Lesson video

Hello and welcome to our lesson today.

My name is Ms. Holland and I'm really excited to be teaching you today.

So what is it that we are gonna be learning about today? Today we're looking at abstract art and dry materials in response to stimuli.

And this is part of our unit "Abstract painting: sustainable materials." Our learning outcomes, so by the end of today's lesson you'll be able to work into my abstract artwork using dry materials to create a variety of marks and textures.

Our keywords today are intuitive, define, and dry materials.

Intuitive means creating without a set plan, so making choices based on feeling, what our instinct is or the mood of the moment.

Define means making something clearer or more detailed.

And within art, this can often be done by adding lines, shapes, or contrast to show its form.

And then dry materials refers to art materials that don't need water or liquid to work, and they're used for drawing, shading, and mark-making directly onto a surface.

As always, we will be exploring these keywords further during the lesson.

Our lesson is in two parts.

The first part is when we're gonna explore dry materials, and then the second part is when we're gonna work intuitively on prepared backgrounds.

Let's get started exploring dry materials.

Let's have a really close look at this artwork.

What materials do you think have been used to create it? Have a really close look.

Well, you can use many different materials in art.

Here's an image of some materials.

Have a look.

What can you see? I can see some pencils.

I think I can see some pastels.

Have a look and can you explain what type of marks you could make if you used these materials? What type of marks do you think you could make? Our Oak pupils are responding.

So Lucas says, "If I use charcoal, I'll be able to make very dark, dense lines and marks." And yes, there were some pastels.

Sam says, "Oil pastels are great for blending colours smoothly onto paper." And then Alex says he can use the rubber to draw into a graphite or charcoal background.

So, if Lucas has made a charcoal background, then Alex could use the rubber to draw into it and remove some of that charcoal to make some marks.

Looking at a sample of those materials again, the pen, the pencil, the pastel, the rubber, what is the name given to these types of art materials? What's the name given to them? Yes, they are called dry materials, and dry materials are art materials that do not need water or liquid to work.

So unlike paint, they don't need water or liquid.

And as Sam says, "They are used for drawing, shading and mark-making directly onto a surface." And I'm sure you've used many of these materials before and we're gonna start exploring them in more depth today.

Check for understanding.

True or false? Dry materials always need water added to them for them to work.

True or false? Well done.

Yes, that's false, but why is it false? Can you explain why? Yes, because dry materials don't need water or liquid to work.

So some examples include pencil, charcoal, chalk, fineliner, and pastels.

And artists can use them to create texture, definition, contrast, and expressive lines.

They're used for drawing, for shading and mark-making, and importantly, they're used directly onto a surface.

So here is an illustration, an artwork of a pepper.

And artists use different dry materials and mark-making techniques to create artwork.

Dry materials can be mixed and layered to create expressive and unique artworks.

And dry materials can also be layered over wet materials once they're dried.

So if we look really carefully this beautiful artwork, we can see there the amount of layering that's happened.

And it looks as though there's a wet background and then dry materials have been layered over the top, creating this really rich, deep sense of colour and form.

Artists use different dry materials and mark-making techniques as a form of expression.

So Niki de Saint Phalle used dry materials like oil pastels, crayons, and pencils in her artwork.

So her drawings often included symbols, words, rough lines, which created really powerful and personal messages.

Genevieve Chua uses dry materials over paint to add layers of detail.

So thinking about using wet materials, letting them dry, and then using dry materials over the top.

And Jasper Johns created textured surface that he then scraped into to leave marks in the surface.

So a little bit like we thought about earlier using a rubber to remove graphite or charcoal, Jasper Johns created those textured surfaces by scraping into to leave the marks.

Dry materials can be used in a variety of ways to add detail and shading to an artwork.

Here are some examples of charcoal, oil pastel and fineliner effects.

So let's have a look.

So if we look really closely at this charcoal to begin with, we can see that there's a gradient in depth and darkness.

So over to the left we have really dark, dark tones of charcoal.

And at the top they've smudged it, the artist has smudged it to become lighter and lighter.

In the middle part, they've used crosshatching and hatching to create different effects.

And at the bottom, they've swirled the charcoal again as a gradient, becoming paler.

And here in the middle we can see oil pastels, and as said before, oil pastels can be smudged to blend.

If you can look at these different ones, especially the pink, the third row down, the pink and orange, you can really see that beautifully blended, which can have a great effect.

And then the fineliner at the end.

Now here they've basically squiggled repeatedly to create this amazing sense of texture.

And it's very fine, hence the name fineliner, and very precise.

So all three of those different dry materials can be used very distinctly from one one another.

But then within the individual dry materials such as charcoal, you can then use those very differently to create different effects.

So thinking about those three different materials, a check for understanding.

I would like you to please match each of the dry materials to the image, so fineliner, charcoal, and oil pastel.

Well done, we of course have the fineliner.

Those squiggles, those very precise lines.

The charcoal, we can use it for smudging and crosshatching.

And the oil pastel for beautiful blending.

Fineliners and marker pens can be used in abstract art to create bold lines and intricate, those precise and detailed patterns.

And these marks can add depth and definition to the overall composition.

