Lesson video

Hello, and welcome to the second of our lessons on collage.

This art lesson is conducted by myself, my name's Simon and we're going to be looking about different ways of using collage for a cupcake.

So the learning objective for today's lesson is experimenting with collage in the creation of four cupcakes.

Now, these are experiments in a similar manner to the previous lesson, but of course now we're a bit more focused on a particular subject matter.

And obviously, we're looking at cakes in that process.

So I'm sure we're going to have a lot of fun with lots of different things we're going to be doing today.

And obviously this will be leading on to creating your final piece at the end of this unit.

Okay, so this lesson, we are going to experiment with collage in the creation of four cupcakes.

So in the last lesson, we looked at lots of collage but this is going to be more specific to the theme that we're going to be looking at for the next four lessons which is cakes and cupcakes and pastries.

So I think you're going to enjoy this a lot as we move on.

This lesson, we are going to use a sketchbook to record our learning, practise cupcake drawing, experiment with different collage processes, and create four cupcake collages.

So there's a lot which we're going to be doing today, and of course, as we discussed in the last lesson, your sketchbook can be whatever size you want it to be, and how you present your work in your sketchbook is always important.

So, of course, though we're going to be doing this on separate pieces of paper, you want to keep this all together in a sketchbook, that's going to be really important.

The resources you're going to need.

Similarly to last time we've got the glue stick, we've got the scissors we've got four sheets of coloured paper.

That's going to be important.

You need those four different sheets.

Now, again, just like before, they don't have to be coloured, bright paper it could be newspaper, brown paper, white paper, and black paper.

As long as you have four, that's what's important.

You're going to need a pencil to obviously sketch your work out and of course the sketchbook as well.

So very similar materials to what you had in the last lesson.

Keywords that are going to come up multiple times today are as follows.

Layering, again something which came up in the last lesson, but of course, today, as we're trying to create cupcakes, that layering is going to be more important.

Overlap, and that's when the layers are, kind of, on top of each other and they extend and they partly cover each other, as well though.

So layering and overlapping these different terms come up all the time when we're talking about collage and contrasting colours, colours that are opposite each other, such as orange and blue.

We want to have a range of colours.

Now, again, if you don't have that coloured paper to hand, that's okay, you can still do this lesson using whatever colour you have available.

But of course, if you have got contrasting colours like orange and blue, that will really really help.

Bright colours will make a huge difference and cupcakes, let's be honest, we want them to look nice and bright and colourful and tasty.

Last lesson we looked at collage we created 12 different types of collage.

There was no cupcakes involved it was just experimenting.

We were just testing out what works and what doesn't.

And it's absolutely fine if it doesn't all work.

Again, some of them will work better than others.

That is absolutely fine.

What's more important is that you have an idea as to what you think works well and what doesn't.

You are ultimately the artist here.

You're the one deciding what looks effective and what doesn't and then you'll be able to choose what we're doing as we move forward.

Now, I wonder, can you remember any of the artists we looked at last time? There's two artists, which you can see in front of you.

Or maybe if you can think about what was the difference between their styles? What were those key differences between their styles in collage? That's right, so one of the artists was Tom Eckersley and you can see his style is quite defined and sharp and limited in their colours.

We're very similar with the work in that we've got limited colours, which we're using today but some of ours will be a bit more messier in the style of the artist, Shaheen Merali.

And you can see her work is much more messier much more ripped, much more different to Tom Eckersley.

So you've got a huge contrast there between collage styles but again, both things are relevant to collage and relevant to what we're doing.

Here's a question for you as well, as we think about collage again, is collage made with cutting scissors only? Is that the only way you can create a collage? I hope you said false because, of course, collage can be ripped, it can be torn, it can be folded.

It doesn't have to just use scissors.

Now, granted, we will use scissors a bit today but we're also going to rip some paper as well.

So again, make sure that you are aware that collage is huge, there's so many different ways that you can do collage and that's exciting and something to think about as we create these cupcakes today.

Now, presentation, we've discussed briefly before, again you will need your sketchbook and your pencil to begin.

We are going to draw four cupcakes using your pencil in a soft and sketchy way.

Now it's only a practise.

So, it's a bit of a good way to warm up that you have to draw these four cupcakes.

Now, I've got a picture on the screen now so you can obviously look at that and just try and copy my sketch, try and make them exactly the same 'cause you're going to need four to work with, but don't worry if it doesn't go to plan.

There's another solution in the resources that we have for this class.

So you can pause the video here.

You want to have an A4 sheet of paper to draw four cupcakes.

Okay, so I hope you enjoyed drawing those cupcakes.

You should have four cupcakes, something a little bit like this, where you've got one, two, three, four on an A4 sheet of paper.

If you have a smaller sketchbook, you can obviously have it one, two, and then have another two on another page.

As long as you have four to work with that's absolutely fine.

If you're looking at this and you'd like a copy of this, there is that resource there, if you want to print it out and you can work straight on top of these for your collage cupcakes now that's not a problem at all.

So if you've done those four cupcakes, you're ready to move on.

You need four coloured pieces of paper.

You will use these for every single collage, so don't be under the impression that you're only going to use two for one collage and two for another.

