Entry No.6 3/29/21 #enhancement

This week, I finally started adding to my art piece that I created from the tea drippings. I used watercolor paints that were in the same color ranges as those from the tea; browns, yellows, dark reds, and even some blues. As I was looking at the piece away from the tea bags, I noticed the drippings looked like storm clouds and rain droplets. There are even a few rings in the piece from coffee cups that look like moons or suns. I am pleased with the natural composition that formed from these spontaneous tea drippings, and I wanted to enhance those features for now. The composition and overall mood of the piece might change as I continue working on it in the coming weeks, but for now, I just wanted to enhance what natural occurred. I used watercolor paints that were not heavily diluted by water, so they would appear more saturated. Most of the color given by the tea was pretty faded, and I wanted to add some contrast in. I blended some of the colors together and made areas darker to give the illusion of more dimension to the piece. So far, I am happy with how the enhancement to the hues and saturation have changed the piece.

When I was in elementary school, I had an art teacher who would not touch our artwork. Instead, she would guide us and offer suggestions, but she would never do the artwork for us, even a little bit. At the time, that was frustrating, because my own art skills were not very developed, and I wanted my art pieces to look good. Looking back, however, I am grateful that she let us explore on our own and only acted as a guide if we needed it. She helped us enhance our art pieces without touching them. She always told us that if she touched it, then the art piece was no longer just ours. Now, when I look back at my work from being a little girl, I know that all of the lines and colors in the pieces are mine.

I tried to carry this idea with me while I was teaching at Basalt Middle School. Sometimes it was difficult, because I knew what directions the students wanted to take their work in, but I would persist in that I could be their guide, but I would not do the work for them. If a student needed help drawing something proportionally or in perspective, I would figure it out on another piece of paper with them, but for their final piece, it had to be one hundred percent their own work. Or, if a student needed help making decisions or just needed some guidance on where to go next, I was there to have a conversation with them, but ultimately the decision and the artwork was their own. This frustrated my students a lot of the time, because they just wanted art to be fun and easy. While our learning environment was fun and relaxed, I wanted to challenge students to think critically during the entire process of their artwork, and not just do the work for them. For my students, I wanted to help enhance what was already there the entire time, and to act as their guide when they were stuck.

This concept reminds me of social justice in the classroom. Every student has a different background and a different story to tell. If I am the one who just does the artwork for them, then I start to take their voice away and implement my own. Every child has a right to express themselves for who they are and where they come from. Their voice should be heard and felt through their artwork. I always want to learn and grow with them, but their artwork should be wholly theirs, and not mine.

Because I had a teacher when I was young encourage me to explore my artwork on my own and to make mistakes and correct them on my own, but with her there as guidance, I grew as an artist, but also as a critical thinker. I was challenged to turn mistakes into part of the piece, and because of that critical thinking at a formative age, I have learned how to explore the creation process by accepting my mistakes. I do not need someone to swoop in and save my artwork; I know how to do that. I will always be there for my future students as guidance on how to fix mistakes or where there can be improvements, but I will never do their artwork for them. I want my students to be critical thinkers and to express their own voices in their artwork so that they become confident in the development of their art and critical thinking skills.