato (left) and Aristotle (blue), the fathers of Western philosophy. Both thinkers are referencing where knowledge is received. Plato points up referencing knowledge is received from an eternal, spiritual power. Aristotle gestures to the ground as his philosophy was based in earthly experiences of what we can see and touch.  Other notable figures are Ptolemy, Zoroaster, Pythagoras, Michelangelo, and Raphael himself. The figures on the left side of the composition are interested in mathematics, whereas the right side are scientists trying to explain reality. The sculptures of Apollo and Athena in the back upper niches parallel this duality or balance.

How It Went Down in the Studio Class

(The students have no prior knowledge about this fresco)

Teacher: Why does the video take place within this setting?

Student: I don't know. They are thugs. No one in this picture looks like a thug.

Student: They want to seem important.

Student: Yeah, you said these were the most brilliant minds of the time. They think they are or they want us to think they are. Thugs want to feel this important.

Student: Why does the one guy pour his liquor on  the ground? Is he saying he doesn't buy into this rich white guy story?

Student: No. Where I come from pouring liquor out, like that, or on a grave, is showing respect. This painting or place is like a grave. It has ancestors in it. I don't think they are thugs.

Teacher: You mentioned 'thug'. Why would the band choose that look or give that impression? (* the characters in the video are not the band members.)

Student: Because that's what a philosopher looks like today. Look at the rappers who have important stuff to stay about all kinds of things. It's just a look. It doesn't mean they are thugs.

Student: I think they are challenging our prejudice about that. By being in this place, we have to assume they are great thinkers. We shouldn't judge them by their appearance. But everyone does that today.

Student: I think putting them there elevates who they are. Just like the painter did. By putting them there, he elevates their role in society.

Teacher: What is philosophy? Who is Pythagoras, etc. Talk to those at your table and discuss.

Eventually each table peer taught one another about the characters with a little help from me regarding Ptolemy( mathematician and astronomer - his back is to us on the lower right side in a yellow robe) and Zoroaster (founder of the first world religion - holding a celestial sphere in front of Ptolemy). Raphael is standing amongst that group looking out at the viewer. In the video, a character gives a nod to the painter by wearing a Raphael t-shirt.

We held a discussion how once upon a time arts and science fed one another. Balanced one another by being equally important and relevant. Today our schools are focused on the analytical world of Aristotle and less on the ethereal world of Plato. School of Athens suggests both existed and created a balance.

At this point, I really don't need to be there. The students are conducting their own think tank and proposing new questions based upon their investigations.

Student: What role do the girls have? There are no girls in this painting?

Student: Exactly. Because women weren't important so they didn't make it into the painting. I mean, they were important but not considered to have anything important to say.

Student: That's why their mouths were blurred out when they were singing in the video. We still don't have a say.

Student: That one girl's mouth wasn't blurred out.

Student: Because only some girls have a say. It's better than when this painting was done but it's not equal. The girls look like they are just arm candy. They don't respect the women. They are there to get our attention and look sexy.

Teacher: Which worked since the first response was "This may be inappropriate". But they placed a woman in the position of Aristotle. Does that matter?

Students: Thinking...why do they keep making triangle signs?

Student: The Illuminati, dude.

Teacher: Branding? Self-promotion?

Teacher: Where are my IT kids? What happens when you click Alt + J on a Mac?

Students: ????

Teacher: This ∆. Delta, the fourth letter in the Greek alphabet and in mathematics the "change in" or difference of.  Visually, a triangle. Conceptually, leading us to love triangles, the Trinity, Egyptian concept of a universal nature (Isis, Osirus, Horus - Egyptians adopted from Pythagoras)

Students: Cool.

Teacher: Do you think we are right? It doesn't matter. It's our experience with it, so we are "right" to have it. We absorbed it and tried to have an experience with it and we didn't even touch on the lyrics. We did touch on assumptions, stereotypes, socioeconomics, feminism, equality, art history,

history, mathematics, philosophy, communication, etc. I believe we did something more valuable than filling in the blank of who painted The School of Athens. You engaged yourselves. You didn't accept your first observation. You contemplated. In my opinion, that's what going to School should be. You discover it. I don't do it for you.

If you enjoyed this post (or would like to add corrections, etc), please be sure to comment below. I'd love to hear from other educators using music, videos, pop culture in the classroom.

Skye

Stay tuned for more Film Friday features and be sure to follow the blog or like our FB page to get updates of new lessons.

And then several of us got to see the magic live on Dec 3rd at Grand Sierra in Reno, Nevada. Photo by Annalise Gardella (part of our concert tribe) on Instagram.

* There are several other elements: the lyrics, the shark, the filming style of speeding up the film and reversing it, that we could revisit.  What else?

