Keith Haring Tooling

What a better way to celebrate the first year anniversary of my blog than with one of my favorite projects!

I did this project last year with my 6th graders and did it in conjunction with a 3rd grade Haring project of positive/negative space. You can see more details of the project and the 3rd grade project from this post. I didn't do the 3rd grade project this year because I wanted to switch it up but the 6th graders loved this one too much last year not to do it again!

I can statement: I CAN create a metal tooling artwork inspired by the artist Keith Haring.

Day 1: Haring intro with the best YouTube Keith Haring video EVER. My students thought I was awesome for finding this gem...

Then, a little demo of how to draw the figures and brainstorming/sketching time before they put their final drawings on this sheet..... Its just a 6" x 6" box and directions that the metal gets tapped to for easy transfer....

I leave this project pretty open ended with the only requirement being one "Haring figure" and the option of narrative or design based....

Day 2: Artist poster review of Keith Haring and then a demo of the tooling. If they finished their drawing last time, I already have the metal taped to the back of their drawing. I found this little YouTube video that someone must have made for a school project that shows a great variety of his work and all types. I have to mention that they loved his sculptures. I will have to keep that in mind for future projects.

Day 3: Sharpie! Just a quick set of reminders about how the sharpies like to jump the edges because they are rounded and to get different values of sharpie you need to layer the color. Found one last Haring YouTube video to share as well...I didn't show the whole thing because the quality wasn't that great and some censoring issues so I just played the first 2:50-ish minutes which did the job! It is great to watch the whole thing without students too!

Once again, totally in love with the final product and the process!

Jefferson Elementary...

I really hope I can get a bulletin board for this school! I hate strips! SO BORING.

McDill Elementary...

Keith Haring with 3rd & 6th

 The best for last to share with you from my big Art History unit. KEITH HARING! I absolutely love him. I'm really aesthetically attracted to color which probably plays a big roll in me loving his work so much. Which in turn, means every year for the rest of my career I will probably do a Haring project (AND why I did two different projects with two different grades)! I get a little nervous introducing him because I think it is important to share that he died young from AIDS and how bad of a disease it is because it relates a lot to his subject matter of death, birth, AIDS and celebrating the time he had left. I know my older students especially 6th, are a little more educated about AIDS and possibly know the history of the disease with the gay community. And still being early in my career, I never know quite the right responses for certain questions. One student flat out did ask if Keith Haring was gay and I did say "I believe so" and then continued on with what I was talking about. Hopefully over the next few years I will figure out what I feel comfortable with talking about to students. Teaching is a work in progress! Onto the projects!

3rd Grade: Keith Haring with Positive and Negative Space

I did get my inspiration from pinterest for this project from this post which just linked to an artsonia gallery.  

Day 1: Intro to Keith Haring with a quick PowerPoint about him and exploring his art work. There is a really cool YouTube video that I believe was a google doodle but I have to remind them that he didn't actually animate it. Someone else animated his artwork. I can't get it to embed but here is the link. Then we did a super fun activity that I got from here. I created my own sheet so it looked a little different, but essentially the same. First individual students came up and posed then we did pairs and small groups. Lots of laughter was had and they got used to drawing people in Keith Haring style. Winning!

Day 2: Artist poster review of Keith and then we dived in to talking about Positive and Negative Space. I love relating concepts to every day life to students so we explored Positive and Negative space through logos from companies. I put a one page PDF together with all different logos and we figured out what was positive and what was created from the negative space. Super Fun! Next I did a little demo of how to draw the figure on the square of paper to keep it one scrap and a clean cut. I really emphasized keeping a clean side and having that clean side showing when assembling. Per usual, some did not follow that direction!

Day 3: We did need another day to finish assembling and cutting, not quite a whole class was needed but one work day for sure was not enough. I probably could of squeezed in the intro for the next project but I gave them a break.

McDill Elementary, displayed with 6th grade...

Kennedy Elementary...

I drew the figures the early finishers colored it!

Jefferson Elementary, displayed with 6th grade...

 6th Grade: Metal Tooling and Keith Haring

 Once again, pinterest inspired! Pin came from here at Teach Kids Art. Per usual, I changed it up a bit. I wanted more of an idea than just figures.

Day 1: Intro went the same as with 3rd but without the drawing activity. I just did a quick demo of how to draw a figure in Keith Haring style. I gave them a confidence boost by saying "3rd grade could all do it so I know you can!" However, I do still show them the cheat of drawing a stick person then a bubble around it. Which is actually harder for me to do! We spend the rest of the time sketching different ideas. I put emphasis on the messages that Haring tried to send with his work and how he included color concepts, pattern, repetition, unity, etc. The only requirement was at least one Keith Haring style figure. I'm glad I kept it so open ended because some amazing ideas happened!

Day 2: Artist poster for a little review. Then they put their final ideas onto a piece of copy paper that had a square blocked on it that was the size of the metal they were going to be working on. (Some fast workers did this on Day 1) The biggest challenge came here when students that wanted to include words had to do it backwards since we do the sharpie on the opposite side of the metal. I showed them the holding it up to the light trick and that worked for most. Then I did a demo of how to do the tooling. My assistant and I taped their drawings to the paper that had the metal attached to it to cut down on mistakes (since metal ain't cheap) and they got to work!

Day 3: Did a little sharpie explanation about working slow since the sharpies want to jump the walls made when tooling and they spent the whole class working. When they finished they told me what color they wanted behind for when we mounted them.

I LOVE THESE! Check them out!

Kennedy Elementary, hanging right next to 3rd grade....

McDill Elementary, together with 3rd grade...

Yup, that says YOLO.

Jefferson Elementary, together with 3rd grade...