It's For the Birds

WOVEN BIRDS NESTS

BEGINNING 3-D ART

wire, handspun yarns, ripped fabrics strips, jute, laces, recycled yarns & other misc. items

These imaginative nests were inspired by my last years students

who went above and beyond the minimum requirements.

This is the project I use to teach beginners how to weave.

But first we have to spin up our own hand spun/hand dyed yarns. 

We use them as inspiration for all our other color choices,

and include them in the woven nest.

This is also a huge recycle project.

It's our chance to use up all the odds and ends that I insist on saving;

bits of yarns, laces, ropes, plastic bags, beads & donated fabrics.

This year I asked the kids to not only weave a bird's nest but to then do something special around it.

Junior William Kim came thru in a big way.

He managed to find a very sweet blue bird, 

some eucalyptus stems, stuffing, silk leaves and a flower.

Then he arranged it all around his nest so perfectly along with his needle felted eggs.

In this next one,

very creative sophomore Shreya Sheth finds an old piece of wood that she splits,

then wood burns cool musical designs into it, 

and places it under her lovely nest.

Notice her sheet music stuffing?

Shreya's outside of the box critical thinking skills are going to take her far,

and I look forward to teaching her in many more of my art classes.

Junior Hazel Cruz,

a highly artistic young woman,

has built us this very soft & fluffy nest.

It's so realistic looking to me

 the way she has settled it onto a branch that she reconfigured and wood burned.

Notice how Hazel has woven with recycled plastic as well?

In this fun piece,

 senior Sunny Kim,

who was a joy to teach last year in Beginning 2-D,

 has used a lot of natural materials to cleverly incorporate into her work.

I love that she thought to wood burn on top of a piece of bark.

I asked her about the meaning behind her sign and she told me, 

"It's a bitter bird whose unlucky in love"

What a crack up!

She had me laughing out loud  :)

I'm so thrilled junior Liana Chie,

super star student from my 7th grade Art Wheel class 4 years ago,

has returned to me.

She, 

along with my other juniors this year who I adore,

have talked me into staying one more year 

so I can take them thru the Intermediate 3-D class.

I've put in my dues and can retire at any time now,

but teaching these young ones makes me so happy

 and I know they keep me young.

:) 

The hardest part for me,

 and has always been,

the getting up so early in the morning.

I accidentally oversleep my alarm at least 2-3 days each week

which makes me a crazy woman on the freeway  :(

And tremendously talented senior Anna Lee built this cutie.

She found lots of cool, old fabrics to weave with,

and I love the handle she made out of the foundation wire that we built the weft structures out of.

And notice those sweet strips dangling from the bottom?

Nice touch kiddo!

If you look closely you can see felted eggs alongside fabric eggs.