​“Art is something unique for yourself to create and not for others to judge. Art has the ability to enrich each individual.” As a high school student, my definition of art is more than just a painting or a drawing. Art is an outlet for my feelings and emotions, it’s one of the ways I can express myself without communicating with others. Art class is one of the classes that I can escape from my in school, and it also motivates me to express myself as well as show my reactivities. I was really eager to find out all the projects we are going to get involve with in the unit.

In art class we were assigned an art project in which we had to create something using recycled materials. We were given several examples to guide us into the project and help with brainstorming. When I was beginning to brainstorm for this project, my original idea was to create a lamp shade using old detergent containers. I was going to melt down the containers for the mend together maybe even tint them a bit to get a different color for the light shade. My goal for this project was to ultimately create something that I would be able to use over and over again, something that would be easy to make again for family or friends.

Ultimately, that idea became difficult to create. There were so many other aspects to the project that would of taken awhile longer to make. The electronic part of it, attaching a light bulb with a harnest for the light to hang from was becoming to be difficult so I decided to brainstorm for another project. I lost a lot of artistic value in the project I originally brainstormed for, the replacement project  I came up with was less artistic. Due to timing and such I had to come up with a replacement project and since I put so much thought into my original project that most of my timing was lost for the replacement project.

The idea for my new project came from my recent birthday. I received a lot of balloons for birthday and I figured its very often we receive balloons for holidays and we don't know what to do with them so we throw them away. I figured I could reuse them, probably not in the most artistic way, but I decided to use them as book covers.

I started by deflating the balloons and cutting around the edges. The after I had the balloon opened half way, I placed a book on the deflated balloon a sized it out to match borders of the book, so it fit it neatly. I'm still trying to figure out more creative ways to use recycled art. I've found some cool interesting things online and my peers have also been doing cool and exciting things with recycled art.

Balloon Book Covers - Pictures





Bottle Caps Poster



For my bottle caps poster I thought it would be nice to look at the aquatic life's perspective of bottle caps being thrown in the ocean and how it's directly influencing them. The design of the poster was to convey sight that sort of shocking or gross to get people's attention. The wording plays a huge part in the message of this poster. The problem being that people "throw" their bottle caps tells the reader to throw the bottle caps in a place where it won't cause harm to the aquatic life in the ocean.

            Why don’t we recycle? There are many answers to this question but yet it is still a question we have. Recycling is something we should to make sure our environment is in good condition for everything that needs to be done. In art class we needed to create something that dealt with recycling for us and that meant something to us. Well for this project I decided to use shoeboxes and the tissue paper that comes in the boxes.  I made a question mark out of the tissue paper and put it on the box in a 3d view.

             Not many people recycle these things. They want to but they keep their shoeboxes and then when they are tired of them they just throw them away. Sometimes intentional other times just wanting the space and not caring. So I wanted to do something that would mean something to me. I really like sneakers and I didn’t use to recycle them either. But when I realized what effect it was having on the environment I changed that.

            The boxes are just something I needed so that it can hold the question mark. I made a question mark because it’s asking the question why. It’s making a silent but very loud statement trying to figure out why people don’t recycle these things. I made the question mark 3d because I wanted it to pop so that people will be able to see it. I wanted people to look at it and get that feeling of  “why?” If people do that then I will have accomplished my message. 

Hello my name is Samuel Kabangai, I am a junior at Science Leadership Academy.  Our quarter one benchmark we had to take something that we see everyday and transform it into a work of art.

For my project I had different ideas that i wanted to peruse that will make a statement. I decided to make a T.V out of a card board box. I made the T.V by butting out a select from portion of the box and replacing with recycle white paper. It works through the reflection of light, I used candles to make a light behind the box and i used cut of figures that i made from card board the reflect through the back of the T.V.

The inspiration for this project came through when i saw that in our school, we had many boxes that were lying around and there was no use for it and when i saw trash in the schuylkill river and majority of the trash was cardboard boxes. I though to myself that, we are informed about everything that goes on in our life today mostly through the T.V and its amazing how little things like recycling was be ignored by our society. The project was clever and unique and if someone see's it they will always remember it and maybe that will make them remember to recycle.

