Art

This term the Grade 3 and 4 students have been fascinated learning about the Princess of Polka Dots, Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama. Inspired by her exhibition that will begin in a few weeks at the National Gallery of Victoria, the students have been making dotty artworks all term. 

They started by investigating her love of mushrooms and cut their own mushrooms out of coloured paper. Their mushrooms are all different sizes, shapes and colours, and of course covered in polka dots. The students learnt how Yayoi likes repetition and pattern in her work as a way of not thinking about her troubles, her use of nets in the background are examples of this and the students added their own nets in gold, silver and black markers. 

We then delved into her world of flower sculptures titled ‘Flowers that Bloom at Midnight’. To Yayoi they represent the great contradictions in this life: celebration and mourning, life and death, male and female. The students created their own flower petals constructed out of foam, with patterns and dots added with paint pens. An eye was glued in the centre of the flower (another of Yayoi’s motifs) and ‘planted’ inside their polka dotted pot.

Here is a video from the director of the NGV discussing Yayoi’s world premiere exhibition which spans the artists incredible eight decade career: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weSBTbb5XBw

Finally, thank you to the many visitors who came to the ‘Reg Mombassa’ Art Exhibition and voted, it took me many hours to count them but the votes are in: 

Equal 3rd Place – Mariam and Petra (5M) 

                                 Diva, Mila and Hazel (6P)

Equal 2nd Place – Fiona (6H) for her Cranium Universe Portrait

                                 Ged, Charlie and Noosh (5L)

And with an outstanding 43 votes:

1st Place – Amelia, Maddie and Edward (5M)

Congratulations to all the prize winners and to all the entries into the competition, the work created was outstanding by ALL students!