So you could revisit the composition and add more detailed marks using a fineliner.

Charcoal techniques allow for expressive mark-making, dramatic contrast and textured effects.

So as we said, there's lots of different techniques going on here and you can use them in different ways for different effects.

And then oil pastels can be used to blend vibrant colours.

You can also layer and create texture.

And a little bit like Jasper Johns, you could scrape into it to remove some of it to add texture.

Moving on to our first task.

I would like you to explore dry materials through responding to this artwork.

So again, really looking carefully at this artwork, taking time to create your response.

I'd like you to identify and describe the types of dry materials and mark-making techniques you can see.

This means you'll need to look really, really closely as there's so many different layers and so many different types of mark-making techniques.

And then I want you to create your own, I would like you to reproduce just a small section of the artwork, so pick a section that most inspires you.

It could be where the stalk is, it could be one of the rounded sides.

And then I'd like you to use your own dry materials, your own choice of dry materials to explore it.

You could use oil pastels and create a vibrant version of it, or you could use charcoal to create darker and focus on those different techniques you can use charcoal for.

Pause the video.

Well done, let's see the first part of the task, what you may have said.

So Lucas here is saying he thinks the dry material that has been used is maybe oil pastel.

And he thinks another material, perhaps like watercolour, is in the background though, like we said earlier, watercolour, perhaps, or ink.

And the lines used are intuitive as they are following the flowing marks and shapes on the background.

Did you think it might be oil pastel? What did you think? And then the reproduction.

So Lucas decided to focus in on that top bit of the pepper and explored using pastels in black, white, and grey.

And he really, as we can see here, he layered them up and then he went over say with the white to really emphasise certain aspects of it.

I wonder what part you chose and I wonder what material you chose.

Did you try combining different materials? Which one did you like using the best? Why? Right, let's now move on to working intuitively on prepared backgrounds.

Andeep and Sofia are discussing the benefits of working intuitively.

So remember, intuitively is working to a sense of instinct.

And Andeep says, "I like the freedom of working intuitively.

It means you can make abstract art and focus on the elements of art you are more interested in." And Sofia says, "I like working from a stimuli and then creating expressive outcomes.

So the stimuli helps me start the artwork and this to me is very intuitive." So Sofia likes something concrete to start from, whereas Andeep prefers creating abstract art.

When an artist works intuitively on a prepared background, they let the marks, textures, and colours already on the page guide their work.

So instead of planning, they might also react to the mood of a stimulus and choose dry materials to match.

Artists might, for example, use bold charcoal for something dramatic or a fineliner for something very delicate and precise.

Then the background and the artist mark-making work together to define the shapes that are already there and create a personal and expressive response.

So really importantly, when an artist works intuitively on a prepared background, they let the marks, textures, and colours already there guide their work.

Check for understanding.

I'd like you to answer the following questions.

What dry material could you use for something dramatic? And what dry material could you use for something delicate? Just think of one perhaps.

Let's have a look.

So these are the answers.

They're not finite, you might have come up with your own answers.

But I said bold charcoal for something dramatic, because with charcoal you can make very dense, thick lines.

And then for something more delicate, I've said fineliner, because you can make small marks and capture lots of details, but you may have said other things.

And if you are in class and you have said other things, you could perhaps discuss in class now.

Paula Rego often worked with soft pastels, a type of dry material that she uses like paint.

So she would use these soft pastels like paint and build up layers of colour and texture by blending, pressing, and layering the pastel onto paper.

Nancy Spero uses dry materials to make her abstracted figurative pieces.

And Michael Armitage applies thin layers of oil paint onto Lubugo, a traditional Ugandan cloth, often rubbing and scraping the paint away to reveal the texture of the cloth beneath.

Working into a prepared or found surface can be fun and can have you make a piece of art without overthinking.

Here are some backgrounds that have been worked onto with dry materials in an intuitive way.

So we can see the backgrounds here are this use of blue and white, and they're very similar.

But the artist has used different dry materials to intuitively work into them and follow the lines and the forms and the shapes that are already there.

So you can see in the first picture that we saw at the beginning of the lesson, it's almost like a narrative.

It's a picture telling a story.

The second one has used a dry material, possibly a fineliner, to draw into it.

That makes me think of this beach and the wind and the dunes.

And then the next two are using pastels to build on the textures and the shapes already in the background, to build on them and almost, again, create beautiful landscapes.

And for me, the fourth one is certainly a mountainous landscape with forests, and I can see that the wind and the clouds are moving across it.

What do you notice about them? Having a look at these three, and I mentioned this, which one of these pictures has been worked on intuitively with oil pastel? Well done, yes, of course it's C, and we know that because oil pastels give us this really rich, dense colour.

Artists can work into existing artworks or prepared grounds to define shapes or sections of an artwork.

Which material do you think the artist has used to add mark-making and definition to this artwork? Have a look, have a look at the type of lines that have been made.

What do you think might have been used? I think it's definitely either fineliner or, if I look really closely, it could be the edge of a charcoal? But I feel there would be more smudging, so I would say a fineliner, and this gives us this very precise and delicate mark.

