The 'Square Dance'

Inspired by some modern art titled the ‘Square dance’ by Kazuya Akimoto, we decided to introduce this piece to the children using the media of pastel and ink.

The square dance has many wonderful shapes and patterns for the children to explore and consider. There are straight lines, rectangles, squares, squares in squares, squares divided by lines to make triangles, and lots of repetition. We invited the children to investigate the dynamics of these shapes using the pastels and ink

 

Using two sorts of media together (pastels and ink) the children were able to observe what happens. We asked questions such as “what happens when the ink meets your pastels?” – for some children it took a lot of trust to paint over their whole picture with black ink – but the results were worth it.

As the ink settled into the paper, and the white pastel shapes shone through, many children were astounded and surprised, exciting many. Visually this experience is like magic.

Charlotte “That’s awesome”

Lucy-May “What’s happening…how’s that happening?”

Detroit “I didn’t know that would happen”

Tyler “Look, I can see the white – look”

Hui-Nathan “Look it’s drying out, you can see the shapes”

Exploring pattern, line and shape

Making new discoveries

Celebrating success

 “Every art has a kind of language and its logic. In music, it is very clear. Of course, to use this language correctly in artwork doesn’t necessarily mean that the art is superb, or worth appreciating. There are far too many pieces of music which are correct in grammar that cannot attract our aesthetical attention” (Kazuya Akimoto).

Grace

Some of the finished work:

Charlotte

Dihansa

Detroit

Hui-Nathan

Christine