Realistic Face Rattles - Student Work

It's always fun to show off my Beginning Clay kids' face rattles.  They dread the assignment because they feel  they won't be able to do a realistic face, but it's neat cuz they surprise themselves with how well their pieces turn out.  

So let me start with senior Michael Marin and one of my favorite faces this year, above.  He's put so much personality into this work, and then I really like how he finished it off with both oxides and glazes.

Above senior Kelsey Chang did an outstanding job, I think the whole face looks especially realistic.  

And then below, junior Rita Labib did this wonderful Native American, complete with braids and feathers.

This very expressive piece above was made by senior Shayna Franklin, and I love how she glazed it.  

Below, senior Tim Chai's piece fell off the shelf before it was fired and broke in several pieces.  So after it came out of the glaze fire, he salvaged as many pieces as he could and glued them back together, then mounted the piece.

Fabulous Save Tim!!!

The very talented senior student, Jaimee Chirico created the piece above, and did a great job finishing it off.

And then junior Fernando Jacinto did this very expressive fellow below, using oxides everywhere, but glaze to highlight the eyes.

Another very talent kid, sophomore Ann Munoz, crafted this wonderfully expressive head.  As it fired it began to crack which really added a lot of interest.

I loved  the cracks, Ann wasn't so sure about them.

And this last grouping belongs to seniors Shaun Pak, Lorena Morales and Alice Cho.  

Congrats to all of you for a job well done.

The Annual District Art Show

Every year art teacher Ron Parks from Cerritos High School tryes to get all the high school art teachers in the ABC Unified School District to participate in the Annual Student Art Exhibit.  It used to be a competition between all the high schools, but 2 years ago all the art teachers decided they just wanted it to be just a showcase.

It's housed in the hallways of the District Office every May and runs for usually about a week.  What I love about it is for my students to see what the other high schools are doing in their art departments.   

I especailly loved these super large close up drawings by students at Cerritos High.  The faces were larger then life and very striking and emotive.

It's been a while, but I'm pretty sure these next 2 pieces were also from Cerritos High.  Again monumental scale works of the face, only this time with some surrealistic twists.

This was probably my favorite in the whole show, this abstract portrait above from Artesia High School.  I just adore it. 

These next 2 gorgeous paintings came from the Adult School art students.  What fabulous work they are doing there.

And these last works are from Gahr High School's 3-D students.  I'm so impressed that the teacher has the students soldering recycled materials together into this fun animal sculpture.

She also has them using clear plastic tape to make these body sculptures.

And then recycled cardboard for this ball, wonderful!

And man oh man, I haven't seen yarn coiled baskets since the 80's, but because our budgets are almost non-existent, what a great project to bring on back into the curriculum.  And these are terrific looking.

And a last favorite of mine were these ceramic pots from Cerritos High.  What great looking glaze designs!

Thank you Ron for another year of volunteering to put on this show.  It wouldn't happen without you.