Faith Ringgold is a painter and sculptor, but she is best known for her painted story quilts. She combined the her paintings, the African American tradition of storytelling, with the tradition of quilt-making all in these unique pieces designed after the Tibetan tanghka. She used the quilting to frame her artwork and as an easier way to transport/ship her work.
Students created a torn paper collage American Flag and used her Flag Story Quilt as a jumping off point. I wanted students to play around with composition/ color and words/ images to create a meaningful personalized flag. Colored magazine pages were glued to tag board with collage glue in the first class. The next class, students were provided access to a wide variety of materials to use for printmaking, spraying stencils, applying words and images. This was quite a feat since I am a traveling art teacher, but it was well worth it for a big artful bang at the end of the year. Students have spent this year working with many different materials and learning techniques through their projects, so this is a great opportunity to be creative and experiment by layering many different materials over their flag while not completely obliterating the image under it.
Guidance needed to be given on how to use and layer materials and in what order so as not to ruin dry materials by using it over wet products and that sort of thing. I had many 'drawing' materials on their tables and set up stations at tables near the back of the room for pastels, spray inks, paints, and printmaking. Students worked hard and had a blast blending these products to create some amazing results. Really nice with the 4th of July coming up.
This was the final class for the year. While students were working on their project, I quizzed them about the many artists we had studied that semester (9 in 15 weeks). I was sure to include questions about the artist's life, their style, subject matter, as well as our projects and what they learned about techniques they used to create them. I am truly grateful to be able to teach and do something I love so much. A big thank you to the parents for sharing your wonderful children with me...what a great group of young people I have had the privilege to work with this year!
