Visual Arts

In the La Scuola Arts Atelier, the children have the opportunity to play with 100 languages. Open materials, dance, graphic traces, wire, collage, watercolor, textiles, clay… are both a challenge and a resource. For some of these studies, children are free of tools other than their hands/body to dialogue with the materials offered. This direct contact with the material world develops sensibility, awareness and intentionality.

The Atelier becomes the child’s intrinsic motivation, building confidence and expanding a range of references (from paper possibilities to how to make 3 different types of knots by asking 3 different peers). Other explorations include that of relationships, languages, and skills through self-led collective projects. In one story, we started with an empty room and ended with an underwater world, a secret garden in the closet, a rocketship, animals in all sorts of materials, robots, books, playing cards, and a boat. The children brainstormed, projected/ designed, presented, categorized, chose, discussed, organized, developed, reflected and shared their learning experiences.

Young artists continue to explore environments connected to classroom learning and the world through inquiries such as a focus on migration, with researching and making art about migratory animals, and building awareness of human rights issues with posters about human migration. In exploration of Material Ecology we worked on how nature creates art through patterns and how human beings can be inspired by nature and co-create with nature. We explore the question, how can we express ourselves and the world around us with line, through color? Or, how can artists use and interpret space and spaciousness? We explore creative expression of the world and self, through the ideas and language of art and design, with the stories and games that captivate us, local and global culture and celebrations, featured artists, inclusive and intentional spaces, wildlife, climate, the environment, and ideas of kindness and peace. This year our research brought us to the creation of a story with shadow puppets. La Scuola artists collaborated to create a Book and Art Review elevating and celebrating diverse voices. We created a Peace Forest mural project, with the tree as a symbol of peace, expressing our connection to each other, and sending our well-wishes of love and peace out to the world.