Nutchele

Warming up

Sometimes you need to get those "creative juices flowing" or get in a "right brain" mode. Whatever you want to call it, it's good to loosen up and relax before you start a project.
A few ideas are:
Doodle with your art materials and mediums. Play around to see how they work, try them out on different surfaces.
Take a line for a walk. Paul Klee would let his pencil or brush wander on the page wherever his hand took it, creating an abstract line design. After he was done he would decide what it looked like. I learned this about Paul Klee at the Minneapolis Institute of Art as part of their Art Adventures program.
Draw or paint lines to music.( A personal favorite) See the previous post for more information.
Blind contour line drawings. (Another favorite & I hope to do a video demo to help make it more clear). Choose something to draw. A lot of wrinkles or folds is best. Look at the object. Follow the lines with your eyes, draw them with your hand, never lifting the pencil from the paper so that you draw one continuous line going back and forth through the folds, and never looking at the paper. It will most likely not look like the object when you are done. It isn't supposed to. It's an exercise to help you see what you are drawing.
Another warm-up idea my high school art teacher had us do everyday was to illustrate a quote she would write on the board.
Some students find the above types of warm-ups a little frustrating and prefer something a little more traditional like the warm-up worksheet I made and use for students who prefer it. The idea is to copy what is in a box in the box below it. Empty boxes can be used to come up with a new idea. Feel free to download and print your own here.

Lines to Music

I'm choosing this project first because it's great for knocking down the fear wall. This is a project I use to warm up for myself. It's great for getting in a "right brain" mode. I think it is a great way to loosen those arm and finger muscles and to get rid of the "no scribbling" rule. Plus, it's just fun, I love creating art to music.

It's pretty simple. Cover your table (or floor) with paper or use a large piece of paper, put on your favorite music, grab some crayons, charcoal, markers, or finger paints and scribble away to the music. Choose some fast music and some slow music. Be expressive. Think about how the music makes you feel and what kinds of lines you paint to the different tempo and notes. Are some lines thick? Are some lines thin? Big strokes? Little strokes? Angled lines? Curved lines?

For some this assignment takes some getting used to, but it is very liberating once you can free yourself to do it. Here's some examples of the projects and variations of this assignment that we have done:

Finger painting to music- fast and slow
For this particular lesson in the photos we used Barber of Seville & Act 3 of Carmen; crayola finger paints, & finger paint paper- it doesn't tear as easily with wet paint & has slick side for easy sliding of the fingers, butcher paper could work too

Drawing lines with crayons to different styles of music
This time the song was "I've Got Rhythm", and we used crayons and Ikea's roll of paper

Painting with feet to music
This time we used a wide variety of music, but the song I remember off the top of my head was Benny Goodman's "Sing, Sing, Sing"; and we used sheets as canvas or you can also get large amounts of muslin fabric at a fabric store for a fairly good price, and crayola washable paint. Down side to the paint is it is more of a tempera and has a powdery feel and the color dries much lighter. So if you're brave enough to use non washable acrylic paint, also more expensive, you can get better color and your masterpiece will be washable. I should also warn you that it can get slippery dancing in paint.

The first time I ever did lines to music was in a 2D design class at Utah State University. The assignment was to draw one line to music that expresses the music. I found this assignment to be a favorite and really inspiring for me.

Beatles- Cry for a Shadow

U2-Exit

I've adapted or done variations of it for myself and for assignments and projects I've given out to students. It is okay if you or your children (or students if you're teaching) don't get this right away. Some people get it and love it right away and others need to be shown what to do or what you expect. In my design class there were only a couple of us that understood what the instructor was asking for, that you can express mood or a song in this case, with one line. A handful of the class turned in a page with something resembling a heart rate monitor. Since I am not teaching a college/university class of potential career artists I don't limit to one line and am not so concerned about one line expressing the emotion of the song as I am about giving an opportunity to scribble- to break down a barrier, and to "feel" art or make an emotional connection.

A Few Tips

For my first post on this blog I'm going to start with some basic tips for helping your children with art. The following posts will have projects.

Take time to notice. Art really is all about noticing. Listen to the sounds around you, the smells, touch, and look at how the sunlight shines through leaves, the colors around you, how they are different depending on the time of day, notice how everything has a shape, notice the lines, notice how objects relate to each other. Color, shape, line, and proportion are critical in art. Start to see how they play a role in the world around you. Point out little things you notice to your kids. Kids don't always need help with this, they often notice things we are too busy to see. Don't be too busy. Don't make it too boring either. It doesn't need to be an assignment. Just say, "oh, look at that leaf falling! It did a triple somersault! Wasn't that beautiful?" or find the man in the moon. You get the idea.

Draw for your kids. If they ask you to draw something for them or with them, do it, and don't say it's bad. If you are self conscious of your art they will model that. Proudly hang yours on the fridge with them. Also, if it does look bad and they tell you, don't feel bad, kids can be brutally honest sometimes & sometimes they have an opinion that isn't correct. Handle it the way you would want them to handle it. You can say, "really, what do you think I need to fix?" or you can agree and laugh about it, or you can say, "Hmm. I think I like it that way." Keep drawing anyway.

It's okay to go out of the lines. It's okay to color something a color it really isn't. It's okay to scribble all you want. It's okay to walk in the room and say, "oh what are you making?" or "tell me about your art" It's also okay if it isn't anything in particular.

It is always beautiful or amazing even if you don't think so. When you have boys drawing a war you can't really say it's beautiful, but you can say it's amazing. Don't worry about if your toddler (or you) has talent or not. It doesn't matter. Art is supposed to be enjoyed and a natural outlet or expression. All little kids love to sing and dance and make art just for fun. Don't mess that up by worrying about if they are good enough to get into a special school for that. Just let them have fun for awhile. As a child get's older it still isn't always so much about talent as it is being teachable.

Sometimes you might have a child who is capable of noticing the beauty and details around them so well that they try to recreate them and cannot meet their own expectations. I have a daughter who at three decided she did not ever want to draw again because the bears she kept trying to draw looked like a pile of rocks to her. Of course at 3 her bears looked like a pile of rocks! They were very adorable "rock bears" as she called them, but she wouldn't see that. She wanted them to look real.
I did tell her I like them. I didn't push her to draw or make her keep trying. For a long time she wouldn't draw. She'd do other things like cut and glue or sewing cards. Eventually she got over it on her own and has done some very beautiful things. My point is it isn't the end of the world and if there are art supplies available and opportunities to try, it's too much fun to ignore.
When I have children over for art lessons that I know are a little intimidated and self conscious of their art work I have shown them some of mine from when I was a kid. It doesn't look that amazing really and some of it even won art contests at school. We get a good chuckle.