Pre-Visit Activity: Art Talk

Please view the two reproductions with your class and lead a discussion using the following questions as guidelines.  There are no “right” answers.  The questions are meant to guide the group discussion.
Students will revisit and discuss the original works at BAM.  The vocabulary in this packet will aid discussion.

Research and experience have shown that students feel more comfortable when they can connect with something familiar once they arrive at the Museum.  The students are excited to find “their” works of art while they are at BAM.  They enjoy sharing their insights from the classroom discussion with the docent and making valuable comparisons between the textbook-like reproductions and the original works of art.

Size, Scale and Shape

This tour examines the large-scale and small-scale, two- and three-dimensional works of one of today’s most innovative ceramic artists, Jun Kaneko. Students will discuss the technical and artistic aspects of the artist’s clay sculptures, drawings and paintings and will experience a hands-on project related to Jun Kaneko’s works of art. Born in Japan and currently residing in Omaha, Nebraska, Kaneko is internationally recognized as being at the forefront of the ceramics movement. Known for the ambitious scale of his ceramics projects, his massive tapered forms called “dangos,” which translates as “dumplings” in Japanese, can be as much as eleven feet high and weigh thousands of pounds. Kaneko is one of the few artists in modern history to attempt clay pieces of such size and weight.

Vocabulary
Size, Scale and Shape

Curricular Connections
Size, Scale and Shape

Social Studies, History, Geography

• Jun Kaneko was born in Japan and moved to the United States when he was 21 years old. Have students discuss the Japanese influences in Jun Kaneko’s works of art, including his choice of media, his titles and his overall aesthetic.
• Have students study Japanese culture, including ceremonies and physical activities such as karate, tai chi, judo, etc.
• Have students locate Japan on a map and discuss its geographic, cultural and economic relationship to the United States. Map Jun Kaneko’s life travel route from Japan to California to Omaha to Maine to Alberta to the Netherlands.
• Have students find out what Japan is like today. What do kids their age do in Japan, etc.?
• Have students research the history of ceramics in Japan and in the United States.

Reading and Writing

• Have students write a Haiku inspired by one of Jun Kaneko’s works of art.
• Have students experiment with Japanese brush writing and calligraphy. Bring in a community member to teach students some of the Japanese figures.
• Use web quest to define the meaning of words related to Jun Kaneko’s artwork including dango, tanka, sculpture, ceramics, sumi, etc.
• Talk about ways to describe shapes using words such as sides, corners, lines and angles. Analyze familiar 2-dimensional plane figures, such as squares, triangles, and rectangles. Identify properties that make each shape unique. Compare familiar 3-dimensional space figures such as cubes and pyramids. What properties make these forms unique? Use these words to add to a class spelling or vocabulary list. Have each student select one shape and one form to describe with words, either orally or in writing. Discuss how the descriptions are the same and how they are different.
• Have students create stories in three-dimensional form by using their story pages and fashioning cubes or pyramids so that each side tells or illustrates a part of the story.

Math and Science

• Have students learn about and create a radial design.
• Have students experiment with geometric and organic shapes to create a design.
• Have students experiment with a variety of math manipulatives in geometric shapes to determine the strengths of each shape. Which are best at spanning a long distance or space?
• Have students learn about scale and ratio. Have students use one of the pre-tour packet images of Jun Kaneko’s images to grid, reproduce in sections and enlarge.
• Have students learn and practice origami paper folding.
• Have students learn about shapes and forms (basic shapes and plane figures), volume and space.
• Have students learn about repetition and practice patterning.
• Have students create a Venn diagram that compares other artists’ works to those of Jun Kaneko’s. Possible artists include Rothko, De Kooning, Newman, Motherwell, Pollock, Voulkos, etc.
• Learn how mathematics is used as a tool to construct artwork. Have students learn about the Golden Mean, Golden Ratio, The Divine Proportion, Phi and Fibonacci Numbers by studying various artworks. Refer to the website http://www.princetonol.com/groups/iad/lessons/high/Grace-golden.htm for lesson plan ideas and web links for teaching these mathematical concepts.
• Have students learn the difference between shapes and forms. Have them construct their own two-dimensional and three-dimensional shapes and forms. Begin by having students cut out and measure different angles in order to construct a shape. Use these shapes as tracing templates in order to construct three-dimensional forms. Visit http://mathforum.org/sum95/math_and/poly/polyhedra.html as a reference.
• Take the three-dimensional classroom and translate it into two dimensions. Measure your own classroom as a class project. Calculate its square footage. Practice taking measurements by recording the size of windows, doors and other three-dimensional elements within the room. Use these measurements to draw an accurate two-dimensional floor plan of the classroom. Use ratios and scale to create an accurate design. For example have students use the ratio of 1/4 inch = 1 foot. The design of the room, the furniture and the objects should all fit into this ratio.
• Have students create three-dimensional scale models. www.discovery.com/lessonplans/programs/architectsinaction/ (Discovery Channel Lesson Plans - middle school lesson using ratios and scale to create models)
• Have students create shapes and forms using toothpicks and mini-marshmallows. Which shapes and forms are structurally the strongest? Which forms are most difficult to construct? Why?
• Have students use simple wood or plastic blocks in a variety of forms and sizes to create structures.
• Use the Museum visit as a springboard for science lessons on mass, volume and space and/or states of matter (solids, liquids, gases). Sculptures can be created as solid forms or can be made of curved or flat planes that enclose space to create volume and suggest mass. Masses exist within space, occupy it, are surrounded by it, and some even allow space in. Can the students determine which sculptures are thick masses, hollow masses, slender masses, etc.? Have students describe the masses (rounded, angular, one mass, a collection of separate masses, etc.) Are there areas where space can move around the outside of the masses? Are there openings where space can move through the masses? Is the sculpture mostly about space, mostly about mass or balanced between the two?
• Have students research why glazes change from the first application to the final fired piece.
• Have students learn about the physical properties of clay and the temperature of a kiln as compared to a kitchen oven.
• Discuss the relative scale of human beings to large animals such as elephants or whales. How many people (standing or shoulder to shoulder) would it take to be the same length as a whale? Then compare the average person's height to a smaller creature, like a cat. How many cat-lengths would it take to be as tall as you are? Estimate the relative scale for several different creatures. Have students draw themselves in relationship to the animals. Then have students describe the ratios of one to another.