All four colours will be used on all four cupcakes.

Quite nice to have a certain consistency with your designs when you have those four already determined, already decided on colours.

Okay, it's time for your sketchbook activity, and this is the main activity today.

Like I said, if you want to print out that resource you are welcome to, or you can use your drawings of cupcakes to work on top of as well, it's up to you.

We're going to create four collage cupcakes using only four coloured pieces of paper.

You're going to spend about 10 minutes per collage.

So I don't want you to spend much longer than 10 minutes per one.

Some will be maybe a little bit quicker, but, you know, generally speaking, it's quite a quick activity per cupcake.

Try your best to cover the entire picture and think carefully about where colours are placed.

If you have a look at the examples here you can see I've pretty much used the same two colours for the cupcake holder and a different two colours for the toping.

That type of thing, I think is sometimes nice.

If you plan that out in advance.

Think to yourself out which two colours are going to go well to hold the cupcake holder and one for the cupcake as well.

Things like that are going to help as well.

So think ahead about which colours are going to go where.

You can see, you're going to be doing some ripping and cutting.

So you can see this was ripped and the other three have been cut.

And you're going to obviously try to fit your collage to the drawing as close as you can.

You don't want pieces coming off the paper.

You don't want pieces that don't look like cupcake, they still need to look like four cupcakes.

So it's really important to bare that in mind.

Cupcake number one is all about ripping.

You can see my example on the screen now, which is halfway through then of course, once you've done that you can move on to the next one.

Okay, you can see the example here.

You can have this copy yourself, if you have printed out a copy, but equally you can have them drawn as well.

Now, obviously when you're ripping and sticking I would recommend when you're ripping in particular you want to think to yourself about making sure every edge is ripped.

So these kind of sharp edges here you don't want to have as part of your ripped collage.

But again, it's up to you.

It's all about thinking about what looks good and what doesn't look good, if I'm honest.

When you're sticking the glue on as well, of course you can just kind of carefully kind of run it over the glue stick, like so.

You don't want to have glue all over your work.

You want to think carefully about where these are going to go.

But you can see clearly with this one, I'm going to try and make sure I fit it in.

Notice the direction of the actual cream as well.

It makes a difference, you know what I mean? Where these things go really does make a difference.

This little point one actually I might put actually up going up this way.

Again, those little ripped edges there, I know I'm going to cover a little bit more with the second colour.

But you can see here how I'm going to put this one on as well just like so.

So again I've got that one perfectly done there and then of course I can use my second colour as well.

So I'll use a bit of green and going to layer it on.

So you can see I'm it sticking on top of the glue there, trying to get a little glue on my fingers as possible and then I'm just placing it again to cover the actual drawing or photocopy as best I can, as best I can.

I mean, you have to be realistic with what you can do.

And sometimes even just a little bit showing is absolutely fine, it's not a big deal, and barely, it's not that obvious.

But of course, if you've got the time, add a little bit more.

You can see ripped is a very different effect to cutting it yourself.

If you can pause the video here and then time yourself 10 minutes to create that ripped collage.

Think about some interesting shapes.

Maybe glue them on to colour your first cupcake Well done, we're now going to move on to your second cupcake design.

And again, we're talking this time about small shapes with scissors and you can cut out lots of different small squares as well to do that.

So of course there's lots of different ways that you can cut out your designs, but cutting out small shapes is one way and that's what we're going to do next.

You can see those thin strips that we've got on the cupcake holder.

So think about that before you start remember with using scissors, do be safe don't be too rushed with your work.

Be careful with what you're doing.

To cut out really small shapes, the best thing to do really is to start off with kind of long strips and then kind of cut them off.

And you can see, I have prepared a few strips here which are going to be the base of my cupcake, but of course the top, I'm going to do lots of smaller pieces.

So you can see I'm cutting off lots of little lines.

And then afterwards, once I've done that, I can actually get these, try and keep them all together in my hand, get them nice and tidy.

Then in one swoop, kind of get them all together.

Almost make your own little tile to turn to by just cutting off little pieces like this.

Again, this will save you a bit of time when you're doing the small one.

You can see lots of different pieces I can choose from now, like so and then it's much easier to do this.

Now, of course to actually stick them down again this time, you've probably going to stick down some glue first and then bit by bit gently put these on top.

And again, it does take a little bit of time to do.

If you've got a tiny bit of glue on your hand might even be able to kind of pick them up one at a time and just stick them on.

to make sure again you try and cover as much as you can as possible.

Okay, and because there's already glue on the paper there, I know it's not going to fall off that being said if I suddenly need glue I can always just kind of get a tiny bit of glue like so, gently hold and then stick it on.

Okay, you can see that will take a little bit of time because they're these small little shapes, it does take a little bit longer to do but it looks far more detailed than the bigger shapes.

Pause the video here when you're ready, and you've got 10 minutes to do that second cupcake.

Okay, well done.

You've done two cupcakes so far.

Now your third one again, you're using scissors.

So again, you've got to think a little bit outside the box.

These are slightly bigger shapes.

These are medium shapes.

They are curved in some cases you can see how the shapes are on the one in front of you.

