Surrealism Collages

 What is surrealism? 

In Mrs. Morgan’s words, it is something that looks realistic as though it is happening, but in reality it could never happen. Kinda like a weird dream you might have. It seemed real, but when you wake up, you realize it was bizzare. 

 For example, an elephant riding on the back of an ant, a person flying in a large shoe, a giraffe wearing a suit snd tie at the front of a classroom. 

What is a collage? 

In Mrs. Morgan’s words, it is taking pictures or objects and gluing them creatively onto a surface. 

Rene Magritte-Surrealism Artist

The two paintings below are by Rene Magritte

Son of Man

The False Mirror

Salvador Dali- Surrealism Artist

The two paintings below are by Salvador Dali

The Persistence of Memory

The Temptation of St. Anthony

Melissa Grimes is a Modern Surrealism Collage Artist

 To See more

CLICK HERE

Surrealism Collage from 

www.thatartteacher.com

She explains her process here. 

This guy is seriously Surreal! WhAt an inspiration...

YOUR TURN!!!

You will be creating a collage from magazines to form a surrealism scene. 

The PICTURE  HUNT

You will need to find a picture to use as a 

BASE BACKGROUND first. This could be a room, landscape, or a design. The less words or advertising on it, the better. You can always cover unwanted words or adds with something you glue onto it. 

After the base background is found, you can hunt for things to cut out and glue down. 

These should be real things (no cartoons or drawings) to make the picture seem real. 

Examples coming soon...

Collaborative Mystery Banner

Reflecting on 2020, 

we know that

things are not always clear as to where they are going,

 But, we do know working together is how we get through things. 

We are going to make a banner as a collaborative group to celebrate a fresh start to a new year. 

Each person will make a piece of this banner. 

Each piece will go in the banner to reveal a secret message. 

Trust that if we work together, it will all come together in the end. 

Some people may carry more of the creative load

while other may be more or the banner engineering. 

Putting it Together

THE CREATIVE PART- right brain

You will get a notecard.

You will be assigned (1-286) a number and a color (black or orange). 

You will write your number, name and color on the back. 

On the front, you will do a design using that color only. 

You can use 2021 in your design or you can use your name (or both). 

Fill the card up with your designs. 

You can use lines, shapes, patterns, numbers, letters. 

You can use the ideas above as an example.  

THE ENGINEERING- left brain

There is a plan, A "key" to the banner. 

Only the leader can see it, but there are clues to putting it together below. 

As soon as the pieces get completed by the artists, 

the engineers will begin piecing together the banner with 

clear tape. This will have to be put on the back of the banner. 

HINT- This will mean that the numbers will have to go from right to left when piecing from back. 

----CLUES----

The banner has 286 pieces. 

The banner has 22 columns. 

The banner has 13 rows. 

The banner has 105 orange pieces and 181 black pieces. 

Row 1, 7 and 13 are all black. 

Column 1, 5, 18 and 22 are completely black. 

If we work together, Right Brain & Left Brain, 

we can do it!!

Teachers piecing & taping together the puzzle from the back. 

Students helped finish the last pieces....

in THE END , there was a beautiful 

FRESH START!!

Up close pieces of the banner. 

The examples below show previous Collaborative Mystery Banners that 

have been made by my students. Know that your piece is an important part of the end result. 

The colors you use and the filling in or design is what will make your piece be successful. 

This was the key to the above banner done in the past. 

 

City by Water

Davis, Mrs. Morgan and Jarezi

(above)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1st period Beginning Art 

Isac, Josie, Kaitlyn,

Michael, Jorja, Laine,

River, Jaylee & Francisco.

2nd Period Beginning Art

---,----, ----Lucy, Ke'Yani

3rd Period Beginning Art 

Nathalie, Anonymous, Kelly, 

Elizabeth, Sara and Milo

8th period 

Daniel, Carol and Hunter

This project has 3 parts; 

The Warm Sky, 

the Deep Overlapping City, 

and the Cool Water Reflection. 

We practiced on smaller manilla paper drawing out cities. 

After we were done, we proceeded to step one below...

See student above successfully transferring idea onto final paper. 

1. Softly Fold Paper into three parts. 

2. In middle part, draw a city of overlapping buildings with a pencil. 

Click here to see ideas for Buildings, 

City and Town scape ideas

3. Outline with Sharpie black .

4. Fold on 2nd portion, Trace middle section onto the third section. 

It will be upside down and backward. This is correct. 

If you use a window to help you, Your arms will get tired. 

Part of the top of the buildings may get cut off, that is okay. 

5. Go over tracing with black colored pencil or Sharpie. 

6. Use pencil to shade 

the overlapped areas and parts that are away from sun. 

Use a blendy stump or q-tip to blend shading. 

 

You DO NOT need to shade the reflection of the buildings at the bottom. 

You can outline it with Sharpie if the black colored pencil did not show up well. 

Abbie Going over water flap with Sharpie after tracing at window with pencil. 

7. Use washable markers in warm color in the sky

(about dime size) over the buildings and around them too. 

Dots should very close but not touching. If you can fit your finger tip between dots, add more. 

 

I also outlined the border where the sky and water meets the buildings

to add contrast along the white.  

River and Laine applying marker dots

to sky with warm and to water with cool. 

8. Use washable markers in cool colors in the water. 

You can use a white crayon ahead of time to add horizontal lines to make it glimmer. 

9. APply water with a thumb thickness brush to make the colors bleed together.

Worm's Eye View City

1. Make a Dot somewhere in the middle of your paper. 

This is called the "Vanishing Point" and is where all the sides of your buildings 

will travel to until they seem to "vanish". 

2. Lightly with a pencil and a ruler, 

Draw lines that go from the dot to the edges of the paper. 

3. Cut off tops of buildings. 

Rule of CutOff

Top or Bottom edge of paper = Horizontal Cut off

Right or Left edge of paper = Vertical Cut off

4. Draw the side part of the Building according to guide above. 

5. Decorate the fronts of your buildings with windows. 

RULE OF WINDOWS

If the windows go up, they must follow to the vanishing point, 

If the windows go sideways, they must go the direction of the edge of the paper they come from, 

like the top of the cut off. 

6. Use a rotating compass on the Vanishing Point 

to make concentric circles in the sky. 

This will be a radiating sun above. 

7. We will color the circles like the sun and sky. 

See student examples below from other schools. 

8. Use black and grey to decorate the building fronts. NO COLORS. 

Since the sun in facing the fronts and not the sides, 

Make the side of the building dark using solid black or grey. 

Image From 

ArteAScuola

Inspiration from

http://arteascuola.com/2016/05/buildings-in-one-point-perspective/

MORE LESSONS on PERSPECTIVE from LostSockArtTeacher

https://tabithaannthelostsock.blogspot.com/2020/01/vanishing-forms-in-splatter-space.html