Lesson video

Hello, everybody.

Mrs. Barrasso here again.

So happy to be with you for our fifth and sadly final lesson together on this unit, on installation and site-specific art.

I hope you've enjoyed creating installations together, and I hope that your home, your local area is just a little bit more brighter and cheerful because of all of your beautiful artwork.

Well, today we're going to be creating a miniature installation, so let's get ready.

So for today's lesson, you're going to need the following things: As always you'll need your sketchbook and pencil so we can track our learning journey together.

And you're going to need a variety of recycled materials.

On top of that, you'll need some glue or tape, and some scissors, and adult supervision is required for those.

And you'll need a magnifying glass or a downloadable app for magnifying.

So we're going to start today's lesson with our introduction and a recap of the unit.

Then we're going to spend a little bit of time talking about scale.

Then we're going to look at some miniature art.

Then you're going to be creating your own miniature world installation.

And finally we'll finish with a recap of what we've done today.

So some key words that we'll need in today's lesson, the first is the word miniature.

When we're talking about something miniature, we're talking about something that's very small, a very small thing, or could be a very small representation of something.

Scale: Scale is this size of a piece of work in relation to something else.

And repurpose, which means to adapt or change, to use in a different way.

Let's talk now about what we've done so far in this unit, because if I actually don't and achieved so much, we've created so much beautiful artwork.

Do you remember in the first week, when we looked at windows, and we created beautiful window art? We used wax melts to create something new and interesting.

In our second lesson we were focusing on ephemeral art.

We were focusing on the beauty of nature.

We gathered materials, or we foraged for materials to use in a creative piece to leave somewhere in the natural world for people to find.

In our third lesson, we focused on yarn bombing.

And we use different textile techniques to create a yarn bomb that we left in our environment to cheer up, to brighten, to liven up the space in which we live.

And in our fourth lesson, we were focused on the positive artwork, the emotion, the impact of words, of giving something away.

We did two pieces, we did a Take What You Need poster.

And we also created a beautiful vase of paper flowers that people could take away.

The positive messages in artwork.

Which lesson did you most enjoy? Or what piece did you enjoy creating the most? Do you still have those hanging up somewhere? I have all of these pieces hanging up around my house right now, and every time I walk past them they make me smile.

So let's talk now about scale.

Scale is all about the size of things in relation to something else.

If you look at the image on the left of the angel, this is an image that's very close to my heart.

If you're from the north, you will know what this angel is.

It's called The Angel of the North.

And I have seen this angel for a long, long time.

And often I would see it when I was driving in my car, this small little angel looking out over the north, she's set up on a little bit of a hill so people can see her, and she kind of guards the North of England.

Except one time I went to visit the angel and I didn't realise how huge the angel was, because when I was looking at it from a distance from far away, she seems so small off in the distance.

But when I went and stood at her feet and looked up at her, I realised the scale, the sheer size of her.

So, if you look at the image, you can see the people around her feet that gives you an idea of the size, the hugeness of this angel in relation to the size of a human.

Artists really enjoy playing with scale.

Sometimes they take something that's very, very small and blow it up and make it huge, like of the image of the right of the hand.

Sometimes they enjoy taking something that's huge and making it really small, creating a miniature of it.

And if we look here, we can see some miniature art.

Elephants which are known for being a very large, huge animal here they've been carved very small, tiny, miniature.

Look now at the image on the right.

What clue is there as to the size of these little sculptures? Absolutely, the keyboard.

We know the size of those keys.

So if we look at that now and then think how small those little sculptures must be, that's the scale there.

It shows us in relation to something else the true size of something.

Artists really enjoy playing with scale, making something tiny, huge, or making something big, very tiny.

It's interesting because it forces us to have to look at it in a new, interesting, and different way.

Sometimes we focus on things, small details that otherwise we might not have noticed.

And that's going to be our focus on this part of the lesson.

What you're going to do is you're going to now, really look in detail at something.

So take a magnifying glass and choose a small item or a toy to look at.

It might be fun to try and choose something that is quite detailed.

Try to observe all the lines and marks or the little tiny details that are hard to see with just your eyes.

Make a drawing, include all the details that you've noticed.

Now, if you don't have access to a magnifying glass at home, there are magnifying glass apps available, you'll just need to check with your adult if you're allowed to use one of those.

Pause the video to complete your task and resume once you're finished.

Miniature worlds, the images on the screen now represent a miniature world, something small, a scene taken, shrunk down, and placed somewhere.

I wanted to mention an artist to you, her name is Tessa Farmer.

She's a contemporary modern day artist.

And what she creates are miniature worlds, miniature scenes.

She uses insect bodies and she creates the most tiny, minute, miniature, little fairy-like fantastical creatures and sets them in a scene, sets them in a story, sets them in an installation for people to see.

How small they must be if you think of the size of an insect, let's say a bee, and all these little tiny fairies around it, small minute, miniature work.