So think to yourself about how those shapes are going to be stuck down.

But of course, there's much less shapes than you will have had the last time.

So it shouldn't take as long to stick them down.

But of course, it's up to you how you go about your own design.

So when you're ready, you can start make sure you pause the video again so you give yourself a good 10 minutes for this activity.

Well done, you're now onto the fourth one and this is a little bit trickier.

I want you to think to yourself about roughly eight shapes.

So I don't want you to do lots of little shapes, I want you to think about a limited group of shapes and you can see on my design how kind of strange that design is but I've roughly stuck to the same colours in the same, roughly the same place.

You can see clearly the curved shapes for the top of the cupcake and the more angular shapes for the cupcake holder.

So think about this when you're cutting out your shapes.

Now it's not so much about filling it all in this time, it's more about where you stick those shapes and making sure that you've got those interesting shapes and you have that sense of the top of the cupcake and the bottom of the cupcake and that interesting use of colour.

So again, it should match the same colours of your previous three designs, but of course it's going to be almost abstract which means it's almost not looking like a cupcake because of what you're doing this time.

But again, it should take about 10 minutes to get those shapes just right before you stick them down.

When you're cutting it, again think again about the shapes that you're choosing like as I'll do here, you know, these kind of curved shapes and notice how I'm moving the paper and trying my best, not to move the scissors.

The scissors kind of stay in the same place, and I move the paper and turn the paper in my hand to get what I'd like from it.

But you can see here how, when you're cutting it, I'm going to keep sticking the same two colours for my top half.

And then I'll use the different colours for the bottom half, the two remaining colours for the bottom half.

But you can see again, I'm just putting these at the top, like so, this is the one with the bigger shapes, but of course, you know that doesn't mean you can't try not to think about it.

Again, notice how you're kind of turning that around to get those curved shapes.

You think about the cream on the top, that's always going to be much more curved.

So you get those big blobs of cream if you can help it.

See how that one goes there.

And this one can be carefully stuck there, but think about where they go, okay? Again, there's something about this where I'm kind of slowly filling up the place, but it also neatly fills up that area.

If I was going to continue with the bottom section with my remaining two colours, again, these are going to be much more angular because I'm trying to cut it out to fit on, to be the kind of base of it as well.

And you can see I'm going to stick a few of these down, but of course, these are much bigger shapes, in this case, you've got a medium shape one to do and a small shape on it to do as well.

This is a medium shaped one, see or this the large shape one sorry, not medium shape.

And you can see how this kind of fills that section like so.

When you're doing smaller sections for these ones and you can see on the picture as well, you can see you can be a little bit more precise about where things go, but when we're doing the bigger one we can be a little bit quicker.

You can see how many shapes.

There's not many shapes on this one.

Equally, again, think about where these are going to go, I mean that one's probably going to go well there this one might be nice to kind of just fill that area there.

And finally this one goes there.

So I'm going to check that that works.

Okay, I think that kind of, you can see that sense of the base and the top.

It's different to this one, but again we're trying to do different collages and that's the idea.

Now, when you're doing it large or small, or even the medium sized ones, you can be a bit more precise as you can see from the examples but you can see clearly how these kind of much bigger, chunkier shapes are fine as well.

Now pause the video and when you're ready start your fourth collage.

Now, obviously I've been teaching for many years and this is something which I've told the students I teach myself and you can see on the screen at the moment, lots of other examples.

And these are by other year four students as well.

So you can see their techniques and the different ways that they've done it.

You can see there's different ways that they've approached it.

Some of them have used different colours and moved the colours around.

Some of them have stuck the same colours for the top and the bottom.

Again, there's lots of different outcomes.

So don't feel like there is one way to do it.

There's not, there's millions of ways of doing this same activity.

But again, well done if you've made it this far and you've got those four cupcakes.

Now you know four interesting ways of creating a collage.

Those key words again, do you remember them? That's the question when we get to the end here, hmm.

First one beginning with L, so we've got layer.

Of course, we've layered a lot of those collage pieces on top of each other.

Overlapping, we did have a lot of overlapping again with those collage pieces on top of each other.

And of course the colours, choosing contrasting colours to make your collage up.

That's really crucial in terms of where your colours go.

If your colours all the same sometimes you can barely make out the difference.

So it's important to have completely different colours, contrasting colours where possible.

This is how far we've got so far.

We had those 12 experiments with collages and now we've got four experiments with cupcakes.

So we're beginning to learn how much you can do with collage.

But of course, up until this stage we've actually chosen materials that actually have already had the colour determined.

Some of you might only have limited choices with the colours that you've got, but we're going to move on.

And when we move on to the next part with the collage, we're going to actually start creating the collage surfaces ourselves so we can choose the colours.

But before we can do that we need to start experimenting with some different ideas, and we're going to be looking at drawings and creating drawings of cakes and pastries in the next lesson.

Well done with everything you've done today do share your work with Oak National.

I'd love to see what art you've produced.

And of course, if this has inspired you, feel free to create even more cupcakes in different ways.

I'm sure you could create some real masterpieces, well done.

Please do ask your parent or carer for assistance if you're sharing your work to social media.