Taonga Time With Mr Harris

Ever since when I was a year 6, I wanted to have Taonga time. Taonga time is when the intermediate block has a rotation and goes to different classes. But when I heard I was in a class that I didn’t want to be in I took it all back. In Taonga time, I heard I was in Room 19 with Mr Harris. I didn’t know what was in store for us, but it was pretty interesting, because we learnt about the climate. The climate is about our weather. Our weather comes from the atmosphere.

In our first time with Mr Harris, we learnt about a word called ‘Precipitation’. Precipitation is when the weather is formed. It starts from the sea and the sun dries the water which makes it water vapour. The water vapour the forms clouds. Those clouds then let out rain which goes into rivers and then lead into the sea. That is Precipitation.

I couldn’t wait for Taonga Time with Mr Harris. The first time was way cool so I wanted to go again every day. That week we had to pick a word to research about a word out of Precipitation, Tropical, Climate, Tropical Climate, and many more. I decided to pick tropical because I like the word tropical because it goes with anything. Tropical fruit, tropical island, tropical and where. Tropical is my word.

The last week we went there, Mr Harris set us a task to make a presentation using all the words we have learnt about the atmosphere. We could get into groups of 3, 2 or we could work by yourself.  I decided to work with my buddy Tokorima. We have a great plan of how to do our presentation.

At the start of the year, I thought Taonga time would be dumb but now I really like it. So it’s just like people say, ‘Don’t Judge A Book On It’s Cover’ so don’t judge a class by it’s teacher.

Comparing and Contrasting Daniella Hulme and Pablo Picasso

This week, we are learning to compare and contrast artists. Last week we learnt about Henri Matisse and Vincent Van Gogh. This week we are comparing Pablo Picasso and Daniella Hulme. Picasso’s style of art is Cubism and Daniella’s is Contemporary. The paintings we have to compare are ‘The Weeping Women’ and ‘A Lazy Day In Paradise’.

Pablo Picasso had a weird style of art, Cubism. Especially when he painting ‘The Weeping Women’. Cubism is a style of art where he paints one thing from one angle and then from another. Picasso uses his style in every piece of art he paints. He is the weirdest and best artist to me, but in ‘The Weeping Women’, he made me feel sad, scared and ugly. I think Picasso felt sad when he painted The Weeping Women because it had dull and sad colours. He is so weird.

In her painting called ‘A Lazy Day In Paradise’, Daniella Hulme used her great style of art. Contemporary. She painted with tropical colours and with happy feelings. The reason why she paints with tropical colours is because she is married to a Samoan man.  ‘A Lazy Day In Paradise’ to me looks like all paintings Daniella Hulme does. She paints the same ladies hair and face. Some of her paintings are about her life. She is a happy artist all the time.

Picasso and Hulme are two very different artists. Picasso is sometimes sad and Hulme is always happy. So Picasso’s paintings are sad and Hulme’s are happy. Not just that, they both do different patterns and colours. Some tropical and some sad colours.

If I had to choose out of these two fabulous artists, I wouldn’t know who to choose. Picasso uses sad colours, and Hulme uses happy colours. I like Picasso way better because he paints from different perspectives. I like that. So I would have to choose Pablo Picasso. But I like Hulme as well.  

Comparing and Contrasting Between Henri Matisse and Vincent Van Gogh

In room 21's writing session this week, we had to compare and contrast Vincent Van Gogh and Henri Matisse's style of art for our task. They are two very different artists. Matisse’s style of art was Fauvism (in French it means Wild Beast). Vincent Van Gogh’s style of art was Expressionism.

In his sunflower painting, Van Gogh used dull colours for his flowers and a dull yellow for his background. The reason why I think he used dull colours was because at the time he was painting the sunflower, he was feeling angry and sad. But that's what I think. He painted his paintings the same way he feels. Thats why his style of art is Expressionism. Van Gogh had a weird style of art.

Henri Matisse painted a painting called 'La Musique'. Matisse used heaps of colours including red, blue, black, yellow, mainly green though. Matisse used heaps of detail like a artist should. He painted two ladies. One with a lady with a guitar and the other just relaxing. But to my point of view, it really looks like two people in a tropical place under a palm trees on a red beach. In the background to my point of view, he painted lighting in the red seat, but that's me. Matisse is an interesting artist.

Henri Matisse is a very different artist compared to Vincent Van Gogh. Van Gogh had a rather sad life, that’s why he painted sad paintings like 'Sunflowers'. Matisse painted colourful paintings with bright colours like the painting La Musique. Both had different lives and had different painting styles.

I reckon that both artists are very interesting in their ways, But if I was an artist, I’d look up to Henri Matisse because I like all the bright colours that he used. I don’t like dull colours.

Immersion Class Rotation Part 2

On Friday, we went to Mr Slade in Room 19. We learnt about Claude Monet. He was born on 14 November 1840. He used natural colours including red, yellow, blue, black and white. With those colours, I drew the Vodafone Warriors team logo and a beautiful sunset sinking into the water on the beach. Room 19 was a cool class but not my best. I wonder what Mrs Squires has in store for us on Monday?

Our final rotation class was in Room 20 with Mrs Squires. We learnt about Daniella Hulme. She draws people in tropical places, e.g beach, fruit and many more places. Even though she paints people from the islands, she is European. Daniella normally paints girls with the same hair. She was weird. This class was my least favorite class. I only liked the painting part.

Our class rotations were pretty cool. Others boring. But I still had fun doing art. This is how I rate the classes. 5th Room 20 (Daniella Hulme), 4th Room 22 (Vincent Van Gogh), 3rd Room 21 (Henri Matisse), 2nd Room 19 (Claude Monet) and #1!! Room 18. (PABLO PICASSO!!!) It was FUN!

Immersion Class Rotation Part 1

ART, ART, ART, ART, ART!! I love art, don’t you? I wish I could do art all day if I could. Amazingly, my wish came true. Over the week on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, after morning tea, all the classes in my Intermediate block went to different classes to learn about different techniques and learn more about famous artists.

For my first immersion class I stayed in Room 21. We learnt about Henri Matisse and how he paints. Henri Matisse is a French man who was born in Le Cateau-Cambresis, Nord, France 1954. He is an artist that likes to use different varieties of colours and patterns. The first thing we had to do was to sketch. I tried to do Matisse’s technique which was Fauvism. In French, it means Wild Beast. I gave it a try.  I didn’t really succeed but it was still good. We didn’t paint our art, we only coloured it in with pastels. But it still looked good at the end.

On Tuesday, we went to Room 22 to learn about Vincent Van Gogh. Vincent Van Gogh was born on 30th of March 1853-29th July 1890. When he was young he had bright ideas, and as he got older, he got a bit coo-coo. Vincent Van Gogh cut off his ear then sent it to his girlfriend. He wasn’t really famous when he was alive because he only sold one painting for a grand. However, when he was dead his paintings became famous and way more expensive. His sister (Johanna Gezina van Gogh-Bonger) told people that his paintings are cool as. She convinced them until they brought some. Unfortunately he became famous when he was dead. Our painting that we had to create was in the style of one of his paintings. I looked at his picture very very carefully. My sketch was fantastic but then the paint just ruined it. It wasn’t my best class as well.