Intro to Art

By: Reyna and Soheni

    Everyone at this wonderful school has met—or will meet— the amazing Mrs. Gettleman, our wonderful art teacher here at Daniel Wright. She studied at the University of Illinois, studying in, (I’ll bet you didn’t already guess) art.

If you didn’t know already, every quarter in art the projects differ, but keep the main concepts the same. In each grade there are slightly different projects and materials, but all are similar, raising in difficulty as the grades progress.

  If you’re in 6th grade, you’ll get to do all sorts of fun projects such as creating clay animal/creature sculptures, painting, and learning to create depth in your art, while also getting to use cool tools along the way, like a scraper used to score clay (aka an evil bean, as Mrs. Gettleman calls it). You will have the opportunity to use items such as calligraphy pens, watercolor and acrylic paints, watercolor pencils, and prismacolor colored pencils. In quarter 2, one of the many projects 6th graders can look forward to if you have art next quarter are drawing animals.

 Alternatively, if you are in 7th grade, you will get to use similar tools for slightly different projects, revolving around more advanced skills. Furthermore, you will also learn a type of printmaking called techies linocut, meaning technology inspired print designs. This is a type of printmaking technique where you use a sheet of linoleum, which you would engrave a design onto. Then, you can apply ink to a tray, which you would then roll with your brayer (a tool similar to a paint roller, though it is made of a rubber material opposed to something cushiony) and apply to your linocut. Essentially, a linocut is like a stamp. After applying the ink, you would take your “stamp” and press it onto a sheet of paper or other material, and then peel away to reveal your design. Much like a stamp, your linocut can be used more than once.

Source: https://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-Make-Linocuts/

If you want to try making a linocut at home, the items you would need are a sheet of linoleum, an assortment of blades meant for linocutting, an ink tray or piece of glass, a brayer, ink made for printmaking, a pencil, and a black sharpie. Also, keep in mind that the blades used for cutting the linoleum can be very sharp, so you may want band-aids as well!

    In 8th grade, however, it will get even more advanced. One project you may be doing is building sculptures made from wood and other materials.