Name____________________________________
Date________
High School Art
Blizzard Bag Assignments
All of the Blizzard Bag assignments are assigned on the calamity day and due
2 weeks later. The assignments for all Art I-IV classes are to create sketches
that can be done in or later put into your sketchbooks. They will count towards
your attendance for the day missed, a grade on your quarter grades, and will
need to be put into your sketchbooks- therefore they will count twice! Also, for
those of you intending to attend Art School for college, you will want you
sketchbooks in your portfolio. THE WHOLE REASON I AM ASSIGNING THESE
SKETCHES IS BECAUSE COLLEGES WANT TO SEE DRAWINGS LIKE
THESE IN YOUR PORTFOLIO>>>> DO A GOOD JOB!!!!
Calamity Day 1: Sketch Your Hand.
Choose an interesting position to observe and draw your hand. It can
represent an activity you like to do or a school appropriate sign or symbol. For
example, a baseball pitcher may choose the hand position for throwing a slider, a
dancer may draw the position hands are supposed to be in for ballet, a guitarist
may choose holding a pick, or you could look up the American Sign Language
symbol for peace, love, hope, pain, etc. You will be doing a sketch of your hand
in this position. Please notice I used the word ‘sketch”, not “trace”. No tracings
will be accepted for a grade.
I recommend using a combination of simplest form drawing and gesture
drawing to begin. The palm area, ( depending on the angle,) is a square. Use
gesture drawing (1 line through the center) to capture the position of each finger.
Check position and proportion. (Hint- depending on the position and angle, the
palm and middle finger are close to the same length.) Once position and
proportion are correct, carefully draw the flow of the contour line around the
outside edge of your hand. Check the flow of the line. Add details. Create
shapes of shadow.
Art II, III, and IV students, make sure you capture the shapes of shadow that
show the light source. Check the shapes of shadow for accuracy and add value.
Make sure you have created implied lines.
Grading Criteria/ Learning Goals
 Chose a unique, meaningful hand position.
 Overall craftsmanship of sketch. (Complete, fills the paper, no smears,
wrinkles, time and effort shows in work, work looks clean and finished.)
 Correctly captured position, proportion, and flow of contour lines.
 Accurately created shapes of shadow.
 Accurately captured values:
Art I- 4 values. White, Light Gray, Dark Gray, and Black.
Art II- 5 values. White, Light Gray, Medium Gray, Dark Gray, and
Black.
Art III- 6 values. Same as Art II plus Medium Light or Medium Dark
Gray.
Art IV- 7 values. Same as Art II plus Medium Light AND Medium Dark
Gray.


Art II-IV only- Indication of light source.
Art II-IV only- Created implied lines.
Calamity Day 2: Sketch Your Foot.
You will choose a view of your own bare foot to draw. You must draw from
life, so choose a view that is comfortable to sketch from. I recommend using the
same techniques I described to help draw the hand. The Grading Criteria are the
same as from Calamity Day 1: Sketching your hand.
Calamity Day 3: Sketch Your Favorite Piece of Apparel.
Choose a favorite piece of apparel to draw. It should represent your
personality or who you are as a person. It could be a favorite shirt, jersey, shoe,
purse, gym bag, hat, outfit, or anything that is appropriate for school. (Nobody
wants to see your underwear!)
Set your piece of apparel up close to a light source so there are light
highlights and dark shadows on it and shadows cast by it on the “ground”. Be
sure to ground your object by adding the horizon line of the object the apparel is
sitting on. Add the shading on the ground cast by the light source to make it look
like it isn’t floating. This is called grounding your object.
There are 2 additions to your grading criteria for this assignment: accurately
created texture and grounding of the object.
Grading Criteria/ Learning Goals.
 Chose a unique, meaningful hand position.
 Overall craftsmanship of sketch. (Complete, fills the paper, no smears,
wrinkles, time and effort shows in work, work looks clean and finished.)
 Correctly captured position, proportion, and flow of contour lines.
 Accurately created shapes of shadow.
 Accurately captured texture of the object.
 Correctly grounded the object by adding a horizon line and shadow cast
by the light source.
 Indication of light source.
 Accurately captured values:
Art I- 4 values. White, Light Gray, Dark Gray, and Black.
Art II- 5 values. White, Light Gray, Medium Gray, Dark Gray, and
Black.
Art III- 6 values. Same as Art II plus Medium Light or Medium Dark
Gray.
Art IV- 7 values. Same as Art II plus Medium Light AND Medium Dark
Gray.
 Art II-IV only- Created implied lines.