To make this art work i only need a cardboard box, box cutter,glue, paper and candles. The turn out of the project to me was great and i will love to build on that idea more and make it better. A future consideration will be to decorate the art work and give it a sort of spunk that will catch attention and leave a memory in anyones mind.

Bottle Cap Recycle Project

 For our bottle cap recycle project, i made a poster that showed a image of an bottle pouring in the water and the cap of the bottle was falling and on the image of the water it showed a fist eating the bottle cap. That idea came to me when my art teacher informed me that they bottle cap from our bottle drinks are not being recycled, but instead they were being thrown in the ocean and animals/food like fish were eating the bottle caps. It came to my knowledge that those fish were dying or if they don't die they are cough and people eat those fish that have these chemicals from the bottle caps in them.

Hello my name is Shakeelah Finney. I am a junior attending Science Leadership Academy. For our Advanced art benchmark the entire class was given the assignment of making art out of recyclable material. After scanning through a variety of ideas i had finally chosen the recyclables jean and Capri-sun pouches. With these two elements i would create a dress.
The process for creating the dress was elongated but once i started i didnt stop until it was finished, meaning late nights or should i say early mornings. I would sometimes stay up until 5 am because i was so eager to get the dress done, which meant i was tired when school was in session, but in the end it was all worth it.
This was probably one of my most amusing benchmarks of my entire high school life. Mainly because it was something i got to choose and play around with. The possibilities for what to do were endless. I could've made anything. Something that described myself as a person. It wasnt like any other project where your told you have to do a report on this person, 12-font, double space, 2 pages. This benchmark spoke freedom.
This allowed everybody to be themselves and speak on things that mattered to them. Everybody had so many ideas which was evident at the finish of the benchmarks. The diversity was worth the world. We went from a tv out of cardboard box to a peace symbol made with condom wrappers or what not. And the meaning behind the art pieces were priceless. It spoke a lot on the class as a unison.
The most exciting part of the benchmark for me would have to be seeing everybody in action. Watching them as they build their art pieces and explain the meaning behind it. It proves that teens also think about the world around them. Not all the negative stuff you hear in the media or on the news.
 

Hello my name is Trevor Hinton and I am a junior at Science Leadership Academy, our quarter one art benchmark was to take something we find and use everyday and transform it into recycled art.

For my recycled art project I decided to take a old lightbulb and transform it into a usable candle. The inspiration for this came about when I was searching the internet for ideas and came across an interesting picture of a glossed out lightbulb with a candle light coming out of the bottom in which I then began to search around to find instructions as to how I could complete this myself. The materials that were needed were old lightbulbs, a screw driver, needle nose pliers, gloves for safety and a knife. I wanted to make my lightbulb candle look a lot different from the one that was displayed on the website so I tried looking for different color candle waxes and illuminates  so that when the candle was ignited it gave off a different color other than the standard orange flame. When I began this project what seemed like a fairly easy task of pulling apart the bottom of a lightbulb soon turned into a big mess because of broken glass, filaments going missing, wax being poured into wrong ends etc. etc. However I did learn from this a better understanding of not only how candles work on the inside but also how artist carefully need to plan out each step when creating a work of art from something else, I found myself many nights wondering if this project would actually even come out like a lightbulb and if in fact it would even work.

Although I was unable to fully finish the project and light my candle, I was able to gain valuable experience from this and that when working with recycled items it brings about a certain joy knowing that what your goals are for the piece and what you are aiming to complete may be able to be used on a daily basis and that what you are working with didn't end up in a landfill or someones trashcan. I really like that this project was giving to us and hope that we can continue to complete projects like this in the future.

We were asked to make poster to recycle plastic bottle caps, and below is a picture i painted of a recycle bin and a bottle lying on the the ground beside it. This picture was mad to create the message of instead of throwing the bottle on the ground an littering you can put it in the recycle bin and it can be put to good use. 

