Teaching at KidVentures Summer Art Camp Pt. 2

Picture Book Art Journal
created by James
Kidventures summer camp program
Aug 10 - 14, 2015
Baggage Building Arts Centre
Thunder Bay, Ontario


I completed the second and final week as an instructor working with young artists through the City of Thunder Bay's KidVentures summer camp program. 
This week 18 young talents explored the theme of "Around Thunder Bay" and created a multi-page "Picture Book & art journal".

Here is a daily breakdown of this week's activities

• Monday, sketch in pencil then fill in with acrylic paints on rag paper.

pencil sketch on paper held onto plasti-core board with green painter's tape. The young artist decided to explore the theme of rivers and fishing in this piece.

applying primary acrylics with brush to the pencil composition

the beginnings of a forested area in brown and orange

a floral theme being explored by this young artist

• Tuesday, search for imagery from various sources (ie. magazines, newspaper) then cut and paste these onto the painting to create a visual story.

this artist decided to do collage first and paint later

a small collage element (local retailer logo)

a bit of birds added and persons in watercraft in the lower areas

what one would see while canoing down a river

fish 

wildlife in the forest

• Wed, onto heavier board map in pencil another image then using air dry sculpting medium and liquid white glue construct a low relief composition.

rolling out clay-like air dry sculptng medium on plastic sheet with a wood dowel

the artists had the chance to use texture pressing plates (the colourful plastic squares you see at the top of the photo

applying the sculpting medium with liquid white glue onto the heavier paper board 

(this will become the cover of the picture book)

book cover with no colour added, the artist liked the effect just as it was in white.

• Thursday, apply paint to the dry sculpting medium.               Begin sketch on paper and transfer onto thin styrofoam plate by tracing through using ballpoint pen.

painting the dry sculpting medium on board, don't worry the board will lost it's curl when the paint has dried.

using a ballpoint pen an artist is drawing into flat styrofoam plate that will become a relief print on paper

• Friday, using soft rubber brayers roll water soluble relief print inks to the foam plates and print onto coloured papers. Create small stamps from scrap pieces of styrofoam and print on paper.

printmaking station - graphic chemical water-soluble inks (non-toxic, easy wash up with water. Good open air working time (up to 2 hours). We used plexiglass to roll our inks out with soft synthetic rubber brayers.

two colours of ink carefully rolled on the plate ready for printing

relief prints drying on a sunny ledge

student stamping using different designs and arrangment

relief print page in the Picture book



We took all of the work and assembled it in a book form using drilled holes and decorative string. A few extra pieces of blank rag watercolour paper were included as additional pages for doing an at-home activity with wet or dry media.