This article discusses rock art which was the very first "art." Rock art, such as the images created on the stone surfaces of the caves of Lascaux and Altimira, is the true origin of the canvas, paintbrush, and painting media. For there, within caverns deep in the earth, the first artists mixed animal fat, urine, and saliva with powdered minerals…

Latin American customs and colors play an important role as second graders are introduced to multicultural experiences through food, music, dance, art, and craft. In this article, the author describes a printing project inspired by Guatemalan weavings and amate bark paintings. (Contains 2 online resources.)

The economy is often the feature story in our daily news. Synthesizing life is an essential skill for teenagers. The visual arts are a wonderful tool for students to process their situations and explore future aspirations. In this article, the author describes a lesson plan he developed to help students better understand their own situations, as…

Kids love to build robots, letting their imaginations run wild with thoughts of what they might look like and what they could be programmed to do. Yet when students use cereal boxes and found objects to make robots, often the projects look too similar and tend to fall apart. This alternative allows students to "build" robots in a different way,…

Nature has always been a source of inspiration for artists across the centuries. Artists such as Leonardo da Vinci, Georgia O'Keeffe, Ansel Adams, and Andy Goldsworthy all drew inspiration for their work from nature. Seeds come from the dried pods, which when planted and cared for, bear fruit. In this article, the author describes how her…

Sustainability is the capacity to endure. For humanity, sustainability is the potential for long-term maintenance of well-being and has environmental, economic, and social dimensions. In Oaxaca, Mexico, artists and artisans create everyday objects that are aesthetically pleasing, functional for daily life, and that represent the continuation of…

Build, create, make, blog, develop, organize, structure, perform. These are just a few verbs that illustrate the visual world. These words create images that allow students to respond to their environment. Visual culture studies recognize the predominance of visual forms of media, communication, and information in the postmodern world. This…

In order to inspire her students to work in mixed media, the author chose to highlight the art of Jasper Johns and Robert Indiana, both of whom used numbers and letters as a main focus in their art. In this article, the author describes a mixed-media printmaking project. (Contains 2 online resources.)

In 1971, members of the Naples Art Association (NAA) in Naples, Florida, initiated a scholarship program designed to encourage local young artists to realize their dreams of becoming professionals in the visual arts. Since then, awards have been given annually by the NAA to Collier County high-school students in conjunction with an exhibition of…

Architecture is a versatile, multifaceted area to study in the artroom with multiple age levels. It can easily stimulate a study of basic line, shape, and various other art elements and principles. It can then be extended into a more extensive study of architectural elements, styles, specific architects, architecture of different cultures, and…

The print has a long-standing tradition of carrying a political message. This can be seen in the works of artists from the German Expressionists, like Kathe Kollwitz and Emil Nolde, to Mexican printmakers like Jose Posada and Leopoldo Mendez. Whether it was during the Mexican Revolution of 1910, the War in Iraq, or the 2008 presidential election,…

Questor is a curious little bird whose four broad questions are helpful to anyone interested in making art or understanding the art of others. He was designed as a character in an online video for children, "Building on a River: Questor's Tale." The video is narrated by Questor, who relates the 2000 year history of architecture along the Salt…

Can art be powerful enough as medium to connect two economically and culturally diverse groups of students totally unfamiliar with each other? The author put this question to the test by introducing a lesson on Madhubani, a traditional folk art from a remote region in India. The author describes how this activity gives students an opportunity to…

A sky fading from blue to white to red at the horizon, and water darkening from light to midnight blue. Strong diagonals slashing through the image, drawing a viewer's eyes deeper into the picture, and delicate trees poised to convey a sense of beauty. These are the fascinating strengths of the ukiyo-e woodblock prints of Japanese artist Ando…

While planning a print-making unit for her ninth-grade class, the author was looking for a way to extend a project beyond the usual boundaries to incorporate each student's personality. She also wanted to add a three-dimensional element. Her original project involved creating a linoleum block print of each student's face. In this article, the…