Senior Spotlight: K VanBlarcom

The Ten

Germantown Academy 

Personable

Comfort food 

All things having to do with Christmas 

Sun valley, Idaho 

Good humor 

Winter and summer classics 

1998 Suburban 

Henry lane 

328A/701

1st Grade Mosaics and Invented Cities

First grade artists used their initials or names to design a paper mosaic. A mosaic is a picture made of colorful tiny pieces and can include materials such as paper, glass, or tile. Students chose warm colors to fill in their names and cut shapes in cool colors to fill around their names. After the project, they took a local “art trip” to see the mosaic mural made by the GA community along with Philadelphia artist Isaiah Zagar.  Next, they learned about different types of architecture in a printmaking project. After reading Iggy Peck Architect by Andrea Beaty 1st graders built bridges to help the art room toy animals cross the gap between the tables just like Iggy Peck helped save his classmates by building a bridge. Next, they designed a foam building stamp that included doors, windows, and arches, using ink, brayers, and Plexiglas to print their buildings and then traded buildings with friends to create an invented city.

Senior Spotlight: M Meyer

The Ten

Family 
Good Friends 
Dogs/puppies
Swimming
Listening/ playing Music 
Creating
Smiles
Inside jokes
Carbs 
Wood Fired Pizza

GA Alum Spotlights GA Faculty in Women in Art Post at Penn

University of Pennsylvania's Women in Art Initiative featured an interview with US art teacher Gabrielle Russomagno. Written by GA Alum Helen Berhanu the post titled "Being Relentless" describes some of the complexities of working as a woman in art fields.  Read the interview here.

Senior Spotlight: T Gales

The Ten

Dance 

Cookies and cream ice cream 

Kiawah Island

Music 

Baking 

Determined

Shopping 

Art 

Knitting 

Family

US Students Participate in PAFA Workshop

 

GA students join together with Phila. area High School  students in Printmaking Workshop at The Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.

 On Saturday, November 21st, a group of devoted GA art students were invited to participate with  other creative individuals from the region in a High School Printmaking Workshop at PAFA. Mr.Love organized this event in collaboration with  Prints Link Philadelphia.  GA students participating included-  Carter Seegev, Sabrina Tran, Shannon Hill, Julia, McKernan, Asya Shane-Milton and Elizabeth Wescott.  These students joined forces with  students from Abington Senior High School, Esperanza Academy and Abington Friends School for a day of drawing in the Historic Cast room, studio tours and printmaking explorations.  "PAFA is the oldest art school in the country and the chance to have our students work in the same rooms where Thomas Eakins taught is pretty incredible. But besides working in some awe-inspiring spaces, the students were also able to create work alongside other area high school students and hear about art school life. It really was an amazing day and I was so happy that we could make it happen. The PAFA team was great and we are already beginning to plan next year’s event." 

(Founded in 2009, PLP is a coalition of arts organizations who develop projects and curriculum to educate and support printmaking to children and teens in the Phila. area

Senior Spotlight: C Connor

The Ten 

Music
Sports
Art 
Friends 
Family
Pets
Food
Creativity
Health  
Sleep

Katrina Whiting: GA Alum Designer Returns to GA

Katrina, a Senior Experience Designer at Method in San Fran Shares the New Space of Work (which just happens to support all of our work in 21st Century skills) graduated from Maryland Institute College of Art two years ago. She visited art students to share what an experience deisgner does:

They are collaborators:

We work with you to frame the problem or opportunity space to ensure we are solving the right challenge. We are flexible and adaptive to fit your needs and context. We run projects with small, focused teams that integrate with clients and their customers throughout the design process, often co-creating with them in our studios in San Francisco, New York, and London.

They are insight driven:

We gather and synthesize customer and market insight to inform the design process. We use a combination of data-driven quantitative research and market and consumer trend analysis with ethnography and user testing to provide design insights that help guide decision making.

They work iteratively:

We believe that the best products and services are the ones that are shaped by the people who use them. We take time to understand the business challenge or opportunity, and then we work iteratively to test hypotheses and assumptions through prototypes and user research to continuously build and test the products and services we create.

The consider the big picture:

No product or service exists in a vacuum—neither do we consider design in isolation of the overall brand experience. We consider the varying touchpoints and experiences a customer might have with a brand and ensure that any new interaction both fits and builds upon the overall customer experience.

They deliver beautiful design:

No matter what the ask, our dedication to the highest quality of craft remains constant, in both our thinking and the final work. We are dedicated to the details of design, delivering both beautiful form and function.

And they design for and with technology.

2D Design Students at Work

This is Art: PreK Collagesm Discussions, and Earthworms

Pre-K artists are learning how to create in a unique place—an art studio. Their first activities have been about the process of creating art: How can an artist use line, color, and shape to create? How do artists solve problems? Where does your artwork go when it is finished? How can artwork make you feel?

 Their first projects focused on the element of line. After reading Patrick McDonnells’ picture book This is Art, students painted as many different lines as they could in primary colors and created themselves as collages by ripping, cutting, and gluing paper shapes. They also practiced looking at and responding to artwork; Pre-Kers had a variety of responses to a painting by Franz Kline such as “It makes me nervous” or “It makes me want to make art!” Pre-K artists made their own line compositions by dropping and gluing strips of black construction paper on their background. Recently, tying in with their study of earthworms in science, Pre-K decorated earthworm shapes by dropping and/or placing lines of yarn. Next, they will be creating a mural showing their worms’ connected underground tunnels!

Mural Honoring Bobby Taggart

Upper school art students under the direction of Dave Love drew a chalk mural to honor Bobby Taggart. 

Art Across the Acedmy: Painting in the Preserve on Preserve Day

4th Graders Prototype Super Powers in the Beard Center

Jess Killo, Lower School art teacher has been an early adopter of both design thinking and maker space education, incorporating the work into the traditional practice of studio art.  This year, her 4th grade students began their Super Power project with a design thinking exercise, following that with a hand rendered prototyping project before utilizing iPads and digital technologies to render in CAD (computer assisted design) to print on our new MakerBots (3D printers) in the Beard Center for Innovation.

Photo Foundation Students Test Drive the Pentax k1000 in The Preserve

Outsider Art Exhibition