Identity Portraits
Our Middle Schoolers in Opal band (12-14 year olds) have been working hard, alongside their Collaborator Phillip, to produce their own Identity Portraits.
In the first few weeks of school, he likes to combine learning a skill with learning about each other. An art piece gives me both insight into each individual in my band as well as their comfort with communicating visually.
Developing communication skills in a variety of ways is a cornerstone of the program, and focusing on the visual is a great way to start off as it allows for the practicing of authentic feedback and critique, another lens we'll use frequently throughout the year.
Starting with an Identity Web (and building beyond it students generated ideas for visual elements they could use to fill a silhouette of themselves. This included aspects of their heritage as well as their favorite things.
After practicing drawing some of those elements, we learned how to give feedback that is kind, specific, and helpful as a way to help each other better meet the goals of the project.
Next, students began fitting and resizing those elements into their silhouette, some generating several iterations with help from Rob (our art collaborator), and Phillip (the band collaborator), the light table (and even utilizing the sun on a window) to trace some of their elements. The last stage was to trace and ink their final draft onto cardstock, color it 100%, and add their background gradients. The effects of good feedback and lots of practice are clear in their products!
“We simultaneously practiced the skill of blending colored pencil and crayon to later create gradients for their backgrounds and inner elements of their identity. The students surprised me with their quick application of the technique I showed them.”
