Submitted by Dorothy Morris, Mccluer North High School in Florissant, MO

UNIT: Artist Research Poster - Careers in Art Lesson: Poster Design - Contemporary Artist Research Grade Level: Middle School and up

Note from Dorothy:

This is a lesson I've already done with a dual-enrollment Humanities course I teach and which I plan to assign to my AP Studio group as well. I was a Museum Educator at The Saint Louis Art Museum for several years and found one way to "force" high school students to approach contemporary art with an open mind was to become an "expert" on one artist and then to share that expertise with other students. In light of that experience, when I recently took my Humanities class to the Museum we did the following in preparation:

The assignment: In class, you will be the recipient of the name of a well-known contemporary artist. On your own time, you are to research this person and become our resident "expert" on his/her life and works.

The format: You are to present this information in the graphic format of a poster. This poster should include the following items (see handout): biography media used by the artist information about style and subject matter names of important works, and their locations illustrations of actual works

If possible, you should produce the poster in a style that echoes or evokes your artist's style. The design of lettering is one way to accomplish this, adding designs, drawings, pop ups, and other devices to the poster might be another.

1 Materials:

Varies...22" x 28" size poster board can be provided along with basic art supplies. The rest can be provided by the students. Artist Research Handout

Places to get information: I gave them a list of resources in the metropolitan St. Louis area as well as the names of art magazines ("Art in America" etc).

Extension for AP Studio Group: I plan to take this one step further, and after our upcoming Museum visit when they'll have a chance to actually see the work of "their" artist, I'm going to have them choose the artist whose work a classmate presented which evoked a strong response. They will then execute an original work in the style/manner of that artist.

Some names: This was the list I compiled, sometimes because it was an artist whose work is in the St. Louis Museum's collection, sometimes because I thought it was someone with whom they should be familiar.

Jenny Holzer, Richard Tuttle, Frank Stella, Jim DIne, Alberto Giacometti, Chuck Close, Anselm Kiefer, Constantin Brancusi, Keith Haring, Marcel Duchamp, Claes Oldenburg, Donald Judd, Roy Lichtenstein, Ellsworth Kelly, Louise Nevelson, David Hockney, Wayne Thiebaud, Joseph Beuys, Joseph Cornell, Robert Rauschenberg, Larry Rivers, Magdalena Abakanovicz, Richard Estes, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Eric Fischl, Miriam Schapiro, Robert Indiana, Bruce Nauman, George Segal, Deborah Butterfield, Judy Chicago, Laszlo Moholy- Nagy, Jeff Koons, Cindy Sherman, Robert Smithson, Alexander Archipenko, Wang Cheng, Umberto Boccioni, Kiki Smith, Larry Poons, Francis Bacon, Jasper Johns, Christo,

Also see Artist Research and Art timeline by William Van Horn

Note from Judy: Keep the posters the students create. Do this as a "service project"/career lesson. The posters will be used for teaching in the lower grades and can be signed out by the art teachers in the district. Add new names each year to get more variety. This can be a career unit in graphic design. See the Know the Artist posters from Crystal Productions.

2 An Art History Research Project

Name ______Section______

Artist’s Full Name ______Country______

Biographical Info:

1. Place/date of birth: 2. Place/date of death: 3. Primary type of artwork (ex: painting? drawing? sculpture? printmaking? ceramics) 4. Media (what materials are use?): 5. Style or period of art? 6. Short definition of that style or period (see Artlex or Artcyclopedia):

7. Interesting/Personal information on the artist

8. Three other artists who work in this style (from the time period of the artist - or contemporary artists working in this same style). How is the work similar? How is the work different?

9. Favorite Quote

10.Biography Resources (minimum of three -use authoritative sites and books). Include author, title, date, URL (for sites), publisher (for books), page numbers.

3 IMAGES (find a portrait or photograph and five works)

Portrait or Photograph of artist (find one online or scanned from book) artist or photographer: date: location of image:

URL (or print material source):

As you are doing your research SAVE FIVE (5) images of the artist's work to your disk (or folder on server).

For each image:

1. Title: Date: Media: Size: Location (museum/collection): URL/ site name (or book source if scanned):

4 Critique:

Choose one of those pieces of art and answer the following questions:

1. What is the subject matter?

2. Genres. Is this a still life (group of things)? a portrait (a painting, drawing or sculpture of a person)? or a landscape/seascape/cityscape (picture of the land/water/city)? other (explain)?

3. Style/form: Is this artwork realistic (as real as possible)? abstract (distorted reality)? non-objective (as far from reality as possible)? symbolic? functional? other (explain)?

4. Description. Identify the sensory qualities (art elements). Can you identify a color scheme? Why do you think the artist might have chosen the colors she/he did? Do they make sense? What kind of lines did the artist use? How does the texture add to the work? etc.

5. Discuss the formal properties - use of design principles.

6. Interpretation. What do you think the artists was trying to say? Why do you think he/she chose this subject?

7. What feeling does this artwork give you and why?

What part of the artwork is your favorite and why?

8. Judgment: Defend this as a work of art using one of the theories of aesthetics (or combination): Art as Realism - Art for Formal Properties - Art as Expression - Art as Functional

5 Timeline (include some key world events that may have influenced this artist) :

sources for timeline:

6 What the heck is that artist up to?

PREPARATION

Materials: • Pencil • Printing paper (standard and glossy photo), scratch paper • Word (or other document software)

Resources: • Computer with Internet access and color printer • Handouts: example of short biography with bibliography (student handout) • Optional: books and digital camera or scanner

Vocabulary:

• Search engines - Internet programs to search by keywords for relevant sites • Keyword - descriptive words to use with search engines (e.g., "+art +picasso +images") • Jpeg, GIF - formats of graphic images on web sites • Biography - life history of a person • Bibliography - list of sources for research paper • Expressionism - art style that portrays emotions or elicits an emotional (Frankenthaler, Pollock, Joan Mitchell ) • Surrealism - art style where the objects are distorted or in odd juxtapositions to each other (Dali, de Chirico, Magritte) • Naturalistic representation - object in artwork looks like object being represented • Abstract art - Mondrian, Rothko, O'Keefe) • Pop art - art style that uses and "glorifies" images from popular culture (Warhol, Lichtenstein, Johns) • Marginalized art - art that has traditionally not been accepted by the mainstream art culture (Chicago, Kahlo, folk art, art of people with disabilities, African and/or Asian art) • Copyright - Fair Use Guidelines

7 Overview: Each student will look up an artist on the Internet and choose an artwork (medium of artwork depends on the art-making assignment) to print and talk about. Each student will write a short biography (with a bibliography) of the artist. (Biography and print will be placed on the timeline.)

INTRODUCTION

Objectives

• Identify different styles used for artwork, including non-traditional artistic styles • Use the search engines on the Internet to research an artist • Write a short biography of artist and the culture, including bibliography

• Identify artwork and print out hard copy - save information about image - learn about copyright and fair use of images • Present to class an artist and artist's use of techniques in artwork

Introduction:

• Describe the process and the objectives of the assignment • Show reproductions of art work of different "schools" of thought, including non- traditional artistic styles • Discuss the relation of the styles to the impact of the work • Discuss biographies and purpose of bibliography • Biography will include dates and place of birth and death, significant events in the artist's life (e.g., schooling, friends, economic situation, health), social and political events (e.g., war, scientific and geographic discoveries, attitude of culture), and a brief critique of artist's artistic influences and stylistic growth

Demonstration: • Demonstrate use of search engine, downloading and printing images, saving bibliography information

8 STUDENT ACTIVITY

Research and report (See student handout): • Search on Internet for artist and artwork to report on • Gather information and write, using word processor, a one page biography with attached bibliography • Give oral report to class on artist and how he or she used pencil or lines in their drawing (or whatever element/principle you are discussing). • Place in correct spot of timeline - include image documentation on the artist's work.

Critique: • Discuss the artists on the timeline in relation to each other

Critique questions: • What problems did you have with searching for artists and/or using the Internet? • Why did you choose the artist that you did? What would you ask the artist if you had a chance to meet? • What differences and similarities do you see between the artists? • What did you learn? What was the reason for this assignment? • How else could you use the Internet for finding out information? • Why is copyright important? What is Fair Use? Why should we respect an artist's or institutions copyright?