We're going to be creating a scene, a miniature world of our own that we can instal somewhere.

Question for you.

Miniature art is easy to make and less important than large scale art? Do you think that's true or false? That's absolutely false.

Just because something is small doesn't mean it's easy to make, or that it's less important.

So today you're going to be creating your own miniature world installation and installing it somewhere.

This is the one that I created and I installed it in my garden.

As always, we always talk about the three key ideas for our installation work.

The first one is space.

What space will you bring to life with your artwork? I knew I wanted to create something to go in the garden, and that led my other ideas.

Number two, message.

What message will your artwork send? It could be on the importance of small miniature art.

It could be on using recycled materials to recreate something, to repurpose it in a new way.

It could be both of those things.

Number three, transformation.

How will your artwork transform the space? Recycling and imagination.

I gathered together some recycled materials and made sure they were clean and safe to use.

Then I looked carefully at them.

I looked at what I had, "What could I create?", I thought, "Using what I have in front of me".

I used my imagination to think about what these things could become.

I knew that I wanted to create something to go into the garden, a garden installation.

And that led me down the path of thinking about garden fairies, garden mythical, magical creatures, small little creatures that might live at the base of the plants in the garden.

That informed my idea, and I wanted to create a house for my garden creatures.

Then I looked at my items and I thought, "How can I create a garden fairy house for these little creatures?" I thought carefully about what I might need to do to create my idea, to pull it off.

I knew I would need to cut my milk bottle.

I knew I would need to draw a few things and stick them on, I knew I would need my tape for that.

So I want to talk a little bit about making mistakes, persevering, and making changes.

When you're in a project like this, sometimes things don't work the first time.

Have you ever tried something and it hasn't worked the first time? Yeah, me too.

Have you ever tried something, it hasn't worked the first time, and you've got an upset about it? Yeah, me too.

Have you ever tried something, it hasn't worked the first time, you've gotten upset about it, and then you didn't want to do it anymore, or you wanted to stop or pull out? Yeah, me too.

As artists it's really important that we don't give up, that we keep trying, we take those mistakes, we learn from it and we try again, we make changes if we need to.

And that's what I had to do in my work today.

If you look at my finished item on the right, I'm going to let you into a little secret.

Do you see that doll on my fairy house? That is actually the fourth doll that I created, the fourth doll.

I made three mistake dolls, three dolls that didn't work and I had to make changes.

One was the wrong material.

One wouldn't stick.

One was too small.

It took me four attempts to get that doll right, and that's okay because I learnt something on each of those three of the dolls.

So my little tip for you today, my tip is to work with what you have, look at the materials you have, what can you create with what you have? Remember, it's okay to make mistakes or for something to not work out straight away.

This is when we get the opportunity to use our problem solving skills to try something else, but we must persevere.

If you look at the image on the left, you can see all my mistake dolls are in there as well.

And maybe you can see those blue bottle tops.

There's actually four or five of them all stuck together.

Originally, I wanted to create a big, tall chimney, but you know what? Those things would stay stuck together, they kept falling off and coming apart.

That's okay, I tried something else.

I found an old egg box, I cut my milk bottle in a different way, and I managed to stick part of the egg box on top.

I still ended up with a chimney.

And actually, I think I ended up with an even better one.

Now it looks in this a bit higgledy-piggledy, which I think really looks like something that belongs in a fairy house.

So your activity today is to use recycled materials to create your own miniature world.

With an adult, look through your recycling, make sure your items are clean and safe to use.

Then use your imagination to think about how you could transform a piece of recycling, you could repurpose it into something new for your miniature world.

Then instal your world in a space, and of course, don't forget to capture it in a photograph, pause the video to complete your task and resume once you're finished.

Well, well done.

What another great lesson we've had together.

We've looked at miniature art.

We've used magnifying glasses to look carefully at something.

We've talked about the scale.

And we've created our own miniature world installation as well.

There's only one last thing left to do, and that is of course, to look at our sketchbooks.

So, some reflective questions that you can think about when you're working in your sketchbook today.

How do you feel about your finished miniature installation? Where did you decide to instal it? Did you have any challenges when creating your piece? How did you overcome them? How did you persevere? That's really important for an artist to think about how they overcame something, how they handle their challenges.

And what are the benefits of repurposing recycled materials? If you look at my sketchbook piece, I've given myself a title, I've written miniature worlds, my miniature garden fairy house and garage.

I've also drawn a quick sketch of my house and I've got a photograph in there as well.

And then I've written a little bit based on those questions.

Well, sadly we are at the end of our time together, the unit may have come to an end, but our learning I'm sure will continue.

I really hope you've enjoyed exploring different techniques and creating new things in this unit.

And I hope you've enjoyed thinking about power and the importance of a message behind our artwork.

If you've created something beautiful, your installation has transformed a space then we would love to see it.

Check with your adult if you can share something on Twitter using the hashtag below.

Hope you keep on creating, lots of love from me.