Pop Art Collage - Group Project

The more you read the more things you will know. The more that you learn the more places you'll go.  
~ Dr. Seuss





You're never too old, too wacky, too wild, to pick up a book and read to a child.  
~Dr. Seuss

Pop Art Collage

This project was inspired by collage artist Michael Albert. We cut cereal and snack boxes then reconfigured them onto a piece of cardboard, adhering with glossy acrylic polymer. When the collage was complete we brushed on a layer of polymer which adds some protection, keeps the pieces in place and add a little shine.


Project length: The individual collages take about an hour to an hour and a half, including 5-7 minutes talking about the work of Michael Albert.

Materials:
- Gloss medium acrylic polymer (a plentiful supply is in the community room).
- Cereal or snack boxes. Normal thickness recommended. The large Costco boxes are much thicker and were difficult for the students to cut.

- Paintbrushes. The flat ones seemed to work better.
- Small cups, one for each student with about 2 tablespoons of polymer.
- Thick cardboard to put the collage pieces on. We used a 6x6 in size. A larger cereal box size may have taken too much time and felt overwhelming to some of the students.

We watched a 5 minute video from the artist's website, and I checked out his book, An Artist's America, from the library to show additional examples.

Pop Art Grumpy Cats

I had the pleasure of leading Mr. Reardon's 4th grade class in a lesson about pop art. First, I explained how pop art is a movement that surfaced in 1950's, and challenges traditional art by using imagery from popular culture, such as subject matter used in advertising and the news. Also, pop art usually has a visual "pop" by using bright, vibrant colors with simplified, iconic forms and plenty of contrast. I had print outs of examples of pop art for each table of students to reference.

For our subject matter, we used Grumpy Cat. How fun is that? Many of the students weren't familiar with Grumpy cat, so I was lucky enough to show them examples of Grumpy Cat memes. The students were very excited!  

To begin, I asked them to put their names on the back of their watercolor paper. Then, I lead them through a step-by-step process on how to draw Grumpy Cat that I found here. I drew Grumpy Cat on the white board, and the students drew him using pencil.

Then the students traced their cats using a thick, black Sharpie, and colored the pupils of the eyes black. I provided the students with a limited color palette of tempera paints. Each table of students got to work with 4 different bright colors, and I encouraged them to consider the white of the paper a color, too. I instructed them to choose their colors wisely, and not to let any of their colors touch each other, so the shapes that made up their Grumpy Cats wouldn't blend together. When they were finished, we let the paintings dry on the drying rack.

Because the paint covered up the Sharpie lines, I asked Mr. Reardon to let them retrace their Sharpie lines when they were dry. This gave the finishing contrast that was necessary to pop!

We hung the finished pieces in the hallway by the Staff Lounge. They look great! Like Andy Warhol's Marilyns, only much grumpier!  Hope you have a chance to see our Grumpy Cats while they're on dislplay this month.