Artist Trading Cards

Wait, a first post of the school year already? Not really, this one is long awaited from last year’s very hurried end.

I began last year with a year long final project, one that has been trending on art teaching blogs out there: ARTIST TRADING CARDS.

The premise of the project was that throughout the year, students would be working on a collection of miniature, one of a kind, quality artworks which would be assessed and traded at the end of the year.

The artist trading card helped to solve a continuous problem I have in the art room, early finishers. If a student had finished their assignment early, they could work on a card- sometimes it was based on a prompt from me, other times it was their choice for the artwork. I also used the cards to practice ideas and techniques before starting bigger projects. Examples of these would be:

Do you recognize these from projects we did this year? Clay Creatures and Scratchboard

We also made cards to emulate well known artists and art styles. Seen here are portraits in the styles of Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol and Picasso

I especially enjoyed watching students experiment with new materials, taking what I introduced in projects and being creative with their own ideas. Here are a few more favourites:

The last element of the project, before each student handed in all of their cards made during the year, was to make a case. I had some clever and unique designs- including bands, envelopes, folders and boxes!