Metal Journals - Student Work

This is the beautiful, talented, superstar 9th grader Karisma Dev getting started on her Metal Journal, using an anvil and hammer to flatten out her wire frame that she has braided for a more interesting look.

These kids are in my Intermediate 3-D class, and they are working on a very complex journal assignment that has several components.  The first being to make their frame foundations.

Here is a look at Karisma's front of her journal.  The kids were required to incorporate hand spun yarn, hand made felt, beads, and hardware store findings into their front and back covers.

Their pages were done on canvas duct fabric and had to be hand painted with acrylics, and they had to incorporate text, buttons, and machine or hand stitching.  There was so much design and planning that went into these.

Not only are these kids talented young artists, but they are also very competent writers as well.

A look below at Karisma's back cover.

This next frame and cover belong to junior Kevin Tang.  This was a very powerful piece, very expressive as is most of Kevin's work.

A few of Kevin's pages...

and the back side.

More of the frame foundations.

This next one is the work of junior Joyce Le.  She came up with a most interesting shape.  These are her front and back covers.

And her very sweet pages.

This next one below belongs to junior Rita Labib.  I really like how she incorporated the dried rose that really sets the color tone.

The kids got to choose how they wanted to bind their books.  Rita has used the long stitch. 

Junior Nida Fatima went all out with her journal and enjoyed every second of it.  

From her cover...

to all her pages.

Senior Elsie Aguilar did this very sweet journal below.

This is one of my favorite pages from all the journals.

In fact, she put a lot of work into all her pages.

Love these adorable birds and nest.

Senior Ingrid Huang didn't get a chance to finish her cover but I still wanted to showcase her gorgeous pages.  So beautifully painted with wonderful collage elements...

text...

buttons...

and stitching.  Just doesn't get any lovelier.

Metal/Canvas Journals - Student Work

Inspired by felt artist Gail Perrone of Catfish Studio, and her wonderful work, I bought one of her metal/felt/canvas journals and showed it to my Intermediate 3-D students, and they were excited to try out her techniques.  The fun began when I bought them metal re bar from Home Depot and they cut and twisted the ends into interesting shapes and used an anvil and hammered those shapes flat.

Here we have junior Nandi Best's front and back covers.  She really outdid herself on this project, spending so much extra time on so many incredible details.  Notice the left side to see how she bound the book with a a hand spun and hand knit spine.  Amazing child!

They then built their frame structures by lashing the pieces together for the front and back covers of the book.

Below is a peek at one of Nandi's many pages.  Look closely at the handwoven door that opens on the page on the left.

Then they did more decorative work on the inside of the frame with the re bar to stabilize it.  They went all out decorating the fronts and backs with handmade felt pieces, painted canvas, beads, buttons, yarns you name it!

They had all kinds of requirements for the front and back covers.

Here is senior Abby Ilagan's front cover and one of my favorite pages from her book.

And then more requirements for the pages inside.  They had to bring in text, hand stitching, machine stitching, watered down acrylic washes, pictures and eyelet findings.

As well as sewing down pieces of clear vinyl to slip photos in.

Junior Kelsea Lee also spent a lot of time sewing on lots of fabulous embellishments both on her covers as well as her pages.

The results were fantastic, and I believe the kids really enjoyed how expressive this assignment became.

These are two pages from Kelsea's journal.  Very clever girl with terrific designs.

One more page from Kelsea's book below.  Love your work Kelsea!

Senior Florence Buendia worked to the theme Bucket List, and had many incredible pages.  Here is one below.  As you can see these kids put so much thought into their work.

Senior Jessica Jay went all out on her cover doing so many cool layering techniques.  A close up below.

And her back cover below.  Lovely Jessica!

I want to end with one of my favorite seniors, (yeah, I know I'm not supposed to have favorites LOL) she knows she has a special place in my heart, Brittaney Lee.  This young woman had so many illness this last year connected with her allergies, and was probably absent more then she was at school, and when she was able to come to school she was so sick, but she never complained or made excuses, she still managed to turn in every one of her assignments and keep up with the rest of the class.  And on top of that, what a terrific designer she was.  Hope this summer found you in better health kiddo. 

A close up below.