Texture Totems

Thanks to my wonderful partner, Tim, finally our texture totems have been installed outside our art room. 

They were finished last year but they needed cementing into the ground and we changed our minds several times where they should go. Our principal approved of the position outside the art room. So then it was just a matter of finding a time when Tim was available to give me a hand.   

We were inspired by the work of Lex Dickson, but we also looked at a number of different totem poles from different cultures in our investigations leading up to our final activities.  

 Lex Dickson's totems 

To make these the kids explored textures and lines in our environment. They used their sketch books and cameras to record what they saw.   

They learnt how to make hand built clay hollow forms, focusing on joining techniques. They then added textures and patterns to the surface. The hollow forms the children made were a part of our collaborative art work to be installed in the school but because I am aware that kids love to take things home too, they had the opportunity to create an individual totem on a satay stick using air hardening clay.   

  These little totems had to contain objects or symbols that communicated something about themselves.