Rumriver Art Center - Art Projects and News

Students either love or hate self portraits, so i tried having them do a self portrait in the Modigliani style and they all loved it. Amedeo Modigliani  (1884 - 1920) was a late-18th century European artist who never lived to see his success, but his paintings are some of my all-time favorites. He settled in Paris in 1906 and was friends with Picasso, Brancusi and Soutine. I love his portraits with elongated faces in soulful colors. Modigliani drew his faces in stretched proportions as his eyes usually sit near the top of the face. Our self portrait project works with facial proportions, color, shapes and space to create our elongated portrait. I always have the students do a quick self portrait with the correct proportions for comparison. Materials: mirror,heavyweight paper, sketching pencil, sharpie and oil pastels to finish.  Step #1: Draw guidelines down the center and across the middle of the paper, Now lets add two more guidelines, one splitting the top ...

My students love drawing birds and their favorite is bird is owls. I recently used a Robert Bateman Owl painting as our inspiration.  Bateman was always interested in art, but he never intended on making a living from it. He was fascinated by the natural world in his childhood; he recorded the sightings of all of the birds in the area of his house in Toronto. He was also interested in making abstract paintings of nature. In our lesson we use Bateman’s painting “Saw-Whet Owl” as our inspiration. We focus on the shape and texture of the Owl as it sits on the branch. We use sketching pencil, sharpie and watercolor pencils to create texture and dimension. They can weigh from 54 to 151 g (1.9 to 5.3 oz) with an average of around 80 g (2.8 oz), making them one of the smallest owls in North America. In relative size to other birds they are close to the size of an American Robin. The Northern Saw-whet Owl has a round, light, white face with brown and cream streaks; they also hav...

I like to mix geography and cultures into some of my lessons. The Senufo Spirit Drawing project is perfect to learn about the small Ivory Coast county of Cote d'Ivore. The Senufo people of West Africa’s Ivory Coast are renowned for their cloth paintings. They believe their artwork has special meaning and helps protect them in their daily lives. Design motifs usually include birds, snakes, fish, frogs, crocodiles, and turtles as seen from above or side, covered with lots of geometric patterns. Materials: Heavyweight drawing paper, sketching pencil, sharpie and oil pastels or colored markers to finish work. Step #1: Draw a border around the paper as shown below.  Step #2: Draw a large gator, snake, turtle ect in the middle of frame. I used my favorite alligator for my drawing. Step #3: Draw a grid through your animal so you have several small shapes. Step #4: Create different geometric patterns in the boxes. Step #5: Design your border with images from the earth, s...