09.11.2022

Beacon Visual Arts Show brings together artistic productions of students at Campus

By Gabriel Oliveira

Beacon Visual Arts Show is an art show in which students from G6 (age 6) to Y11 exhibit what they have produced in the school atelier during the second semester. Art at Beacon is related to the awakening of creativity, spontaneity, and analysis of contemporary issues. By sharing their productions with the community, the students gave a new meaning to the study, practice, and reflection, which originated the works and pointed to a path of aesthetic discoveries and inexhaustible inventions.

From the investigation about gestuality in art, G6 (6 years old) made a collective painting. Inspired by the works of Tarsila do Amaral, the children created a panel, which was produced based on the principles of mutual respect and communication so that the ideas and emotions of everyone could be heard.

The 1st grade (Y1), on the other hand, was invited to reflect on the different aspects of visual language, using natural materials. They modeled clay, produced paints with natural pigments, and, in the installation, each student was present through paintings, drawings, Kokedamas, and sculptures.  

The 2nd grade (Y2) discussed in class the relationship between art and nature, especially the works that have nature as a source of inspiration. Guided by the question “How do animals and humans build their houses?”, the students explored the use of materials such as clay, sticks, flowers, and seeds to make homes for imaginary animals.  

After learning more about the artist Louise Bourgeois, who made use of fabrics in her work, the 3rd-grade students (Y3) individually produced a panel with embroidery techniques and fabric overlays. In the theoretical field, they developed notions of figuration and abstraction, as well as the use of traditional and non-traditional materials.

Initially, the 4th grade (Y4) investigated the “cordel” literature and produced their booklets with their own illustrations. After learning about Color Theory, in groups, the students filled out a color journal based on the one they were given. Trying to dwell on a variety of issues involving colors, they asked themselves questions such as “If blue had a smell, what would it be like”, or “If the world was made of yellow, what would it look like?”

As part of the Unit of Inquiry “Cultural Diversity”, the 5th-grade students (Y5) came into contact with textile art through artist and teacher Joana Salles, of the BordaEMIA collective. The artistic result was a collective panel that illustrated popular tales representing Brazil’s cultural diversity. 

In an attempt to understand what the 6th-grade students experience today, and how it dialogues with the past of the space occupied by the school campus, the exhibitions proposed relationships between the students themselves, our time, the space, and the history to which we all belong.

How to visually express an identity? This was the guiding question of the 7th-grade Global Context “Personal and Cultural Expression” (Y7). In pairs, they had to show how they converge the way they see themselves and how they would like to be seen, besides the presence of a partner, who would be immortalized next to them on the screen.

Working with three-dimensionality, the 8th graders (Y8) transited between common materials and “non-artistic” objects. Using wooden benches and tables, blank sheets of paper, rustic cardboard plates, and clay, the results are a fragment of learning that attempted to develop a broader vision of what three-dimensional art is.

Using a simple flipbook as a starting point, the 9th graders (Y9) went through all the recent audiovisual development, from the iconic Hong Kong cinema of the 1930s to Wes Anderson’s animations. Exercising what they saw and controlling space and time, the students brought inanimate forms to life through stop-motion videos.

Starting with the distinction between art and nature, the classes of the 1st year of High School (Y10) went from the complex definitions of what art, artificial, and nature would be to a discussion about cities, technology, and “natural environments”. Followed by subjective reflection, they came together in groups to define a project. Within the scope of the theme and the resources provided, the variety of the results reflects the freedom that was granted.

Under the name Pandemic Feelings, the 2nd-year High School project presented itself as a space for the students, newly arrived at High School, to manifest their feelings in these two emotionally demanding years. The second strand investigated, in art, the ability to propose reflections on typical contemporary themes such as politics, consumerism, identity, and technology. The exhibitions were also diverse, as the students produced sculptures, drawings, collages, and even videos.

There was a special group composed of students from the 1st and 2nd year of High School (Y10 and Y11) who opted for Visual Arts Higher Level, which constitutes the IB Diploma Program curriculum. The Y10 exhibition was the result of sensorial experiences that sought to broaden the perception of the environment, while the Y11 students were provoked to see art as an instrument of denunciation. The resulting works are very diverse, including animation videos, wearable works, modeling, kinetic sculpture, and painting.

Beacon Visual Arts Shows was an opportunity for the students to present to the community their investigative process and the poetic experimentation of making, through direct contact with matter, the constant exercise of symbolic creation and fruition in relation to the artistic production of different people in different times, from contemporary art to popular art, from the group’s production and their own.