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Study of hands and the cycle of life.
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©Kings Davis 2023
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4 year old Lucas's "circle game", comprised of re-usable plastic parts to make an obstacle course of circles, chutes and holes..
Children from Kindergarten 1 Sunflower take their shadows for a splash in the virtual river as they watch the work of an artist unfold.
(Interactions with a projection of Andy Goldsworthy's 'Rivers and Tides: working with time' film: www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WP2AfqyOsI )
For the monochrome moment, go to: www.michikofujii.co.uk/blog/6dm2wjw996j3lwj9xkbpj46acx2bw5
The Kindergarteners returned to their mini world transformations. The "haze is gone" and the sea water is "clean" and the tigers and animals have been set free and are allowed to play out...
For the monochrome version and more, go to: www.michikofujii.co.uk/blog/jxsxjcdtd5cyjlrefebfe6chxwpak6
Today we laid out a canvas sheet in a circle of grass, hidden in the bushes. We "walked through the jungle" to find a "secret pool of water" that the children could paint on. We experimented with rollers and different sized brushes. There was a lot of interest in smearing the mix of cool colours and making lines and dotted brush marks. Then one little boy began to talk about a family of fish who were hiding from a shark. Where was the shark? Well, there, in the water, of course, he pointed with his brush.
The drama of drawing continues as 4 year old Estelle reveals shadow "monsters" hiding in the dark and then it starts "to rain"!
For today's alternative dramatic drawing, go to: www.michikofujii.co.uk/blog/b7dp7a3xbea27zn4yzd7z8cb4hr95z
We've been mixing food colouring, pigment paint and soap in water to blow bubbles and watch them pop. The children are highly immersed in this and squeal with delight as they watch us blow the bubbles in the liquid - bubbling and bubbling like a colourful potion! Then it's their turn to stir, mix, blow, squeeze the dropper, dip their hands in (inevitably) and spill the ink:
"I make bubbles. Look, more bubbles. I make more bubbles! Pop!"
Natsu spent time collecting sticks outdoors in the garden during outdoor play. Each day, he would hand me a bundle of sticks suggestively to indicate his interest in using them for the class artwork. He was interested in painting them to add to the colourful canvas (scroll back to 098/365).
This week we have begun to try something different - using feathers to draw with ink. The children tentatively dipped the feathers in the ink pot and began to test them out to see how they could form marks. Natsu took his drawing to the next level filling this large A1 sheet. The ink flowed as the feather tip formed these fluid, considered lines. At the end, Natsu decided he had drawn "a fish".
Responding to the central idea of their unit of inquiry: 'living things cannot survive if we do not take action', the children wanted to re-use waste and natural materials in their explorations in the atelier. They explored different ways to re-use waste paper from the school office to make "marbol paper" (through the marbling process) and using pigment inks. They also decided to make the following out of clay, wire, beads and twigs from the garden:
"a necklis"
"a bralislet"
and a "tree for (hanging your glasses and) gelri" (jewellery) on..
The marine odyssey continues as we catch colours with string on sticks and "go fishing" for the rarest of deep sea creatures. We catch the odd glimpse of them under the waves.
Will they take the bait?
Work in progress:
Groups of children (3-4 year olds) have been visiting the atelier to create an art piece based on their idea to build a bird's nest. Together the class had decided that they wanted to paint and also use natural materials.
Mixing and applying paint to the canvas in small groups, the children began to imagine "the forest", "trees", "flowers", "birds" and "cotton balls."
We used small scented pieces of bark that the children called "banana chips". These were painted too by the children, before they decided to construct the nest using wool and sticks collected from the garden...
Documenting a morning of discovery (playing sensorily and experimentally with two year olds)! First the oil pastels were an object of intrigue as they were laid out like colourful sweets in a tray. The pigment paint and droppers stole the show though as the children practised sucking the ink out of pots with their pipettes.
"Squeee," they repeated as they squeezed the droppers and thus the ink onto the paper. Then out came the salt to add texture and a visual effect. There was lots of interest in the way the salt absorbed the colour and also the disappeared into the ink. "Crunch, crunch, crunch," a child observed as it crunched into the paper.
"Drip, drip, drip.." another child chanted, followed by "Ooh" as the colours emerged.
Kian, 4, cut his clay roll swiftly with a wooden knife. "Michiko, can you count them?" he requested. And so the challenge began - how many languages could we count them in?!
For today's alternative monochrome clay observation, go to: www.michikofujii.co.uk/blog/hmlw27wln5jsbgdz9d82l635tk4f5s
After a few weeks of working on the painting with the children, the canvas has now been stretched onto a frame and is on display. The children painted with their hands and feet, long brushes, sticks, rollers, droppers, round sponges and water sprays. We imagined we were swimming in "the sea", on "the moon", "building bridges" to avoid stepping into shark-infested waters (where we also met "the wild things"). We fed the fish (or "poissons" and landed at the "airport" by "building a runway" over the sea. With all the slippery sliding on the wet paint, we also imagined we were on "motor bikes" and "ice skating" (which is what the children decided to call it).
