6th grade students were introduced to non-objective artwork in September. As a group, we discussed why artists create non-objective work and how meaning can be found within these works of art. Students learned that artists can express meaning through symbolic color, form, shape and line. Before building their sculptures, 6th grade students selected an intense emotion and created thumbnail sketches of how to represent emotion in a 3d form. As a group, we viewed work by Henry Moore and Alexander Calder. Students learned wire and cardboard building techniques, paper-mache while constructing their sculptures. In order to express their emotions, students selected one symbolic color and practiced mixing tints and shades through the creation of a monochromatic grid. After practicing, students painted their sculptures using a full range of value. At the end of this project, 6th grade students wrote a professional artist statement which not only described their work and advocated for the importance of their personal artwork.
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Vocabulary:
Non-objective artwork - meaningful artwork without obvious reference to real objects; only includes shape, form, lines, and colors
Monochromatic - Tints and shades of one color
Tint- Lighter hue (adding white to a color)
Shade - Darker hue (adding black to a color)
Value - the darkness or lightness of a color
Mobile - a sculpture that can move; invented by Alexander Calder
Stabile - a sculpture that does not move