Visual arts is not a elective that involves preforming. At least that is what I thought until semester 2. This semester I chose visual arts expecting for us to do something involving painting and relaxed. That is not what happened.

The task was to create a piñata something which you usually see at a party not an art class. This task was a little shocking to me especially since we had to create not just any piñata but a mythical creature. I had to research some ideas and surprisingly I had found many which I liked. I drew them up and decided to join with my partner who had also had a few of her own. We both found many which we liked but chose one design

After this selection process we decided to choose colour schemes. Our creature was a wolf crossed with a peacock. We both came to the conclusion of having a blue purple and green colour scheme. Those colours just went well together. And matched the aesthetic of our animal It gave a midnight mood overall.

We next had to attach cardboard to our piece this was hard especially with our piece as when we had many curves and small parts. This made us extend the time which we thought we would take on this process however we worked harder and eventually finished it.

The cutting and pasting of our paper. We pasted the first side with colours which matched our theme perfectly. However when It came to the other side we had hit an ice burg there were not enough of the colours which we needed to match the sides. This caused us to problem solve we decided the colours from both sides could be different to represent different atmospheres. This not only made the piece more different it allowed us to problem solve

The final part of the piñata was to paint the remaining sides we first used the only paint available (pink) this not only made the colours clash and created a weird outlook we were very unhappy as our hard work had been destroyed. However, when Ms Elscott bought out a dark purple, we knew we were saved the. Purple complimented all colours and allowed us only to apply one layer because of its darkness.

The final part was presenting the even overall was fun and a god learning experience being confident enough to go out on the stage was hard but the thought of knowing the eyes would be on the piñata was reassuring. The piñata lit the room up and was a great sight. If this were ever to happen again, I think that I would love to create a more known animal and have more time. This not only could make the art look better it also would allow the audience could understand what they are seeing

Collaboration is a key concept needed for English. It not only allows us to push us to go beyond our comfort zone, but I also push us to make more friends. One project that really pushed me to collaborate was task 2 acting a script out. I used collaboration by being the group leader and monitoring roles and creating time limits. I also made sure my ideas were heard and well thought about. I also helped create goals. This was not only effective and portrayed in task 2 but many other tasks too like task 8. During task 8 I helped many people complete their poems and provided them with feedback and themes for their poems. This not only helped me create a stronger bond in my community, but it also helped me when creating my poems as I had many people I could rely on and people that can help me achieve goals which I have made.

 Learner agency is also a key concept needed for school. It not only allows us to take constructive criticism, but it also allows us to adjust our work to the feedback we have been given. One way I used my advice and applied it was during the novel study of Boy in Striped Pj’s during the novel study I wrote practise essay’s and sleeked for help by Mr Gatti these essays helped me as I applied the feedback when I wrote my real essay. I not only utilised the teachers help also took feedback and applied it to my work which strived me to be better and more effective learner. I also read many others essays this is to gave me a better understanding of the topic and gave me ideas on ways to improve my essay. Providing feedback strengthened my learning and my peers too and It really allowed me to apply my knowledge and spread it to others.

Brutalist art Brutalism came to symbolize urban decay and economic hardships that were out in the open for the world to see they were made by only raw concrete. Our task was to create something similar using concrete and Lego.

The process:

First, we had to search for brutalist images however I did miss this due to me being away. Next we made prototypes out of Lego to see what our final piece would look like. This took many trials as when Mrs Elscott tried the project there were many flaws with the Lego such as the concrete to crumble. This then added many rules to what our mould would look like. We had to limit the size of our mould and the number of over hangs. This resulted me to just create a very small simple design with no over hangs.

Then we had to make a box out of board and wood, this was one of the most difficult parts of the project because we had to hot glue the walls and floor with hot glue (which took a long time to dry) and we had to make sure no water leaked out of the box, this meant we had to add more and more hot glue to stop the water from leaking out. Then we poured the pinkysil into the box and waited until it was dry

With the pinkysil we poured half pink and half white pinkysil and mixed it fast so that the silicon does not set before putting into the walls. Once it was mixed, we poured it through the walls and then tapped the side of the walls to make all the air bubbles rise.

We had to wait for a lesson for the silicon to dry so once it did, we cut our walls open and were left with a mould. Then we took the Lego out of the mould and made sure our moulds were good to pour concrete into, again we had to tat the sides so that the air bubbles rise because I they don’t parts of the final design would be chipped. We had poured the concrete into the mould, we had to wait a long time for it to dry. Once it dried, we took it out of the mould and added it to the other sculptures in the class creating a brutal city.

What worked in this project was how I was able to change/ adapt my Lego build to fit the guidelines and have exactly what I wanted. I built several different Lego builds so I could see what style I liked and what I wanted to have my final product look like. In the end I had chosen the simplest design which was a mistake as my art did not look as complex.

What did not work for me in this project was my time management. I spent too long on some things and that really left me behind which made me rush my work and my overall design was not done to the best of my abilities.

Overall, I enjoyed the freedom we got to work on our project because we could do our own thing and work well without having to follow a structure. This project has many steps to complete but ultimately it was a fun project and I really enjoyed it and the final design was very cool.