Benefits of coloring for kids and adults!

Coloring is usually thought of as a child's activity but there is so much more to coloring...
According to studies coloring helps children develop and master fine motor skills and finger dexterity. It also helps

• develop mental and motor skills
• encourages creativity
• teaches color recognition
• relieves boredom 

 According to the Huffington Post, 10/13/2014 article entitled, Coloring Isn't Just For Kids. It Can Actually Help Adults Combat Stress, one of the first psychologists to apply coloring as a relaxation technique was Carl G. Jüng in the early 20th century. He did this through mandalas: circular designs with concentric shapes similar to the Gothic churches’ rose windows. They have their origin in India.

When coloring, we activate different areas of our two cerebral hemispheres, says psychologist Gloria Martínez Ayala. "The action involves both logic, by which we color forms, and creativity, when mixing and matching colors. This incorporates the areas of the cerebral cortex involved in vision and fine motor skills [coordination necessary to make small, precise movements]. The relaxation that it provides lowers the activity of the amygdala, a basic part of our brain involved in controlling emotion that is affected by stress."

So enjoy life through color and take a moment to draw... There are free coloring pages by me, Elan, at the bottom that can be printed and colored. Have fun!!!!

Acrylic Abstractions

 Inspired by artist Kianja Strobert, in this workshop participants used dried sheets of acrylic paint,  paper, tape and mod podge to create colorful acrylic abstractions.
As posted in her bio, Kianja Strobert’s mixed-media sculptures and works on paper share a coarseness of texture and an expressive line. Often working in series, Strobert strives to maintain a similar rhythm throughout each work by implementing similar color palettes and visual motifs, as in a recent series that combined sculptures of concrete blocks and terracotta shards with bold abstractions on paper rendered in vibrant autumnal hues. Her delicate and colorful works reveal a preoccupation with assuring that every edge of the composition commands an illusion of depth, perspective, light, and motion. Pushing the boundary between abstraction and figuration, Strobert’s works, like Untitled (2011), have no identifiable subject and yet are highly evocative of light and, perhaps, space.

Supplies:
-acrylic paint
-wax paper
-mixed papers
-mod podge glue
-tape
-matte/frame
-scissors

To create dried sheets of acrylic paint lay wax paper down on a counter and place thick layers of wet cheap acrylic paint on top. Allow to dry for a day and then peel the dried paint off of the wax paper. Cut, rip or slice into managable piecs and create your own Acrylic Abstraction.
 
Vocabluary:
Layering: a covering piece of material or a part that lies over or under another
Collage: a work of art that is made by attaching pieces of different materials (such as paper, cloth, or wood) to a flat surface
Abstraction: a general idea or quality rather than an actual person, object, or event : an abstract idea or quality

Artist Highlight: Stanley Whitney

Stanley Whitney was born in 1946 in Philadelphia and currently lives and works in New York and Solignano, Italy. His works have been featured in numerous international exhibitions since the early seventies. His work was part the 50th Venice Biennale (2003) in the project Utopia Station, and was also shown in the Dakar Biennal (2004). He is the recipient the John Guggenheim Fellowship (1996) and Pollock-Krasner Fellowship (2002) as well as winning the First Robert De Niro Sr. Prize in Painting (2011). 

- See more at: http://www.studiomuseum.org/event-calendar/event/the-artists-voice-2015-03-26#sthash.hkwzAxM8.dpuf

In this Lil Studio participants were to be inspired by Stanley Whitney's painting http://www.studiomuseum.org/event-calendar/event/lil-studio-2015-01-14

to create their own colorful abstraction. 

Supplies: 

-pre-cut construction paper in squares and rectangles (different sizes)

-one large piece of paper 

-glue

 Possible Vocabulary:

 abstract: expressing ideas and emotions by using elements such as colors and lines without attempting to create a realistic picture

Complementary colors: Colors that are opposite each other on the color wheel are considered to be complementary colors (example: red and green).

Link to playing with color:  http://paletton.com/#uid=1000u0kllllaFw0g0qFqFg0w0aF

Painting Portraits...

 Inspired by artist Titus Kaphar and The Jerome Project this Target Free Sunday highlighted portrait paintings. Established artist Mario Moore, kindly facilitated the workshop and participants left with their own paintings on canvas panels.

*For young children the discussion of incarceration may be too much to understand but the idea of sharing a name with others can be a stepping stone to the bigger discussion of The Jerome Project. 

Supplies:
-pencils
-different size brushes
-acrylic paint
-paper and canvas panels
-use a mirror/photo if you would like to draw and paint yourself

Valentines for Mickalene

Late posting but HAPPY LOVE DAY!!!!
I am not someone that is fond of traditional holidays and Valentine's is one of them but I do enjoy the idea of sharing love with one another and I definitely love the idea of making art with love as the theme. For the February Lil' Studio we created Mickalene Thomas inspired Love Cards (also known as Valentine's Cards).

Mickalene Thomas, according to her bio on her website,  "New York-based artist Mickalene Thomas is best known for her elaborate paintings composed of rhinestones, acrylic and enamel. Thomas introduces a complex vision of what it means to be a woman and expands common definitions of beauty. Her work stems from her long study of art history and the classical genres of portraiture, landscape, and still life.

Inspired by various sources that range from the 19th century Hudson River School to Édouard Manet, Henri Matisse and Romare Bearden, she continues to explore notions of beauty from a contemporary perspective infused with the more recent influences of popular culture and Pop Art.

She is represented by Lehmann Maupin in New York, Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects and Galerie Nathalie Obadia in Paris."

MOre images can be found here: https://instagram.com/p/y9_CGRSDWA/?modal=true
 https://instagram.com/p/y9_ebJSDWw/?modal=true
 https://instagram.com/p/y9_eqZSDWy/?modal=true

I felt Mickalene Thomas' work displays a love and appreciation of women of color that needed to be highlighted and celebrated. What better way then love day cards! :) 

This was such a success that I had also turned it into a hands on workshop for the Target Free Sundays.