Lesson video

- Hello and welcome everyone to today's lesson on pop art.

So we are focusing on modern, popular culture today.

And the artist we are studying is Chila Kumari Burman.

So, for today's lesson, you will require a sketchbook or some plain paper, some magazines, some family photos.

Now just be mindful that you will be cutting these up as part of your artwork, so please make sure you have permission to do so.

Otherwise, if you have access to a photocopier, then you can photocopy them.

You will also need other art materials such as felt tip pens or pencil crayons, perhaps some paint and other materials that you might have such as scrap paper, or other little bits that you feel could be useful for this piece of work.

A pair of scissors and a glue stick.

Okay, so what I would like to do now is to pause the video, go and gather up all your equipment.

Have a good rummage around of things that you could use for this piece of work.

And then, when you are ready, you can resume.

Okay.

Welcome back.

So don't forget to do your intro quiz before you continue.

We are going to recap on Chila Kumari Burman.

We are also going to recap on the artist Richard Hamilton.

Our main task today is to create a personalised collage.

And then don't forget to do your exit quiz.

Okay, so I'm going to introduce two keywords.

The first one is mixed media, a type of visual art in which more than one medium or material has been used.

And the second one, collage, a picture in which different materials or objects, such as paper, cloth, or photographs are stuck together.

Now, I'm sure you are already familiar with that word because we have created collage work in a previous lesson.

So, in this lesson, you will reflect on the work of Richard Hamilton and Chila Kumari Burman, collect magazine pages with images of objects that reflects your personality and your family heritage.

And then, finally create a collage that says something about you.

Okay.

So Richard Hamilton recap.

So before I continue, can you remember anything about the artist Richard Hamilton and his work? I'm going to give you a few moments to have a think.

Okay, so, well done if you said Richard Hamilton was part of the pop art genre.

He worked mostly with collage, printmaking, and then later on in his life, he used digital art.

So he was best known for his collage work.

And the next question I'm going to ask you is, can you remember what often featured in his collages? Now there is an image of one of Richard Hamilton's collages on the slide.

So maybe you can have a little look at the picture to give you some ideas.

Okay, excellent if you said, his collages often featured people, consumer goods and interior decoration.

Okay, so let's just do a little recap on Chila Kumari Burman.

Can you remember how she describes herself? Have a little think.

Excellent, well done if you said Punjabi Liverpudlian.

Now, she's often also described as a South Asian pop artist.

So Chila Kumari Burman was born in Liverpool and likes to combine her Indian roots with popular culture.

Now this piece of artwork that you can see on this slide is called Auto-Portrait.

Now, this showcases her versatility.

Now, that basically means that she doesn't just create work using one type of media or technique.

She uses lots of different types of materials.

And it also shows that lots of the themes are very personal to her.

So this piece of work, now if you look very closely, it is made up of lots of small portraits.

Now, in fact, there are 28 portraits of herself, all representing different sides of her personality and her identity.

So, this piece of work actually took her 12 years to make, which is an astonishing amount of time.

I'm just wondering how long it's taken you to do one piece of work.

Okay.

So, what we're going to do now is we're going to have a look at some of Chila Kumari Burman's collages.

Now, we've already had a look at Richard Hamilton's work.

Now, he also does collages, but so does Chila Kumari Burman.

Now, before I continue, I want you to think about what you can see in her work and then what you saw in Richard Hamilton's work, and whether you can see any similarities or differences.

We can talk about this later.

Okay.

So, what are the personal narratives about these pictures, okay? So we're going to have a little discussion and a little think about what we see and what these collages are actually telling us about the artist.

So, collage work that Chila Kumari Burman does are very personal and unique to her.

In fact, it's one of her favourite types of work to create.

Now, you can see that the colours are really bright and vibrant and dynamic, but when you look closely, you can actually see messages about her culture, her identity, and her personal beliefs, okay? Now I'm just going to read a quote from Chila Kumari Burman.

