Tisko Workshop

Our first major fundraiser for the art club came in the form of a workshop at Tisko Elementary School in Branford. We really wanted to create a project that would both bring us profits and enrich the community with art; in a unanimous decision, the club decided to hold a two-day workshop at the elementary school in which the children would create various works of art relating to nature.

After Hurricane Irene hit the North East, many trees were ripped from the ground and tossed aside. Branford High School teacher and art club advisor Mrs. Kaiser cut rings of wood from fallen tree trunks that would be used as the surface upon which children would paint a gradient and then fashion a tree on top with different types of tissue paper. Also, children were able to create little magnets for the fridge that also displayed some symbol of nature.

In the end, we received an overwhelmingly positive response. There were around thirty children from the first to the fourth grade that participated in the workshop, and a great number of them were very excited and hardworking throughout the event. For the art club, we had achieved both our goals of raising money and spreading our love of art to the community.

"The Look for the Good" Project

One of our first major projects of the school year was "The Look for the Good" Project. Artist and author Anne Kubitsky created this project in which a person would make a small card describing what he or she is thankful for as a way to encourage people to reflect on what they are grateful for in hard times like now.

Our members found this task very interesting, and many members submitted pieces with a variety of different messages. All the cards were showcased at a few locations in New London in January; some of the cards were quite familiar to our art club members ! The project is still on-going, so anyone can continue to send in cards if interested ! For more information, click here.

Paper Making

One of the first projects that the art club encountered this school year was the task of creating paper. We used different types of materials, like colored tissue paper and printing paper, to add some color to our paper. Once enough material was shredded, we placed heaping amounts of the assorted paper into a blender with water, creating a paste that's called "slurry." After the mixture was placed into a large vat of water, we used a deckle covered with a screen to scoop up the slurry to fill the square shape of the paper mold. When the excess water was eliminated, the square solid was left to dry, becoming dry, rough, and colorful paper the next day !
We all enjoyed this experience, and many members created their own paper to take home. You can see our members working below.

Introduction

Hello, all !

This is our first post of hopefully many on this blog.

At Branford High School, our art club participates in many activities to enrich not only our experience with the arts, but also the experiences of those in our community and others in different countries. We have created many beautiful pieces of artwork for our various projects throughout this school year; you can check the "Artwork" page on this blog periodically in order to see our ever-growing collection.

Continue to check back to this blog to see our updates on new pieces and new projects that we are or will be working on !