superheroes make art AT COILE MIDDLE SCHOOL
Last October, the Georgia Museum of Art received Junior League of Athens Community Impact mini-grant funds to partner with the Athens, Georgia, Chapter of The Links, Incorporated, and Coile Middle School in creating enriching afterschool programming focused on photography.
cameras and digital cameras and each received a disposable black-and-white film camera, paid for with the Junior League funds. To learn how to use the camera, students went on a treasure hunt outside, taking photographs. They were allowed to keep the cameras and take photos through the end of the year. They also took superhero photographs of each other, having fun with the project. When the novel coronavirus outbreak occurred in March, the community reception scheduled for April was canceled, but the museum did manage to collect the disposable cameras, submit the film for processing and send digital prints of their work to students digitally. We look forward to continuing student programming like this in the future, especially with the help of such good community partners.
During the four-session program, the museum’s education department met with over 20 students to create three photography projects. At the educators’ first visit, in October 2019, students discussed the difference between a selfie and a portrait, reviewed portraits by artists of color and examined the idea of personal expression and visual literacy by closely looking at each work of art and using them as inspiration to take themed portraits of their classmates. Later in October, they learned about cyanotypes, one of the earliest forms of photography, as well as how color was first introduced to photography through hand-tinting. The session ended with an
age-appropriate critique of classmates’ work facilitated using the T.A.G. approach (Tell the artist something you like, Ask the artist a question, Give a positive suggestion). Each student “tagged” three works of art by writing their response on printed cards and then discussed their responses with the artist about their tinted cyanotypes. In November, students learned more about artists of color and how photography is used for different purposes. They also took pictures with Polaroid minis and interviewed each other for a portrait project. During the final visit in December, students learned about the difference between film
12
Made with FlippingBook Ebook Creator