Environmental Installation Slab

Objective: Students explore outdoors to create an original environmental installation that demonstrates this acquired knowledge

Students define, identify and discuss the significance of these art terms in relation to their own artwork, their peer’s artwork as well as current and historical artist’s work

Historical and cultural exemplars: Andy Goldsworthy, Christo and Jeanne-Claude

Final Project is inspired by environmental photo and created through slab building with clay. 

Project Requirements: 

• Student will explore and create an environmental installation while on nature walk
• Student will preserve the installation through photography and video
• Student will use the installation to inspire a final project as a slab vase. 
• Student will design and create a hand built slab base in a style of their choosing while sticking with demo instructions. 
• The vase will be a min of 6” and a max of 10”
• Vase should include relief, indentation, subtraction and pattern, 
• Student will complete the vase using only one, neutral glaze color

CA Art Standards: 

1.1 Identify and use the principles of design to discuss, analyze, and write about visual aspects in the environment and in works of art, including their own.

1.5 Analyze the material used by a given artist and describe how its use influences the meaning of the work.

2.3 Develop and refine skill in the manipulation of digital imagery (either still or video).

3.3 Identify and describe trends in the visual arts and discuss how the issues of time, place, and cultural influence are reflected in selected works of art.

4.4 Articulate the process and rationale for refining and reworking one of their own works of art.

5.3 Compare and contrast the ways in which different media (television, newspapers, magazines) cover the same art exhibition.

DISCUSSION: 

ARTIST: Christo Javacheff (June 13, 1935-           )

Christo attended the Fine Arts Academy, Bulgaria, 

When the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 broke out, he fled to Vienna.

He studied for a semester, moved to Paris and began exhibiting his works with the nouveaux réalistes. 

Christo’s earliest sculptures were composed of cans and bottles—some as found and some  painted or wrapped in paper, plastic, or fabric.

Vocabulary: Nouveaux Réalistes: Founded in 1960 by the critic Pierre Restany, artists associated with nouveau réalism (which translates as ‘new realism’) made extensive use of collage and assemblage as well as painting

While working there as a portrait artist, Christo met Jeanne-Claude de Guillebon, whom he married in 1959. 

ARTIST: Jeanne-Claude de GuillebJon  (June 13, 1935- 2009)

environmental sculptors, noted for their controversial outdoor sculptures that often involved monumental displays of fabrics and plastics.

Jeanne-Claude was once described as her husband’s publicist and business manager. 

She later received equal billing with him in all creative and administrative aspects of their work. In 1964 the pair relocated to New York City, where their art was seen as a form of Arte Povera.

Vocabulary: Arte povera:  means literally ‘poor art’ but the word poor here refers to the movement’s signature exploration of a wide range of materials beyond the traditional ones of oil paint on canvas, bronze, or carved marble

 

Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s first collaborative works included Dockside Packages

In 1968 they also completed a suspended 18,375-foot (5,600-metre) “air package” over Minneapolis, Minnesota, 

Their monumental later projects included Valley Curtain (1972; Rifle Gap, Colorado), 

Running Fence (1976; Marin and Sonoma counties, California), 

In 1985 in Paris, they wrapped the Pont Neuf (bridge) in beige  cloth. 

In 1995 the couple received the Japan Art Association’s Praemium Imperiale prize for sculptures

ARTIST:Christo and Jeanne-ClaudeThe Gates, Central Park, New York City, 1979–2005 was unveiled in 2005. Stretching across 23 miles (37 km) of walkway in Central Park, the work featured 7,503 steel  gates that were 16 feet (5 metres) high and decorated with saffron-coloured cloth panels. The Gates was on display for 16 days and attracted more than four million visitors.

Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s huge, usually outdoor sculptures are temporary and involve hundreds of assistants in their construction. 

Seen as they are by all manner of passersby, including those who would not necessarily visit museums

These works force observers to confront questions regarding the nature of art. 

As the scope of the projects widened, increased time was needed for planning and construction phases, the securing of permits, and environmental-impact research. 

For each project, they formed a corporation, which secured financing and sold the primary models and sketches. 

Most installations were documented in print and on film, and the materials that created them were sold or given away after the projects were dismantled.

ARTIST: Andy Goldsworthy (1956-     )

Born in Cheshire, England

Currently resides in Scotland. 

He studied at Bradford School of Art and Preston Polytechnic and has been making art in the environment, both rural and urban, since the  mid-1970s. 

Over the past 25 years, Goldsworthy has gained a significant reputation for both his ephemeral works and his permanent installations that draw out the endemic character of a place. 

The artist works with natural materials, such as leaves, sand, ice, and stone that often originate from the local site. 

Goldsworthy has produced more than 70 exhibitions and projects all over the world

In addition, he has made temporary museum installations at the J. Paul Getty Museum, The Metropolitan Museum, and The Tate. 

Goldsworthy's other large-scale installations in the United States include Garden of  Stones (2003, Museum of Jewish Heritage, New York); 

All of these large-scale commissioned works have their origins in ephemeral works.

Vocabulary: ephemeral: lasting for a very short time.

Andy Goldsworthy's Garden of Stones at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in NYC has trees growing from boulders creating an ongoing process of growth 

PROCEDURES: 

Students receive and hour of class time outside to create an environmental installation. 

Students document that installation in photograph

Students use their photograph to inspire their slab sculpture 

SLAB STEPS: 

• Slab-built ceramics: the artist assembles an artwork by hand using flat slabs of clay.
• Artists form slabs by forcing a lumps of clay through a roller mechanism, flattening the clay to a consistent thickness. 
• Roll slabs of clay using 1/4” slab sticks (Guides)
• Slabs can be used to build sculpture or functional vessels, and often gives the artist more freedom to alter a form from the beginning of the process.
• Start with wedging and throwing clay on a flat surface (covered with canvas).
• **Wedging: throwing or kneading clay to remove air bubbles
• Spread the clay out by patting it with your whole hand.
• Flip the clay over carefully.

Place wooden slab sticks (guides) on both sides of the clay to help you achieve an even thickness

Trace from sketchbook planning and cut with a needle tool.

Sketchbook plan should be to scale. 

Once slab is complete: Students will use additive, subtractive and relief methods to create the look of their environmental sculpture in their final sale vase.