Playing games with art - art project

Arts & Activities, March, 2003 by Geri Greenman

MATERIALS

* Hot- and cold-press illustration board

* Colored pencils and colorless blenders

* Board games

* Light source

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

Students will ...

* consciously determine what board game would best suit their skill level.

* stretch their composing skills.

* experiment with color and "seeing" color in shadows.

* improve their ability to work with colored pencils and colorless blenders.

* learn how to achieve photographic realism.

* successfully give the illusion of at least one three-dimensional object.

Oftentimes, we become somewhat jaded with all the input of the beautiful graphics around us. We're visually bombarded with colors, patterns, great illustrations, book jackets, logos and myriad other artistic and technological advancements that we're so privileged to have. Because this is such an expected part of our lives, we often take it for granted, and some very lovely work by artists goes unappreciated.

I try to enjoy the millions of visual treats available to all of us, and enjoy looking at the artist's color choices, composition and all the elements that make each person's work special and unique. I never tire of looking at art.

One area that is often overlooked is game boards! Many are very, colorful, with big, bold lettering, faux effects, not to mention those that have tokens and cards, all created by artists.

It was with this thought in mind that I had my advanced drawing students search their closets for games that they've played with friends and family, and to bring them in to create art from art. The assignment was to compose only a portion of their chosen game, rendered in colored pencil (we used Prismacolor[R] pencils). It had to have at least one three-dimensional piece on the board as part of the composition to give a believable sense of real space.

Once everyone chose their game, we were ready to set up the game boards and tokens to have nice visual movement and good use of space, and proceed to make a sketch. After preliminary drawings were approved, I gave students a choice of either hot press (smooth) or cold press (toothy) illustration board on which to create their final drawings.

Students were reminded to be careful not to leave grooves in their illustration board by pressing too hard with their pencils, and to be especially careful with erasures. They didn't want to mar the final project!

Because the actual game boards are mass-produced, their graphic quality is impeccable. Therefore, the students had to be extremely neat on this assignment. Students put clean, dry paper towels under their forearms so that they wouldn't smear their work. Also, because the class before them was a freshman group painting in oils for the first time, most of them cleaned their desks before getting their work out.

Renderings that try to achieve photographic realism are always a challenge. Adding colored pencils to the mix certainly made it more so! I usually do a rendering with my advanced drawing students and I often use colored pencils rather than graphite, but this idea I had with the games was very difficult. I was pleased with the results of this assignment.

My students did a fabulous job, exceeding my expectations! Several won blue ribbons for excellence in our annual student art snow, and one was included in the annual Scholastic Art Award competition. We all gained an appreciation for things we take for granted, and found out that hard work pays off when you're playing games with art.

Geri Greenman is head of the art department at Willowbrook High School in Villa Park, Illinois, and is a Contributing Editor for Arts & Activities.