Portraits, Portraits Everywhere!

Merrily Boyd, K-6 Art Teacher

As students finish up their first art project of the year, you'll start to notice many faces adorning the walls at GRACE.  "Why all the self-portraits?" you might ask.  "Why do students start art class each year with the same project?"

Kindergarten self-portraits at GRACE

One of the fun things about self-portraits is that they are never the same from year to year.  Of course, as I explain to students, they grow and change from year to year and their portraits will reflect those changes!  A student's kindergarten self-portrait project will hardly resemble their fifth grade self-portrait.  Not only do students' skills improve (sometimes drastically) from one year to the next, so that they can more accurately represent their physical appearance, but they also get new haircuts, lose teeth, get glasses or braces, and so on.  I encourage students to show the little details that make them unique at the particular time that they are working on their portrait so that in future years they can look back and remember what life was like in first grade or third grade, for example.  You may see details like freckles or band-aids or a favorite headband--all of these are students' way of capturing a moment in time and showing just how God designed each of them to be completely unique and special, different from every other person. 

Each year we look at some famous self-portraits from art history, including a few by Rembrandt.  He painted over 80 self-portraits during his lifetime, showing himself as a young man, then a successful middle-aged artist, and finally as white-haired and aging.  What an amazing record he left!  I encourage students to hold onto the self-portraits they make in each grade as one way they can look back when they're older and remember their time at GRACE.

   

Self-Portraits by Rembrandt van Rijn (1629, 1640, 1669)

While self-portraits are the subject, the way we create them varies for each grade level.  This provides an opportunity for students to learn many new skills and techniques and experiment with a variety of media.  Kindergarten students create collages of their faces from cut paper, while first-graders use markers and focus on filling the background space.  In second grade, students use glue to outline their image on black paper and fill in with chalk pastel, adding a horizon line and favorite place in the background.  Third grade students read I Ain't Gonna Paint No More by Karen Beaumont and take inspiration from the book's illustrations, showing themselves in a familiar room (all in black and white, with the only color resulting from splatter-painting).  In fourth grade, we view art by mixed- media artist Romare Bearden, who was born in North Carolina, and combine a background collage with a contour line self-portrait.  Fifth-graders really strive for accuracy, studying the Photorealism of Chuck Close and practicing the grid method by referencing a photo they take of themselves using PhotoBooth on their MacBooks.

By GRACE's Grandparents' Day celebration on October 14th, all students will be finished with their self-portraits, and you'll see their beautiful artwork decorating our school.  I hope our grandparents and other visitors will enjoy looking at and talking with students about all of the "faces of GRACE" that will line the halls!

"I praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made..."  Psalm 139:14