Students in second grade have begun the year learning about positive and negative shapes, which is a considerably different way of viewing and thinking about shapes from the initial kindergarten/first grade introduction to basic shape types. Understanding positive and negative shapes is of key importance when viewing a work of art. For this lesson, students looked and several examples of relief sculpture and were asked how a sculpture such as this is different from a sculpture such as the Statue of Liberty. Students are usually pretty quick to point out that the Statue of Liberty is a free-standing sculpture, seen from all sides, whereas a relief sculpture, such as seen in many ancient artworks, can only be viewed from one side as it is carved halfway onto a flat surface. In essence, the positive shapes are raised up from the flat, negative background.
To help students understand this concept, students were instructed to create their own cardboard relief using pre-cut and sorted pieces of mat board and yarn and gluing them onto a cardboard background. Careful attention was paid to layer the pieces of varying sizes and shapes, so as to create a raised design.
Once complete, the reliefs were covered in tin foil to create a visually unified effect.
