We have an all -star line up for Friday's 8th Annual Artist Alumni Day. From fashion designers, to architects and graphic designers you will be impressed by the wonderful talented artists who graduated from Burlington High School. The schedule is below so feel free to come by and see all or some of the artists. Check out this great video featuring the artists from Jenn Scheffer:
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Principal John Lyons came to the art department to ask if we could redesign the logo for Pine Glen. Last year the Digital Publishing course helped to redesign the Francis Wyman Elementary School logo and it was a big success. Take a look at Jill's winning design above, then look below to how she got there.
If you don't already know about the digital publishing course here at BHS, it's a wonderful course that tasks students with creating real world projects. Timelines are tight and critiques are intense, but this class prepares students to work in a professional design agency atmosphere, learning both design and marketing skills. Mr. John Lyons from Pine Glen Elementary School recently asked us to create a new logo for the school. They are changing their mascot from a beaver to an owl so we took ourselves down to the science center, meeting Miss Pavlicek and Scout, the great barred owl that lives outside here at BHS. It was a great experience and it really helped us to understand how to draw owls. Which one do you think Pine Glen should use?! The web design classes here at BHS learned how to use Photoshop by creating some fantastic logos for made-up cafés. Students learned about hierarchy, illustrative techniques, text placement, as well as the specifics of Photoshop tools.
Last year Ms. Kennedy came up to me and suggested that we design clothing for students in the pre-school who have physical disabilities and/or global developmental delays. She noticed that the pre-school teachers had trouble putting coats on and off the students for recess. I thought, "what a great idea!" The fashion class raised money selling tickets for a chain department store and my students mentioned that they wanted to use that money and create something for others.
With limited experience creating children’s clothing, never mind adaptive clothing, I looked online for sources. The article, Design and disability: fashion for wheelchair users by fashion designer Rebecca Paterson really helped myself and my students to understand what it’s like to design adaptive clothing for people with disabilities. Rebecca was inspired by her sister, who has Cerebral Palsy, and created a line of adaptive clothing for her. She included flat garment drawings of her adaptive designs, allowing students to understand the needs of someone in a wheelchair. We met with the pre-school teacher, Ms. Shannon Conroy, and inundated her with questions. What type of clothing do these kids need? What fabrics do you think would be best? How about the best type of clasps? We realized that the best course of action would be to design fall and spring coats that Ms. Conroy could use in her own classroom for recess. I took my class of 8 students down to visit Ms. Conroy’s classroom. Working in groups of 2-3, students researched adaptive clothing designs and collaborated to create 2 different designs per group. We brainstormed as a class to refine the designs and then we made our pattern pieces, using current sewing patterns and altering them to suit our own needs. One final design was chosen per group and students worked together to complete the garments. I can not be more proud of my fashion students! Their big hearts coupled with positive attitudes and ambitions helped this project succeed. I am very lucky to be able to work with these students on a daily basis. Thank you to Shannon Conroy and Deborah Clark from the BECC! And thank you to the administration here at Burlington who continually support the students and staff here. CALL FOR ARTISTS
Cambridge Street Art Gallery is seeking proposals for exhibitions at the gallery at Burlington High School. Opened in Spring 2010, the new gallery space offers high profile visibility in the school with its location next to the BHS cafeteria. The secure gallery has one large window, three walls for hanging work and is 12 feet x 16 feet. Requirements: Artists must submit proposals to the gallery via email to [email protected]. Artists should include 10-20 images of artwork, artist statement and resume. Works of art must be appropriate for high school students. Gallery Information: The gallery is contained in Burlington High School and is located across from the cafeteria. The gallery can feature multi- media works of art, two dimensional hanging works, sculptures and installations. Artists are responsible for insuring their work. The school maintains no responsibility for the artwork. Artists are expected to participate and be on site for the hanging of the exhibition which is done with the BHS Art Department faculty. Sewing is not easy! Take a look at the self-portraits done by the Fashion class to help them learn how to sew on the sewing machine. This is a fun way to get the class to get excited about sewing! The Digital Publishing class was tasked with creating the 2016 yearbook cover this year. We had a contest where the yearbook voted for their favorite image. See the winning image above, but also check out the amazing designs done by other students in the course.
This past July, I was lucky to spend time at the Peabody Essex Museum's Summer Teacher Institute, Artist as Innovator. The summer institute included about 20 teacher participants from various disciplines. The course is available to all teachers who want to learn more about art and educational techniques. I signed up for the course because I thought it would be a unique and fun experience to learn about art and contemporary art education practices. This institute really got me to think about how I run my classroom; I took away many practices that I have already used in this school year. I was able to meet so many teachers with such insight into education. We had wonderful conversations and built a strong community throughout the week. We even were able to preview the upcoming Strandbeest exhibit before it opened! Take a look at some of the things we did. Making Art with a Practicing ArtistJulia Marshall - Keynote Speaker
Concept MappingConcept Mapping is a diagram that allows people to brainstorm relationships between topics. It is usually organized in a hierarchal fashion. Concepts and ideas flow through natural brainstorming and conversation, sometimes showing cross-links. I really enjoyed the idea of concept mapping to help student brainstorming techniques. Learning Some New TechnologyThe StrandbeestWe were able to get a sneak peek of Theo Jansen's exhibit at the Peabody Essex Museum, Strandbeest. Theo Jansen is a Dutch artist who has been working on his Strandbeest for over 20 years. The Peabody Essex Museum asked us to create a lesson plan using Strandbeest as the central theme. I plan on creating a lesson plan in my web design class utilizing storytelling techniques using the Adobe Slate app.
To learn more, read this great New York Times article. |
About MeI teach art at Burlington High School in Burlington, Massachusetts. My goals include teaching my students to live and thrive with 21st century learning skills while helping them to learn valuable creative artistic thinking and technical skill. Art ContestsBHS Art DeptArt Dept RubricClassroom RulesCategories
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