Visual Arts
Visual arts classes introduce students to the key skills, concepts, and studio art disciplines that are basic to the development of their creative
expression and visual literacy. In the elementary years, the focus is on exploration and experimentation. In the middle school years students
learn the essential skills of each art discipline. The high school provides a foundation in classical and modern methods of drawing, painting,
graphic design, and sculpture which gives students the insights and abilities to undertake more advanced works in these areas of concentration
and build their portfolios. From K-12, Visual Arts emphasizes the following intellectual skills:
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Methods, Materials, and Techniques
Elements and Principles of Design
Observation & Abstraction
Critical Response & Exhibiting
Stylistic Influence and Expression
Drawing and Painting I: Description
Figure drawing is the traditional cornerstone of representational art. This course begins with methods for classic depictions of the head through
charcoal and pencil, emphasizing planar, volumetric, and tonal structures that contribute to 2D representation. Students will then work on form,
structure, and spatial development by copying master drawings and then making cast drawings from portrait busts in the art studio. Switching
media, students will paint portraits and self-portraits in monochromatic scales and full color. The course concludes with figure construction and
observational drawings from casts as well as life drawings.
Units:
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Unit 1: Drawing the Head
Unit 2: Master Copies & Cast Drawing
Unit 3: Drawing the Figure
Unit 4: Equine Drawing
Subject: Drawing & Painting I
Grade: 10-12
Suggested Timeline: 11-12 weeks
Unit Title: Drawing the Head
Unit Overview/Essential Understanding:
Beginning with a review of the ball and plane method, students begin drawing the skull with attention paid to skeletal structure and its relation
to surface form. Drawing the head comprises several steps, building skill in rendering facial features (eyes, nose, lips, ears) and positions
(frontal, profile, ¾), and practicing these poses in numerous angles, giving attention to the variety of features based on sex, age, and race.
Unit Objectives:
Students will:
Apply standard proportions & sight measuring to head construction
Use anatomical knowledge to create ideal & observational portrait drawings in pencil and charcoal
Create a self-portrait from reference
Focus Standards Addressed in this Unit:
9.1.12.A: Know and use the elements and principles of each art form to create works in the arts and humanities.
9.3.12.B: Determine and apply criteria to a person’s work and works of others in the arts.
Important Standards Addressed in this Unit: n/a
Misconceptions:
Problems with head construction usually occur because students tend to draw portraits based on an embedded symbol system practiced and
memorized in early childhood and not based on observation.
Concepts/Content:
Proportions of head
Ball and Plane Head construction
Anatomy of skull
Facial features
Planar analysis
Competencies/Skills:
Create proportional heads in multiple
positions from observation &
imagination; Apply knowledge of planes
to facial construction; Analyze
proportions of skull and its effect on
surface form; Create facial features based
on anatomical proportions & observation
Description of Activities:
Students will draw skulls in multiple positions from
observation and from memory; Drawing a series of
heads in multiple positions using the ball and plane
method; Use casts of eyes/noses/mouths to apply value
to facial features; Construct anatomically
correct/proportionate heads in multiple poses based on
reference; Create ideal heads based on sex/age/race
Assessments:
Students will create a large-scale study of a head constructed with planes and values
Interdisciplinary Connections:
Human Anatomy
Additional Resources:
Portrait Drawing, Graves
Drawing from Life, Brown/McLean
Drawing the Head and Figure, Hamm
Drawing the Head and Hands, Loomis
Subject: Drawing & Painting I
Grade: 10-12
Suggested Timeline: 6-7 weeks
Unit Title: Master Copies and Cast Drawing
Unit Overview/Essential Understanding:
This unit gives students the opportunity to apply their skills at drawing heads to works made from reference and direct observation. Using
master drawings, students will make meticulous copies in order to carefully observe line, tone, proportion, plane and mass, form modulation,
light and shade, atmospheric perspective, figure structure and composition. The skills they acquire from undertaking master drawing copies will
be incorporated in the second half of the unit, where they will be creating large-scale drawings from plaster casts (portrait busts based on great
sculptures/sculptors in art history) in the school’s collection.
Unit Objectives:
Students will:
Develop rendering skills in regard to line, value, plane and mass, structure, composition
Apply methods of head construction to working from reference and observation
Analyze the style of master artists and incorporate these styles in their own work
Focus Standards Addressed in this Unit:
9.1.12.B: Recognize, know, use and demonstrate a variety of appropriate arts elements and principles to produce, review and revise original
works in the arts.
9.3.12.B: Determine and apply criteria to a person’s work and works of others in the arts.
Important Standards Addressed in this Unit:
9.2.12.D: Analyze a work of art from its historical and cultural perspective.
Misconceptions: n/a
Concepts/Content:
Competencies/Skills:
Description of Activities:
Cast drawing
Academic atelier drawing style
Values
Painting from casts
Facial planes
Use a variety of media in the production
of drawings based on the work of great
artists; Critique master drawings in group
setting; Create large-scale drawings with
charcoal of plaster casts, using ball and
plane methods or sight-sizing for initial
construction and then employing
meticulous rendering of value and
contour
Students will draw a portrait by Sargent together and
then compare their work to each other and the original
in a group critique; Create a paint sketch of a planar
head cast; work on individual master drawing copies
selected for complexity of pose and value; Apply the
skills acquired in copying 2D works to the drawing of a
3D portrait bust.
