General Art
General Art students thoughtfully experience a wide range of projects with a variety of media. Drawing, painting, printmaking, and ceramics are among the media students work with, giving students a taste of artistic fields explored further in future HC art courses.
Drawing
Students in Drawing are encouraged to slow down, look closely, and realize that there are many ways to make a drawn mark come alive on a page. Media used include pencil, colored pencil, india ink, charcoal, collage, chalk, oil pastel, etc. Students create drawings from observation, photographs, and imaginations. Subjects vary from still life to portrait to abstraction on our quest to discover works with compositional inventiveness, strong line quality, and surface richness.
Fibers
Students in this course experience fibers as a medium for creative expression and design. They create 3-D fiber sculptures, fabric collages, learn various hand stitches, experience weaving, try out photo transfer processes, and look at the work of contemporary fibers artists. We witness the wonderful quality that fibers hold to connect as we stitch, weave, wrap, and press fabrics, threads, paper, pulp…
Painting
In Painting students explore the fundamentals of color, color mixing, form, space, texture, light, and composition, as they look for inventive ways to give their individual ideas and expressions visual form. Students work primarily in acrylic as we explore a variety of painters, basic painting techniques, styles, and movements.
Sculpture & Ceramics
This class emphasizes working hands-on with a variety of sculptural materials, including clay, wood, paper, plaster, wire, and found objects. Projects challenge students to visually “solve” various artistic problems with 3-D “solutions” as they learn to put things together, think about, look at, and respond to artwork “in the round.” How can you make a flat material become dimensional? How might you multiple objects to create order out of chaos? Why is negative space important in 3-D work? Students respond visually to such questions while searching for inventive sculptural forms.
Advanced 2-D: Explorations in Drawing & Painting
In Advanced 2-D, students explore a variety of studio problems and techniques designed to expand their understanding of the expressive potential of drawing and painting. Sketching from life, the landscape, and one another, using materials in both traditional and non-traditional ways, projects evolve from direct daily assignments designed to stretch style and process toward the culmination of a series of self-directed works. Students also look at drawings and paintings, visit a gallery, and discuss their work, continually retaining an awareness of creating within community.
College Drawing
College Drawing is a yearlong advanced drawing class accredited through Calvin University. Students explore and advance fundamental drawing skills in observational drawing, look into and experience contemporary drawing practices, develop an active sketchbook habit, and create a body of work. Students may choose to dual enroll at Calvin College to receive Calvin University credit for ARTS 250.
Advanced Placement Art
AP Art is a yearlong course designed for students who are ready to intensely create with other serious student artists, and to produce a portfolio of approximately 15-20 quality works of art exploring and expanding personal artistic interests and strengths. Students compile an organized portfolio package including digital photographs and artist statements by the end of the course. Students also complete several pieces of artwork and assignments over the summer.