Art Studio 508 in Tessellations | High School Art Lessons | Reno Nevada

MC Escher Metamorphosis 

Let's talk TESSELLATIONS. Tessellations are tilings created by juxtaposing shapes next to one another.  I'd love to see students discover tessellations through an open ended question and the internet. As a teacher, I feel we often give so much away. It's in the discovery that we learn so much. One fact leading to another connection and so on. For example, a quick Google search will bring a student to understand tessellations in math, science, nature, folk arts, metallurgy, artists, history, and materials conservation; well, beyond simply placing colored hexagons on paper. My role as an art educator is to develop their artistic skills by developing their own critical thinking abilities.

I want to encourage the role of discovery and research in my students' learning. Let me give a brief example. After this project, I was driving to school and a song I had never heard came on the radio, Tessellate by Alt J. It was a sultry rhythmic song whose chorus struck a chord in me;

Triangles are my favorite shape
Three points where two lines meet
Toe to toe, back to back, let's go, my love; it's very late
'Til morning comes, let's tessellate

With the sheer mention of tessellate, I hurried into the studio (classroom) and Googled the song. What happened next propelled our class into what became known as Film Friday--a day of thought provoking issues and think tanks through art. In my opinion, exactly what learning should look like. Pose a question, offer an image, a problem and let them discover its meaning.  If I had given them a worksheet or explain everything in a powerpoint, I'm robbing them of this multi-faceted, connected, hopping from lily pad to lily pad approach to learning. Learning should be an experience, not an activity that scores a 70% and time to move on.  According to my report cards, I did well in high school but no one could assess the merit of the real and most valuable experiences I learned in Ms Burnett's Sci-Fi/Fantasy class. She allowed us to discover and explore the big questions through literature. We discovered ourselves and our ability to navigate tough questions in life. She showed us how to look deeper, to investigate the possibilities. I want to teach guide like her. I want to see less handouts and more discovery.

Next year, this is the approach I will be taking with this opening project. For additional math connections, check the Math is Fun site for examples and play with the tessellation creator.

Click here to read more about using music videos in the classroom and how Alt-J helped me become a better educator in part II.

And we're back...with a focus on the high school art room

Yes--that's the first mach-up for
the Transporter  in Star Trek. Beam me up,
Scotty!

The 2013-2014 school year is underway and the NVartworks blog is back but with a big kid bent. I switched over to high school this year. I am thoroughly enjoying the discourse and talents of the high schoolers. As a newcomer onto this scene, other art teachers have been invaluable to the settling-in process. I am so grateful for their generous giving of knowledge and advice, especially upon learning after a quick Google search, that a disproportionate number of online lesson plans are geared for elementary art students.  Time to trust my gut and continue to make NVartworks a place for art educators, art lovers, and art students to gain inspiration and to celebrate our successes.

What's been going on?
My studio classes are 2D art from beginners to honors plus a couple of classes focusing on wearable arts such as clothing and jewelry. 

Getting the room together in the summer

Art 1/2 & 3/4 - Tessellations- Focus on line, pattern, value, and landscapes. A look at M.C. Escher and how Art is Math.

Art 5/6 Advanced 2D Art - What is student voice in art? How to focus on a concentration to create a collection. Students independently create the first piece in a portfolio of eight pieces.

Wearable Art -  How to hand-stitch and craft a custom purse--focusing on basic stitches, hemming, beading, inserting a panel, pattern making, design sketching, button sewing, and craftsmanship. A look at Linda Przybyszewski, Notre Dame Associate Professor of History discussing "A Nation of Slobs". Art is Math---how many yards of x fabric do we need for 70 students to create a purse x big.



Upcoming Projects from Studio 508

Art 1/2 - One and Two-point perspective with a look at Perugino, Da Vinci, and Estes and how Art is Math. During the Renaissance,  the Artist and the Scientist were the same person. How did they become so separated in our modern culture?
Art 3/4 - Marc Chagall inspired profile pastel drawings. A look at Expressionism and the art of visual storytelling.  A look at Frida Kahlo and her personal journey in paintings.  240 of Kahlo's photographs will be on display at the Nevada Museum of Art during the month of September. A required visit for 3/4 and 5/6 students.
Art 5/6 - Ongoing analysis of art works and creating meaning in an art piece. Taking risks with new media and drafting artist statments and beginning piece #2/8 in their collections. A required visit to the NMA.

A Goodbye Post with Flowers and Skulls

"Mom, life is like a roller coaster."
"Oh, yeah? What do you mean?"
"You never know what's coming around each corner. Sometimes it's crazy fun. Sometimes it's scary. The highs and lows."

You got it, Ruby! Life is like a roller coaster. A few days ago, a career opportunity knocked on my door. I wasn't looking. Why would I be looking? I had just spent the last year teaching art in Oz. It was wonderful to have the opportunity to introduce art to young children ages 4 - 11 in a school environment where art was appreciated and valued by the families. It really was magical. I learned how much I LOVE teaching art and how absolutely critical art is for a twenty-first century child. I hope to explore this more and express with you my findings in future blogs. I hope you stick around.

For the reasons of retirement, benefits, all the dry but important realities of growing up; and a lingering desire to teach high schoolers art, I accepted the position. Packing up was tearful and exciting. The tears prompted by the random passer-by popping into my classroom and reminding me just how wonderful the year has been. Tears came from the lovely texts and emails from parents. Tears came from the thoughtful Turkish cup and saucer left with a note on my desk from a student. Tears came from administration trying to find solutions to hold onto me as their art teacher. That meant a lot.