Assessments:
Students will work from the portrait bust collection of the studio, creating large-scale observational drawings that highlight the following
features: line, value, proportion, perspective, figure structure, composition, and plane and mass.
Interdisciplinary Connections:
n/a
Additional Resources:
Lessons in Classical Drawing, Aristides
Old Master Portrait Drawings
Sargent Portrait Drawings
Subject: Drawing & Painting I
Unit Title: Drawing the Figure
Grade: 10-12
Suggested Timeline: 9 weeks
Unit Overview/Essential Understanding:
This unit introduces figure drawing by developing knowledge of anatomy and construction methods. Students will learn techniques for
proportioning the figure, learn structural concepts about the figure such as cylinder and block construction, learn to depict foreshortening, to
capture gesture and movement, and to create whole figures from imagination, reference, and direct observation.
Unit Objectives:
Students will:
Construct proportional figures
Use anatomical knowledge and shape schemas to determine figural form
Design figures that are dynamic in composition
Create 2D representational artwork from direct observation
Critique their own work, the work of peers, and the work of professional artists
Focus Standards Addressed in this Unit:
9.1.12.A: Know and use the elements and principles of each art form to create works in the arts and humanities.
9.1.12.C: Integrate and apply advanced vocabulary to the arts forms.
9.1.12.E: Delineate a unifying theme through the production of a work of art that reflects skills in media processes and techniques.
9.3.12.C: Apply systems of classification for interpreting works in the arts and forming a critical response.
Important Standards Addressed in this Unit: n/a
Misconceptions:
Lack of facility with standard proportions, focus on contour while ignoring mass and constructive shape
Concepts/Content:
Drawing manikins
Proportion of the figure
Anatomy of the figure
Dynamic poses
Cylinder/block construction
Gesture drawing
Life drawing
Competencies/Skills:
Construct proportionate and anatomically
accurate figures from reference and
observation; Draw figures in various
poses with an emphasis on dynamic
gesture; Critique their own work and
those of others in class discussion
Description of Activities:
Students will practice manikin proportions and apply
them to gesture drawing from reference and
observation; construct hands, legs, feet, etc. with
attention paid to cylinder/block construction; work from
plaster casts to render form/muscle mass with attention
to value; engage in group critiques to improve attention
to line/shape/form/proportion; compose dynamic
figures; create a large-scale drawing of several figures
integrated into an environment
Assessments:
Students will create a full figure drawing based on direct observation, focusing on a variety of poses that stress balance, gesture, shape, mass,
anatomy, line, and tone.
Interdisciplinary Connections:
Additional Resources:
Human Anatomy
Charles Bargue Drawing Course
Drawing the Head and Figure, Hamm
Figure Drawing for All It’s Worth, Loomis
Life Drawing in Charcoal, Graves
Subject: Drawing & Painting I
Grade: 10-12
Suggested Timeline: 6-7 weeks
Unit Title: Equine Drawing
Unit Overview/Essential Understanding:
This unit introduces students to nature drawing and scientific illustration by focusing on the horse. By studying horse anatomy, they will be able
to construct realistically-proportioned figures in a variety of complex poses both at rest and in motion. They will also use non-Western sources
to create abstract works based on expressive distortion of the figure.
Unit Objectives:
Students will:
Illustrate equine skeletal and muscle structure
Apply value and foreshortening to animal forms
Draw figures in motion
Employ a series of artistic styles to create realistic and abstract drawings of horses based on the work of these and other artists:
Rosa Bonheur
Theodore Gericault
Leonardo Da Vinci
Frederic Remington
Ernest Meissonier
Xu Beihong
Franz Marc
Takeuchi Seiho
Focus Standards Addressed in this Unit:
9.1.12.B: Recognize, know, use and demonstrate a variety of appropriate arts elements and principles to produce, review and revise original
works in the arts.
9.3.12.B: Determine and apply criteria to a person’s work and works of others in the arts.
Important Standards Addressed in this Unit:
9.2.12.D: Analyze a work of art from its historical and cultural perspective.
Misconceptions: n/a
Concepts/Content:
Competencies/Skills:
Description of Activities:
Horse Anatomy: skeletal structure,
major muscle groups
Animal motion studies
Foreshortened figures
Horse head and figure studies
Chinese/Japanese/European/American
representations of horses
Constructing horses figures based on
basic shapes/proportion; Use artistic
style to expressively exaggerate nature;
Create dynamic figures at rest and in
motion; Employ value and foreshortening
to craft realistic figures and heads
Students will construct figures based on skeletal,
muscular, and geometric frameworks; Create a series of
head studies based on photographic & artistic reference
material; Draw from direct observation; Make master
copies of horses from Western, non-Western traditions;
Create a cartoon horse based on the work of a particular
illustrator/animator
Assessments: Students will make a copy of a horse painting from a European, American, or Asian Master painter.
Interdisciplinary Connections:
n/a
Additional Resources:
Animals in Motion, Muybridge
Draw Horses with Sam Savitt