It says, "My father was a tailor and magician, but when the family arrived from India in Merseyside, in the 1950s, he couldn't find work.

So he ended up buying an ice cream van and became an ice cream man.

His van was called Burman's and it had a big tiger on top." So after listening to that, you can probably see why there's some ice cream cones and tigers in her work.

Now, ice cream plays a big part in Chila Kumari's, not only her life, but also in her artwork.

Now at one time, she even bought a small ice cream van and used it as a travelling gallery.

And also, she made an installation of an upside down ice cream, which was painted in fluorescent colours and dipped in glitter.

That's a little bit of information about her work.

Okay, so, what does the work actually tell you about the artist, okay? So, she describes her work as being fun and playful, and she doesn't really have any restrictions or sets herself any boundaries.

She likes to play around with colours and shapes, and she also likes to mix her media.

Now, we used that word before.

So, she doesn't just use one type of medium.

She not only cuts images out of magazines and papers, she also likes to introduce different types of materials.

So she collects junk, treasures, which she likes to use as part of her work.

And then she also uses lots of other different types of medium to create some really unique pieces of collages.

So I'm also going to read another quote.

"So I use collage to open up possibilities.

I create images, turn them into prints, and then add metallic acrylic paint, fluorescent poster paint, felt tip pens, glitter, crayons, spray paints, and pastels." So, she likes to really experiment and have fun with her work.

So if you, once I've just read all that information, maybe you can think about other materials that you might have at home that you could possibly add to the piece of work that we are going to do.

So, thinking about the type of work that she does, do you prefer just to use one type of material when you're doing your artwork? For example, do you like to stick to just paints, or perhaps pencil and adding some shading? Or would you like to, or do you prefer to try and mix your media and have a play around with whether two or three different types of media actually work? So, what we're going to do today is really look at Chila Kumari Burman's work, and try and get some sort of influence from her work into the work that we are going to create.

It's really quite exciting.

Okay? We're gonna be having fun.

We're playing around with colours and shapes, and texts, and putting it all together in a really creative way.

And then even adding other materials on top.

Okay.

So we are going to start our activity now.

So what I'd like you to do first of all is to list down some things about you, okay? Things about your life.

Maybe it's things about people in your life, hobbies, interests.

So there's a list of things.

For example, you might be quite musical.

You might play an instrument.

For example, a guitar.

You might have a mobile phone.

You might like wearing makeup.

You might be interested in fashion.

You might like sports.

There might be other personal things, like events, like your birthday or memorable holidays.

You might be interested in things like climate change or nature.

So I would like you to spend some time writing a list.

Okay? So I would like you to pause the video and then resume when you are ready.

Okay.

Welcome back.

So what you're going to do now.

You are going to spend some time and you're going to look through these magazines and see if you can pick out any images that you can relate to or link back to your list, okay? Now, it doesn't matter whether you have lots and lots, because you can do more than one collage, or you can think about which images you actually want to use in your collage that we're going to create.

So, pick some images.

Carefully and neatly cut around them.

Okay? So this might take you a little bit of time.

So again, pause the video and then when you are ready, you can resume.

Okay, so, before we stick those images down that you have already cut out from the magazine, I'm going to ask you to create a background.

So when we look back at Chila Kumari Burman Singh's work, there's lots going on.

There's patterns.

There's shapes.

There's lots of different colour, but that obviously reflects her and her personality, and part of her culture.

So this, this collage we're doing, is a reflection of you.

So the colours might not be as bright as Chila Kumari Burman's work because you might prefer more subtle colours.

So, I would like you now to look through the magazines again and just select a range of different colours or patterns that you like, okay? So what I've done, I have done a demonstration to give you a little bit of a helping hand, okay? So you can watch the demonstration when you are ready.

Okay, so I'm going to just quickly show you how to create your background for this collage.

So as you can see here, I have just torn out different types of papers.

I've tried to stick to a colour scheme, but it's entirely up to you what colours you use, 'cause remember, this collage is personal to you.

I particularly like this one because of the textures.

