I spent the last few weeks as an artist-in-residence at a school for particularly awesome teens. It’s a specialized school with only fifty students and, since this is my third or fourth stint there, I’ve had the opportunity to really get to know the kids.
For this term, I decided to embrace the Halloween season and have the students imagine character through intensive costume and prop-building. As an instructor, this is a challenge because no one is doing the same thing. That means there’s not a lot of demonstrations on my part, but a whole lot of problem-solving.
This means finding the right type of material for each student’s individual project and then helping them build what’s in their imaginations.
The Theme
We loosely chose the theme of superheroes, though many students decided to lean towards a fantasy or steampunk design.
Over the last few weeks, they drew, painted, sculpted, and built! Here’s some photos of some of the many projects they created.
Jewelry Design
One of the main projects I introduced was jewelry design and creation. Using glass cabochons and fingernail paint, the students came up with different designs. These make fantastic accoutrements for superheroes, wizards, magical thieves . . . you name it.
I think they are all beautiful, but I will admit I’m partial to the ones that look like dragon eyes!
Masks and Goggles
Every good superhero needs a mask, right? Many of the students chose to build masks or decorate goggles to help bring their characters to life.
Enchanted Bottles
I brought so many containers of supplies to the school that I wasn’t even sure what I had there half the time. But one of my students found the “bottle box” and from then on many of them became obsessed with building enchanted bottles. Using colored sand, acrylic gems, beads, moss, feathers, and other material, they created a veritable wizard’s den!
Wands and other magical props
Many of my students chose to build props that you can hold and carry.
One of my friends showed up at my house one day with a box of sticks that he had pruned from some trees on Vancouver Island. “I figure these will make great wands,” he said. (I guess I have a reputation as a prop-builder.)
I decided to share the sticks with my students, and many of them made some cool items with them.
Drawing, painting and multimedia
A significant part of the project was drawing, designing, and conceptualizing characters.
Many of my students combined these drawings and brainstorming notes with their props to submit final “character design” projects.
Wrapping up and saying good-bye
It’s always a bittersweet moment for me to wrap up a term at this school. These kids are so FABULOUS. They come to class each week, often thinking of themselves as less-than, and all I ever think is how I wish more people were like THEM: introspective, caring, creative, and community-minded.
We built a lot of amazing props over the course of the last nine weeks, but we hopefully we also built a lot more.
Between the Cracks of Here and There 