Post-Visit Activity: MAKE IT!

To extend the museum experience and connect the tour to your curriculum, please consider using or adapting this suggested lesson

Visual Comparisons

Introduction
Students will make visual representations by using appropriate scale and proportion. Older students can be given the written information from which to choose and can be divided into groups to create their visual comparisons. Younger students can be read the information and instructions and walked through the comparisons so that they are able to visually represent their knowledge visually. Share the book If You Hopped Like a Frog by David Schwartz, Scholastic, 1999, with students. Then have them make their own visual representations, applying the mathematical relationships to the best of their abilities.

Materials

• Drawing paper
• Colored pencils, crayons, markers

Story Problems

A dolphin’s brain is 7 times larger than the human brain (average human brain is 140 mm wide and 167 mm long). Make a visual representation of a human brain and a dolphin brain on paper.

A snake can open its jaws to 5 times its normal size to eat. Show with a visual representation what the jaws would look like if humans could do the same thing.

Cockroaches move 50 body lengths per second. If humans moved at the same rate, how fast would we move? How would you demonstrate that speed?

A giraffe’s neck is almost half its total height. If the human neck was in the same proportion, how long would it be? Create a visual representation of that relationship.

The orangutan’s reach (arm span) from finger-tip to finger-tip is 10 times the size of its hand. If humans had the same proportions, what would their arm span be? Visually represent that arm span.

A moth eats 86,000 times its own body weight in its first 56 days of life. If human babies did the same, how much baby food (in ___ ounce jars) would a 7 pound human baby eat in 56 days? How could you visually represent this relationship?

At birth a kangaroo baby is only 1/60th the size of its mother in length. If a human baby were in the same proportion to its mother, how long would the baby be? Make a visual representation to show this relationship.

A kiwi bird lays an egg that is 3/4 its size. If a human had the same characteristics, how big would the egg be? Create a visual representation to show what the egg would look like.

A flea can jump 100 times its height. If a human could do the same thing, how high could it jump? Show that in a visual representation.

The scarab beetle can lift 850 times its own weight. If a human could do the same thing, how much could a human lift? Create a visual representation of this relationship.

A red deer’s antlers are as wide as 3/5 of its body length. If a human had antlers in the same proportion, how wide would they be? Show this relationship visually or with concrete objects in the room.

An African elephant’s ears are half of its height. If a human’s ear were in the same proportion, how big would they be? Show this visually.

A baby crocodile grows to be 4000 times its weight at birth. How much would a 7-pound human baby weigh as an adult? Show your representation visually.

A bee can pull 300 times its weight. If a person could pull a load in this same proportion, how many pounds could a 200-pound man pull? Show this visually.

The sperm whale’s head is 1/3 of its body. If the human’s head were in the same proportion, how big would it be? Show this representation visually.

A polar bear can eat 10 percent of its body weight in 30 minutes. If a human could do the same, how much would it eat in 30 minutes? Show a visual or concrete representation of this relationship.

An octopus’ arms are 7/10 of its length. If human’s arms were in the same proportions, how long would they be? Show this representation visually.

A proboscis monkey’s nose is approximately 1/7 of the monkey’s length. If a human nose were in the same proportion, how long would it be? Show this representation visually.

Have students share their mathematically based visual comparisons with the class.

Bibliography
Size, Scale and Shape

Ceramics
Ceramics for Kids: Creative Clay Projects to Pinch, Roll, Coil, Slam & Twist. Mary Ellis. Lark Books. 2004
Materials Science: Ceramics. Brian Knapp. Grolier. 2003
The Kids ‘N’ Clay Ceramics Book. Kevin Nierman. TriCycle Press. 2000
The New Way Things Work. David Macaulay. Houghton Mifflin. 1998

Shape/Pattern
Brown Rabbit’s Shape Book. Alan Baker. Kingfisher. 1994
I Spy Shapes in Art. Lucy Micklethwaite. Greenwillow. 2004
Mouse Shapes. Ellen Stoll Walsch. Orchard Books. 2008
Patterns Everywhere. Julie Dalton. Children’s Press. 2006
Poetry Patterns & Themes. Orndorf. Evan-Moor Educational Publishers. 1999
The Shape of Me and Other Stuff. Dr. Seuss. Random House Books for Young Readers. 1972
Shapes, Shapes, Shapes. Tana Hoban. Harper Trophy. 1996
When a Line Bends…A Shape Begins. Rhonda Gowler Green. Houghton Mifflin. 1997

Size/Proportion/Scale/Ratio
Actual Size. Steve Jenkins. Houghton Mifflin. 2004
Basic Essentials of Math: Percent Measurement and Formulas, Equations, Ratio and Proportion/Book 2. James T. Shea. Steck-Vaughn. 1991
Cut Down to Size at High Noon: A Math Adventure. Scott Sundby. Charlesbridge Publishing. 2000
Geometry of Design: Studies in Proportion and Composition. Kimberly Elam. Princeton Architectural Press. 2001
What Do You Do With a Tail Like This? Robin Page. Houghton Mifflin. 2003
Wings, Horns and Claws: A Dinosaur Book of Epic Proportions. Christopher Wormell. Running Press Kids. 2007