It's less of a painting and more of a magic carpet, I'd say.
Before visiting the atelier, the children stopped at the bamboo tunnel and were invited to explore weaving with wool and raffia. It was quite tricky for some of the children and it took a little longer to get the hang of it, but soon some of them were weaving webs (and getting tangled!)
When we arrived in the atelier, we cooled down and picked up the feathers again to explore ink drawing. Natsu was particularly immersed in his drawing again and began to represent his outdoor experience, which he called the "spider web."
"Lines that wiggle, lines that bend, wavy lines from end to end..."
We looked for lines that wriggle, bend, curve, curl, twist and catch. Then we looked out of the window and decided there was "a spider web in the jungle.... catch it, catch it.... don't get caught in the web!"
Kiss off with your apples, Mom!
The only thing I always wanted was YOU, DEAR!!!
Dedicated to our good firend Mr. Brainripper as far as he's been asking for it quite a long time!
5 year old Sean found a box of small glass tiles and began to line them up. He spent time creating the body and legs before making a short neck. "It's a giraffe," he told us.
His friend pinched some of his tiles and he became upset and spent time negotiating to get some back. Then he found another box of tiles, removed the "giraffe's head" and began to elongate the neck along the width of the table.
"The giraffe is growing," he decided. "It's growing taller and taller. Now it's the tallest giraffe."
The tiles were stacked up higher and higher by the Kindergarteners.
"We're building a rocket that's going to shoot up into the sky!" declared one of them.
"Let's put the rocket on the shelf! They can read the alphabet," decided another.
To see things in black and white, go to: www.michikofujii.co.uk/blog/zdt78xlyb8zgf2r68zx7d8wpd34sxf
For the alternative Monochrome Monday version, go to: www.michikofujii.co.uk/blog/d8g5tyzc2ejwrczehs4dms6f9553yl
For today's alternative secret scribbles and stories, go to: www.michikofujii.co.uk/blog/yftl5kbj4lmk67hsp2dd45dz5l5m9k
Today I had time to pull out my macro lens for a half-our as spring visited Hamburg today for some hours. This is the shot I selected for you;)
Technical: Handheld, f/2.8, 1/800s, ISO250, 100mm, editing with Aperture.
Hong Kong Singer & Actor, Leslie Cheung Kok Wing (12 Sept 1956 - 1 April 2003)
I was looking for some of my "lost" DVDs and bumped into 2 VCDs of Leslie Cheung Mtv Karaoke/Concert my ex-girlfriend burned for me a long time ago. Yesterday was the first time i actually watched it. Then i realized that i have a bunch of HK celebrities photos (when they were young) stacked somewhere in my computer. I found them and will upload all of them later. I'll start with Leslie Cheung because i love this photo so much and he's a real artist. Rarely can we see an artist who can act and sing so effortlessly. I grew up with his songs and films. He acted in such award-winning and internationally acclaimed films like Happy Together, Ashes of Time, The Bride with White Hair, Farewell My Concubine, Days of Being Wild (my favourite film of his), Once A Thief, A Chinese Ghost Story, Rouge, A Better Tomorrow, etc.
The children from N1 Spaceships are finishing their cushion cover designs. The dots are continuing to appear.
"I'm firing the dots," 3 year old Reeaan told me, as he dotted the sponge carefully onto the fabric.
For the muddy monochrome version, go to:
Before the clay arrives - loose parts and wooden sticks for clay exploration and construction in the atelier.
Kindergartener Kiara spent a lot of time pounding her clay flat with a wooden mallet. She worked thoughtfully. She listened to her class mates' scary stories about "caves", "bad guys" and "monsters" but carried on working, just listening.
Then, she found some natural materials on the table and began to place them carefully into the clay. "This is a forest I have made," she announced. "In this forest, all these sticks belong to the forest and all these sticks are so many trees in the forest. These are the trees. We need the trees for oxygen. We can't breathe without the trees."
We're preparing to create an artwork inspired by nature, weather and birds.. although the entire group of children cannot decide. That's fine too.
Natsu has an eye for detail. He gathered some leaves and sticks from the garden (during outdoor play) to add to the canvas and then he carefully painted these wooden chips with such detail.
Let's see if we can collectively decide on an outcome...
Children from Nursery 1 Spaceships, were immersed in paint and bubbles this morning! Vivid inks mixed with soap (and straws) led them to discover the joys of blowing endless bubbles that grew and grew to create a multi-coloured bubble print artwork.
Here's my blog link and a chance to see my photo stream in monochrome: