Mixed Media Windows

One of the main mediums I create my own art in is mixed media reverse painting and collage on old windows.  My best friend's dad had all of the windows in his house replaced and gave me some 30 plus windows.  My studio at home could not handle such a large quantity and I immediately thought about doing a lesson with my older students with the windows.

I also connected it to behavior and effort.  At the beginning of the school year, I showed my students examples of my window art and the blank windows I had brought to school.  I informed them that if they worked hard on their art throughout the year and had good behavior as a class, that we would create a collaborative artwork on a window in the Spring.

I collected old education books and maps from the thrift stores and let them cut out images that they liked to collage onto the back.  Then the classes brainstormed on shapes, and each class voted on one shape to use to create a repetition on their window.  They drew them on with sharpe markers.  Finally, they finished the windows by painting them.

Faith Ringgold's Flag Story Quilts

Faith Ringgold is a famous African-American, female artist who grew up in Harlem, New York.  Her artwork is inspired both by her memories of helping her mother sew and craft as well as her experiences with painting in college.  Faith Ringgold combines sewing, painting, and text to create beautiful "Story Quilts."  One of her artworks, titles "Flag Story Quilt," combines vivd textiles in red, with newspaper clippings to create an abstract version of the American flag.  Here is Faith Ringgold's "Flag Story Quilt."

In this lesson, students created their very own flag story quilt by building a flag collage.  Students cut out paper from magazines, patterned paper, and plain paper.  They glued down their stripes to create the basic flag design and finished of their flags by adding abstract shapes to represent the stars.  Here is a student example of the flag story quilt: