Art Lesson - Mixed Media, Self Portraits

This is the example that I did for this lesson. I thought it was a very fun project to do.

I did this lesson a couple of weeks ago in my son's 4th grade class. It does take a lot of prep work, but since it was with my son's class I felt I had the extra energy to put into it. First, I had to take pictures of all of the kids. I tried to get real close-up views of them. This also gave the portraits a fish-bowl effect which I thought went with the project well. I thought they should be black and white and I also made them a higher contrast. I used card stock instead of flimsy regular paper. (Thanks to H. for all the help!! :) ) So you can see, for 29 kids, this whole process can take some extra time.

I provided the copies of their faces. Luckily, Michaels had a big sale on scrapbooking supplies, so I was able to have a good supply of neat paper. Plus, I had an old dictionary and some magazine images, and contruction paper for collage. As well as markers. I showed the kids my example. Then explained how I had put different things that I liked onto the design. I also mentioned that I was trying to make it look kind of funky, and abstract, not very realistic. I tried to have them think of the process in 3 steps... 1. First, do the background and try to keep it simple. Like strips of plain construction paper. 2. Add their head and make a body, either draw or use some sort of collage body. They were thrilled when they asked if they could make any kind of body, like an animal, and I said yes. 3. Add different things they like, or represent themselves. They could draw or collage shapes and images.





It's always so interesting and fun to see what the kids come up with!