And I've stuck to sort of oranges and shades of blue, because those are the colours that I like.

And actually, orange and blue are complimentary colours, which means that they're opposite each other on the colour wheel, so they actually work well together.

So once you've selected your papers for your background, you need to then think about cutting them into shapes.

I've already done that with some other papers that I selected.

So, still sticking to the blues and the oranges, what I've done, I've cut them into shapes.

So I've cut like a circular shape, an oval shape, I've even cut out some cushions.

'Cause I like the texture on there and I also like the colours.

So, the idea now is to have a little play around.

So I haven't got my glue stick out yet because I want to make sure that I'm happy with this background, okay? So what you can see that I'm doing, I'm looking at the arrangement, sort of thinking about the composition, like we said before, okay? Are you going to overlap things? Are you going to have things at different angles? You know, so before you stick anything down, make sure you are happy with the arrangement.

So, this colour that I selected, you can see that I've cut them into tapered shapes.

Basically that means it goes thick to thin.

Okay? So, make some decisions.

You don't have to fill the whole of the space.

Okay? Remember you are putting other images on top.

So, just have a little fun with it.

You can take things away.

You can move things around.

You can overlap.

Have things at angles.

So when you are happy, you can use your glue stick and make sure everything's nice and stuck down.

Okay? So that is your first task.

Once you have completed it, you can resume the video.

So if you pause it, complete this activity and then come back when you are ready.

- Okay, excellent.

So now we've created our background.

So we've developed it with colours which we like, and reflect maybe your personality.

And then we've arranged them in an interesting way.

Okay? So, what we're going to do now, we are going to start arranging the images that you've already cut out that represent something about you over the top of the background.

Now, it's very important that you think about your composition.

Now composition basically means the arrangement of your images.

So, when we look back at Chila Kumari's collages, things are not all arranged in, you know, in a line or all straight.

You know, things are overlapping.

We've got things in the foreground so that they stick out.

You've got things behind.

So it's all the pictures and the images and the texts are all layered, okay? So what I've done, I've done a demonstration, to show you how you can arrange your images in a really interesting composition.

Welcome back everyone.

So as you can see on the screen, I have completed my background.

So, the next step now is to start arranging the images that you've already cut out from the magazines and thinking about where you're going to place them on your page.

So I've caught a few images out, and I'm going to show you what these are and explain to you why I have selected them.

So the first one is this one.

So you can see, they are of a couple of figures.

Now, the way the facial features have been designed and the actual style of the figures actually remind me of some Indian artwork.

Now, my parents are also from India.

So they originated from Gujurat, which is the western side of India.

So, these figures just reminded me of some of the artwork that my parents had when I used to live with them many years ago.

Now, the next picture that I cut out is of an African sculpture.

Now, there's two reasons why I selected this one.

So, my first teaching job was actually in southern Africa in Botswana.

So, that just brought back some memories from when I remember seeing people making carvings and selling them.

But also, my mom's dad went to Kenya when he was a lot younger and he went out there to work as a carpenter.

So my mom was actually born in Kenya, even though she originated from India.

The next image, this one, is of a couple of ceramic pots.

Now, again, couple of reasons why I selected this one.

Firstly, I absolutely love making pots out of clay, especially on the potter's wheel.

And secondly, my grandfather, who was my dad's dad, in India, he actually made pots for a living.

So there's two reasons why I have selected this image.

And another one is of this chair that I really like.

But the reason for this one is because I actually studied interior design for my degree, and I love anything related to interior design.

And I love decorating and painting, and making house renovations.

So that's one there.

This one is of a cushion, but the reason I've selected this one is because it's got various animals on here, and it reminded me, again, of Africa when I worked there.

And I went on lots of safaris.

So these are just a few images that I have selected.

So, what you need to start doing now, like we did before with the background, I want you to really consider where these pictures are going to go.

Now, obviously you will cover some of the background, but it doesn't really matter, okay? But I want you to start placing these.

