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Celeste Roberge |
Elemental Sculptures
Visual Arts Lesson
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
Students will be able to:
- Describe, analyze, and interpret Roberge’s Wrathful Deities.
- Brainstorm sculptural forms based on the natural elements (earth, water, air/wind, fire) through movement activities where they pose their bodies.
- Create a wire sculpture inspired by Wrathful Deities and associated with one of the natural elements.
- Create a relief collage featuring words and phrases from the poems they wrote in the language arts classroom, using similar forms and colors as their natural element sculptures.
LESSON ACTIVITIES
Note: Teachers Pat Reed and Cindy Rotolo were able to bring Cindy’s 3rd grade class to the Portland Museum of Art to see Wrathful Deities. They were able to team-teach the gallery discussion, as well as several of the classroom activities. The discussion prompts that follow can be used in the classroom with a reproduction of the sculpture.
Describing, analyzing, and interpreting Wrathful Deities (one 45-minute class)
- Description: What you see in the work of art.
- Analysis: the relationship among the things you see in the work.
- Interpretation: the meaning of the work.
- What is this?
- Is it a painting or a sculpture? How do you know?
- What is it made of?
- What colors do you see?
- What is the size?
- What textures do you see and how would you describe them?
- What different kinds of lines do you see and how would you describe them?
- How do the lines interact?
- What shapes do you see?
- How are the shapes arranged?
- How do the shapes interact?
- How would you describe the forms in this sculpture?
- How has the artist worked with and changed the materials?
- Do the tall, vertical elements seem like a group? Do they change as you move around the sculpture? Do they seem to grow out of the base or float on the surface?
- What tools did the artist use? How did she make this work?
- How do your eyes move across the work? Do they move up and down, back and forth, all around? What do you notice first? Second?
- How does the light behave on this sculpture? How does the light change?
- Is this realistic or abstract? Why do you think so?
- What sounds does the sculpture make in your imagination? How does the sculpture move in your imagination?
- What do the objects remind you of? What do you think they are?
- Does the sculpture seem to move? What kind of movement does it have? What does that kind of movement suggest?
- What do you think the artist is trying to say?
- What do you think is happening in this work of art?
- If this sculpture could speak, what would it say to you?
- Does this sculpture remind you of something in your own life?
- How does this work make you feel?
- What does the title, Wrathful Deities, mean? Does the title change how you think of the work?
Planning sculptural forms (one 45-minute class)
- Students first plan their sculptures by referring to the descriptive writing and word lists they developed in the language arts classroom. A theme for their work can be the natural elements (earth, air/wind, fire, water). As a class, brainstorm about those elements, their qualities, and words that describe them.
- A kinetic activity for students to help them think about the movement and form they see in Wrathful Deities is to have students move their bodies and pose like the sculpture. You can even wrap swaths of fabric around the students so they focus more on the shapes and forms. This activity will also help students plan the movement and forms of their own wire sculptures.
- Finally, have students make brief, fluid sketches of their spiraling sculpture ideas. It can be something more realistic like a tree, or something more abstract like swirling shapes that represent blowing wind. They can refer to Wrathful Deities as inspiration and also create their own forms. What kinds of lines and shapes will they use in their sculpture?
Elemental sculptures (one to two 45-minute classes)
- Before students begin work on their sculpture, the teacher may want to attach the wooden dowels to the cardboard bases by cutting a hole in the cardboard and gluing the dowel into it. One idea is to use small jewelry boxes turned upside down as the base, so the dowel can sit down in it.
- Divide students into groups of four or five, with each group using one of the natural elements as a theme for their sculptures. Students use wire pipe cleaners and tissue and foil paper in colors that represent the elements (red=fire, green=earth, blue=water, gold=air/wind) to create their spiral sculptural element. Students can use white glue to attach the wire and colored tissue and foil paper to the wooden dowel. Holographic paper can be used to cover the cardboard base, because it mimics the optical qualities of the metal base of Wrathful Deities. An alternative is to use silver medium weight wire with wooden dowels as the center support to create a sculpture that has the silver effect of Wrathful Deities.
- When students have completed their sculptures, group them together with other students that used the same natural element. Have the students arrange their individual works into one group sculpture, considering how the individual elements interact with and move around each other.
Poem Collages (one to two 45-minute classes)
- Students will use the poems and word lists they wrote in the language arts class as the inspiration for their collages. Using colors they used for their sculptures, students will use tissue, construction, and foil paper to create an abstract collage on a 9 x 12-inch piece of construction paper.
- When students have completed the collage background, they will write words and phrases from their poems and descriptive word lists onto strips of paper.
- Students will attach these word strips to the collage backgrounds in a relief manner. Demonstrate ways to attach the paper so that it sticks off of the surface and creates form and movement like their sculptures.
- Have students complete the Self-assessment— Looking with the eyes of the artist.
MATERIALS
- Paper for sketching
- Pencils
- Wire pipe cleaners (or 20 gauge wire, medium weight or polycoated kid safe wire)
- 6-8” wooden dowels
- Wire cutters for teacher use
- One 3 x 3” cardboard sheet per student
- One 12 x 12” cardboard sheet per student group
- Colored tissue, construction, and foil paper
- 9 x 12” sheets of construction paper
- Pens
- White glue
- Low temperature glue gun for teacher use