GROW at the Nasher

Tuesday, December 17, 2019

What's the Story? Tour, Part Two

At our second stop, we encountered these two sculptures:

What do you notice about these sculptures? How are they similar? How are they different?

What do you think they’re made of? Both sculptures are made of polished stainless steel, which creates a reflective surface.

The tall chair is one clue that tells us that the person we see is a lifeguard. What is a lifeguard’s job? What are some other clues? His bare feet, his swimsuit, and his binoculars.

A vulture sits on the other chair. Vultures are scavengers, which means they eat dead animals rather than hunting for their food. They also have great eyesight, so they don't need binoculars!

We looked at the sculptures with our own binoculars.

2nd grade

4th grade

5th grade

Elmgreen & Dragset titled one of these sculptures Watching and the other one Lifeguard. Students pointed to show their opinion on which was which. Scroll down to reveal the answer!

2nd grade

4th grade

5th grade

The sculpture on the left is titled Lifeguard, and the sculpture on the right is titled Watching!

Tuesday, December 10, 2019

What's the Story? Tour, Part One

We started this year with a tour exploring the idea of "What's the Story?" During our tour, we explored the work of artists Ingar Dragset and Michael Elmgreen, who are featured in our current exhibition Elmgreen & Dragset: Sculptures. Together, Elmgreen & Dragset create sculptures that encourage us to imagine possible stories, or narratives.

Vocabulary:
narrative / la narrativa

scale / la escala

context / el contexto

reflective / brillante

interpretation / la interpretación

2nd grade

3rd grade

4th grade

We explored the questions below at our first tour stop.

Couple by Elmgreen & Dragset

How would you describe this artwork? Are these two items identical? Why or why not?

Do you recognize these objects? They are diving boards. Could you tell these were diving boards right away or did it take a little while? That could be because they’re taken out of context. Context is the place or situation where something usually occurs. The normal context of a diving board is next to a pool, and horizontal instead of vertical.

This sculpture is called Couple, Fig. 21. What is a couple? The word couple usually refers to two people who are considered as a pair – married couple, a couple dancing, playing games, etc.

What sorts of things do you see in pairs? Name some examples of pairs in nature. What are manmade examples? 

What are some items that would work in a different version of Couple, Fig. 21?

2nd grade

3rd grade

4th grade

5th grade

Human Scale (Bent Pool) by Elmgreen & Dragset

How does this sculpture relate or connect to Couple, Fig. 21? What does it remind you of? Could you swim in this pool?

This sculpture is called Human Scale (Bent Pool). What does the word scale mean? The word scale describes when you compare the size of one thing to another.

Human scale is something made in a size that is useful to people. You could say that this sculpture is human scale (it is about our height) or it is not human scale (it is not a size that we could use).

The pool is also taken out of context! When was the last time you went swimming at an art museum? :)

2nd grade

3rd grade

The 4th and 5th graders designed their own pool before moving on to the next stop.

4th grade

5th grade

Tuesday, December 3, 2019

Rosemont Family Day 2019-20

How is it DECEMBER already?? Surely I am not the only person wondering this...

In the past two months, we had a parent information meeting about the GROW program, the 2nd grade audition, the 2nd grade pre-visit, the first tour for all grades, the second tour for 3rd grade, AND the Rosemont Family Day! Even as I type this, I can barely believe how much we've done in such a short amount of time.

Let's begin with fun pictures from the November 16 Rosemont Family Day. What fun we had! Our event included a scavenger hunt, family tours, yummy treats from Doc Popcorn, a caricature artist, two artist-led activities, and a mariachi band performance!

Building with Unconventional Materials with artist Liz Trosper

Exquisite Corpse Drawings with artist Joel Murray

Caricatures with Art by Sam

Mariachi performance by the Grand Prairie Fine Arts Academy

Thank you to everyone who came out and joined us. I loved seeing so many GROW students, and watching their excitement as they showed their families the sculptures they visited during GROW tours. :)