The NvArtworks blog and Facebook page will still be up and running but from a high school perspective. Students may even be contributing to the writing of posts. I hope you stick around.

For our last elementary blog, I want to end our run with our last project. Our Georgia O'Keeffe Flowers and Skulls project seems metaphorically fitting today.

Enjoy the work of your beautiful, young, creative artists.

All the above works were created by students in 2nd through 4th grades using watercolors, oil pastels, or a combination of both. A big thanks to the Kline and Yezeka (sorry if I have misspelled. I do not have access to the student rosters any more) families for taking our project to another level by sharing with us your knowledge of and collections of antlers, horns, and skulls. Thank you, Nevada State Wildlife Department for allowing us to borrow your collection of tracks and skull casts.

A bear, bobcat, mountain lion, and antelope skulls. We also had beaver, raccoon, and mink from which to gather inspiration.

I have a feeling they are going to remember what they learned from this last project for very long time. ART WORKS!

Almost ready to let go of the safety bar and release my hands into the air on this roller coaster ride.

A Hokusai Study : Elementary Art Lesson : Printmaking







To celebrate the coming of spring, we turned toward a Japanese artist focused on nature, Katsushika Hokusai. The students analyzed his pieces and learned that a print of a big wave offers so many things to think about. (visual literacy). We discussed the fishermen. Were they so skilled they could survive these waves-or not? We discussed how beautiful the ocean is and how it possesses great power and can be very dangerous. We discussed our landscape in the high desert, how we would depict it, and what stories it would  tell children in Japan. We observed how people may have lived over two hundred years ago in Japan and learned we may have something in common today across the globe in Northern Nevada.  To further our understanding of how powerful the waves are, we watched a YouTube video of a modern fishing boat on the high seas.

Taking another look at the artist's work, the children tested their visual literacy skills by suggesting the scene in the following print was of a picnic or camping (a very popular past time here in the Sierra Nevadas). They used the evidence of the blanket, starting a fire, and sitting somewhere picturesque to come to their conclusions. Close look art reading addresses many Common Core ELA standards of claims and evidence.

The Great Wave off Kanagawa : 36 views of Mt. Fuji Circa ~ 1823-1829

"The scene is titled Kisoji no oku Amida ga taki ("Amida Waterfall on the Kiso Road") from the series Shokoku taki meguri ("Journey to the Waterfalls in All the Provinces"), circa 1832. The name is based on the round hollow of the waterfall, reminiscent of the "round eye" (or perhaps halo) of Amida, Buddha of Boundless Light. A servant at the far left heats a water kettle while two men converse and admire the view from their spectacular vantage point." - taken from Viewing Japanese Prints

We tried to stay true to the ancient process of ukiyo-e. In traditional Japanese printmaking, there are three artists involved: 1) the concept artist who dreams up the idea, 2) the wood carver who engraves the concept onto several wood blocks, and 3) the inker who applies the ink to the wood blocks to make the print on rice paper. We completed our project in these same steps. However, each student held all three positions for their own art piece. Next time, I would like to stay more true to the process and have them rotate with two other students and see what happens!

Lesson Steps

The Concept

After viewing Hokusai's nature inspired images, students began by drafting a nature themed image within a circle. We traced a small cocktail sized paper plate for this step.  Grades 1-4 were graded on their coloring abilities. I was looking for control of the pencil, one direction (no scribble), and use of values (lightness and darkness of a color).

The Carving

Using a dinner-sized styrofoam plate we carved the concept into the bottom of the plate. We used pencils to carve. Don't use a super sharp pencil. Although is offers much better control and detail, it's much easier to pop holes into the plate which we don't want. A slightly dull pencil worked best for us.

The Inking

I tried brushes but the paint sinks into the grooves which will not make for a well defined print. I tried round sponge rollers. They sprayed the paint too much especially for really excited kids. Sponge brushes, the kind in the paint department at your local hardware store were best. The students were given two primary colors; some mixed to make three colors. Painted their plates and pressed them evenly onto a piece of paper.

Craftsmanship

Some classes chose to cut out the round images and displayed them on colored construction paper. Others enjoyed the pieces as they were on the original printed piece of paper. We sign and date all our art pieces--to me this is the final touch showing pride in one's creation. I have had one student profess, "I'm not proud of it, and I'm not signing it!". He recarved his plate (the grooves were not deep enough and the paint dried too quickly on the plate) and signed the second print.

Kindergarten

In Kindergarten, we had a wonderful discussion of Hokusai's artworks. The students are learning to discuss art while improving their communication skills. The students cut and glued colored construction paper in the style of Hokusai's The Great Wave. We did not use any templates. Their creations and interpretations are pure Kindergartner creativity.

Literary Extension

Our local library services carry two great biographical books for children about Hokusai.

Even Christian Dior produced a Hokusai inspired dress!!