You know, are you going to have them like at angles? Are you going to overlap? Are you going to have them separately so they stand out? So, the next step now, before you start glueing anything down, just have a little fun and make decisions about where you are going to place these images, okay? So spend a few minutes doing that.

Pause the video, and then when you're ready, you can resume.

- Okay, fantastic.

So, we're moving onto the last part of your collage.

So, we've created a background.

We then overlaid it with images that say something about you, but now we're adding a final dimension.

So, we're going to add some lettering.

You can cut these out with newspapers or magazines.

You can write them.

You can think about adding extra patterns and detail using the other materials that you have.

So this is now about really putting your own stamp onto your collage and making it personal to you.

Okay? So take your time, you know, have some fun with it.

Again, I have done a demonstration for you to look at, just to give you some sort of inspiration, okay? But this whole lesson's about you creating something that's personal and unique to you, just like the artist Chila Kumari Burman creates work that reflects her and her identity.

Welcome back everyone.

So we are now on the final stages of this personalised collage.

So as you can see on the screen, I have thought very carefully about where I want to arrange all of my images.

Okay, so what we're going to do now is we are going to think about how we can add further decoration and detail to the background.

We are going to add some text.

And if there's anything else that you have that you might want to put onto this collage, then this is the opportunity for you to do so.

Okay, so I've started to cut out some letters.

Now, again, I'm not gonna stick anything down until I've arranged everything, okay? So, have you any idea what this word could possibly be? This might help out.

Excellent.

Music.

Okay? I love my music.

I listen to music every single day.

I love to go to concerts.

Okay, so I've cut out different lettering fonts, which is really nice because you can think very carefully about the different fonts, okay? So, I'm leaving that there for now 'cause I quite like it, how it fits on that curve of the oval, okay? It might move.

I'm not sure at the moment, okay, but I'm gonna leave that there.

I've also cut out a shape, and then inside it, with a fine liner pen I've written the word art, because art is a big part of my life.

Okay? And I love doing it.

And obviously I have worked in art and design for many, many years.

Okay, so again, where am I to put that? I am not 100% sure yet, but I'm gonna leave that possibly there, okay? So as you can see now, the words are working quite nicely with the pictures.

I've also found some buttons, which I thought were quite pretty.

So, these might be something that I use to highlight a image.

Maybe sticking on the corner.

Again, I'm not sure.

I could create a little line like this and arrange them on the side.

Okay, so I'm gonna leave them there for now, 'cause I quite like that.

And then I found these like, shiny gems, because the artist Chila Kumari Burman Singh, she liked to collect lots of treasures and stuff.

So I thought it'd be quite nice to embellish this, which I'll do later.

And I found some, just some foil, which is partisan packaging, so I could possibly even cook some shapes out of that.

Now, in terms of the background, to develop that, I think I'm just going to start thinking about adding some detail.

So, within the spaces that I have, I've decided to add little patterns.

Okay.

So, I'm gonna leave that there for now.

So now it's your opportunity to start thinking about text, adding additional information, and then we will resume when you have finished.

So pause the video.

Enjoy this activity and then I'll see you a bit later on.

Okay.

So here you can see my completed collage.

So now it's time to do some reflection.

So, does this collage say something about me? So, my www.

So what do I think I have done well? The selection of images I have chosen are personal to me and highlights aspects of who I am and what is important to me.

I also carefully considered the composition of the images to make the collage look visually appealing.

If I was to do this again, what would I do better? So my EBI.

I could have used a wider range of art materials to challenge myself.

And if I had left more space to add further information about me.

Okay.

So it's now your turn to review your work.

So, before you do this, think about whether your piece of work reflects you and your personality.

Does it say something about you? Have you also taken any inspiration from the artist's work? So I would like you to write two things that you have done well, and two things that you could do better.

So pause the video and complete your task.

So, well done everyone.

I hope you enjoyed today's activity.

So thank you for learning with Oak National Academy.

And please remember to complete your exit quiz.

Hope to see you again next time.