Mark-making can be used in a variety of ways to add shading, detail, and define areas of an artwork.

A fineliner is that useful tool for adding definition to an artwork, like we've just seen.

And there are many linear mark-making techniques, so we can see here we've got lines, we've got crosshatching, we've got dotting.

And if we look closely, hatching is a mark-making technique which refers to using repeated directional lines to develop a sense of form, shape, and rhythm.

So you can see in this example, small lines placed together creates a sense of form or rhythm.

And then crosshatching combines different directions of repeated overlapping lines, so you build up by crossing over the different lines, and this really is good for adding texture and depth to prepared backgrounds.

Mark-making techniques can create varied effects through different types of lines.

So here we have scumbling, and that relates to what we saw earlier with the fineliner.

We've got zigzags, dashes and squiggles.

You can create really loads and loads of different effects through these different techniques.

And we're gonna explore how using a stimuli and prepared background can help us make a piece of abstract artwork intuitively.

And for this, we will need certain things.

We are gonna need an image of our chosen stimuli, a prepared surface to work on and dry materials.

So, in this case, black pens and fineliners.

So you need to get your stimuli and have a prepared surface, so that could have been used creating a wash, and dry materials.

So choose a natural form of stimuli for inspiration.

Is there somewhere local you can find inspiration? Is there something in your environment that inspires you? Something in your school? These are three examples you could use.

Then we're gonna make a background wash inspired by our stimuli image, and we're gonna use watercolour, wash, and ink.

So we're gonna make a wash with watercolour using your paint brush.

And so how you do that is that you place water on the surface, you add the watercolour to it and it bleeds in.

You can then dab off any excess water if you'd like.

Then we're gonna drop contrasting ink or watercolour paint over the wash.

And that needs to be inspired by elements in your stimuli, so here we can see it's been really inspired by the colours in the flowers.

And then we're gonna continue adding different colours of ink onto our wash and they'll bleed into each other.

Then, once it's dry, we're going to use dry materials, such as fineliners, to define the shapes on our surface.

So again, we've used those drops that are really inspired by the coloured flowers, and then we are gonna focus on finding a section to focus on from our stimuli.

So a little bit like we did with the pepper, just a small section, and then we're going to use our dry material to outline and define the shapes on our background.

And then we're gonna work intuitively to layer different types of line onto our abstract background.

You can see here intuitively going with the shapes and the forms already on the prepared background, we're gonna create and layer up our artwork.

We're gonna continue to take inspiration from our stimuli and add outlines and linear patterns, and we're gonna make choices based on feeling or instinct, or respond to the marks of the background.

So, now we understand the process, let's do it.

So task, first of all, I'd like you to go and select your natural form stimuli.

So go into a local environment and find something that really captures your interest.

If you can't find anything, you could of course choose one of these beautiful photos.

Pause the video.

Well done, so Sofia has said she actually chose one of these images because she liked all the interesting textures in it and the colours and the shapes and the patterns, and there are lots of different shapes and patterns in there.

A second part, we need to make that background wash.

So we need to make a wash with watercolour, so what we do, we put water on the surface and then we add the watercolour and let it bleed in.

Whilst that's wet, thinking about your stimuli, so Sofia would use maybe oranges and reds and purples, we're gonna drop different coloured inks into that wash and they're gonna bleed together.

And remember to drop it in a pattern or in a composition that you feel intuitively responds to your stimuli.

Pause the video.

So Sofia has said, "I took inspiration from my stimuli and created a background with a wash of blue and then added red drops of ink whilst it was still wet.

And the colours were inspired by the petals of the flowers." So had I gone into my garden and chosen some form of flora as my stimuli, such as a daisy or a dandelion, I'd have probably chosen bright yellows.

And lastly, and this is the point to really take your time over it, once it's dry, work intuitively, exploring fineliner techniques.

So decide what shapes on the background you're going to outline, so do that first.

And then, after that you're gonna layer up, you're gonna use a variety of different linear mark-making techniques and let the background shapes guide you intuitively.

Look at your stimuli, let that inspire you, use line to define your shapes and add interest.

Pause the video.

Well done.

As always, I always say this, I wish I was there to see all of your different examples, I'm sure they're all fabulous.

Let's see what Sofia did.

So there are so many different outcomes, but Sofia has chosen her natural form stimuli, and so she's used fineliner to then work intuitively.

And she's created this beautiful abstracted flower motif with layers of fineliner and with different, if we look really closely, with different use of the fineliner in patterns.

And you may have done, you may have used crosshatching, hatching, all sorts of the different techniques we saw today.

Thank you for joining me today.

We've learned so much and hopefully you've had a lot of fun experimenting with this.

So we've learned that artists often use dry materials, and that could be pencil, fineliner, charcoal, oil pastels, to create definition in their work when responding to a stimuli.

And when working intuitively, we work in an abstract way to reflect mood or energy rather than realistic images.

We don't get caught up in the realism, we want to reflect mood or energy.

And by working onto prepared backgrounds and using intuitive mark-making, artists build layers of texture and contrast, letting the materials and feelings guide the artwork.

Thank you again and I hope to see you soon.