Louise Heilpern | Visual Arts and Design and Technology Teacher

Spotlight, our September exhibition of selected Years 1-6 artworks, showcased the array of materials, techniques and subject matter studied in Primary Visual Arts in 2018. It was pertinent that the Innovation Festival shared the Angles Leadership and Learning space with Spotlight this year, both shows engaging students in programs that offer exciting and open-ended briefs that allow students scope to explore the boundaries of a topic, encouraging problem solving, planning and experimentation.

Year 1 students demonstrated their development of skills when drawing a plant from life. The additional extension to this activity was the long, narrow paper format. The students embraced the challenge, extending the stems of their earlier plant studies and used colour to unify their designs.

The study of the pictorial elements of colour, composition, shape, line and texture formed the basis for Year 2 textured imprints and paintings on clay tiles. The study of Henri Matisse and earlier paper collages formed the basis for these complex and diverse artworks.

Referencing Aboriginal artists and artworks in a unit titled Woven Forms, Year 3 students designed and experimented with sewing and weaving, giving consideration to aesthetic and structural qualities during the making process.

The subjective response when interacting with portraiture instigated the Year 4 study of the German Expressionist art movement and the building, inscribing and glazing of clay sculptural masks.

Year 5 interpreted the theme of Art and Illusion through iPad  photography. Topics covered included reflection, transparency and refraction. In Semester 2, a sculpture unit began with an initial focus on the representation of hands in artworks. Students built a 3D hand in clay which was later painted with a metallic glaze.

Year 6 students undertook research and practical activities that explored the Hermannsburg Potters, a group of Aboriginal artists/ potters from Hermannsburg in Central Australia. In Pots that Tell Stories, students hand-built their own pot with a motif that depicted their HSIE topic, Australia as a Nation. This allowed for discussion and investigation about issues such as Australia’s natural and built environment as well as the exploration of contemporary issues such as refugees and asylum seekers.