  My name is Brooke Thompson and I'm 16 in the 11th grade. Personally I don't consider myself a very artistic/ visual person. But when taking a art class I became more excited and interested in things that meant something to me. 
At first I wasn't to comfortable with being in a art class but when I was introduced to Aurora Robson, an artist who used all recyclable materials to create beautiful art work, I became more interested.  I wasn't good at drawling or painting so I didn't like using those mediums but then I realized recyclables thing could be my medium. 
For our project we were asked to make something out of recyclable materials that meant something to us. So i had to think of something that meant the most to me, and the first thing that came to my mind was clothes. The things I wear on my body man a lot because their how I express myself. So I decided to make a dress out of recyclable materials. 
I worked with a partner on this project and we used materials such as trash bags, plastic cups, wire, bottle caps as well as news paper. She created the skirt and I created the bra. We used the trash bags to create the skirt. And we used plastic cups wire and cloth to create the bra. 
We didn't get to finish the project but its a work in progress and we do plan on finishing below is a preview f our work so far. 

Below is apart of the skirt as well as the start of the bra.

Natalie Sanchez

11/5/10

Art – D²

I have always been interested in the art that is in our natural world. I have always looked at the environment around me and seen a piece of art. Right after I would get home from a long ride, I would run directly to my room to sketch that red and brown tree that I saw on my way, releasing withering leaves onto the front window of my dad’s small and beat up Toyota.  I would always enjoy drawing small doodles on the sides of my paper whenever I was in class. I enjoyed the magical feeling of getting paint on my hands and clothes. I would enjoy the black spots that my pencil tip would leave on my index finger after an hour of vehement shading under the shade of the gates shielding my backyards. I have always loved the feeling of being an artist because with this new title came the right of depicting the world the way that I see it with paints, pencil, or even clay. This is why I am an artist.

In our art class, we are collecting bottle caps in order to make bottle cap art. Our teacher, Ms. Hull, was inspired to do this by Aurora Robson who builds sculptured out of blown bottle caps. To mold the bottle caps, Aurora goes through a process of melting the bottle caps and then blowing them up, like glass blowers blows up glass. What is cool is that not only does Aurora use bottle caps to create art, but she also uses bottles and other recyclable material.

Aurora holds a pretty deep message with the art pieces that she creates; she is trying to raise awareness of how important it is for us, Americans, to recycle. This is why she uses only recyclable materials to build her sculptures and art pieces. She uses bottle caps in her sculpture because, although bottles are recyclable, bottle caps are not, so she uses them on her sculptures in order to reuse them in a way that will bring out their beauty and value. She does not use spray glue because of the contamination that it might add to the gases in the air and she makes sure to make all of her artistic processes eco-friendly. Currently Aurora Robson is working on an art piece that was in fact inspired by a recurring nightmare she used to have as a child. She explained in an interview that, she would frequently dream about being in a dark place surrounded by colorful blobs that were the size of huge buildings compared to her size. She decided to build a life-size mural of her dreams using bottle caps and bottles. She wanted to make a different representation of her dream. She wanted to turn something that was originally scary and unknown into something cool and beautiful.

Recently, in our art class, we were assigned a task to create a piece of art made out of recyclable material. This assignment was made to mirror the importance of recycling and the value that recyclable material can have. As soon as I received this task, I started thinking of a million different ways that I could go about this assignment. My first idea was papier-mâché a basketball. After this I was going to pain the ball with blue paint and then I was going to make the continents out of scrunched up newspaper (to show a sort of topography on the “pieces of land”). I was gong to later paint the “land” brown. Eventually I thought about cardboard boxes. I was reminded of a fish tank. After this, I started planning out what I would place inside of the fish tank. I thought about using newspaper to build my huge fish and using play sand to form my base. I was going to use plastic wrap to form my water in the background.

At the end, I used a cardboard box to make my fish tank. I cut out the frame, then I painted it a dark grey. Inside, I placed its sand. At the back, I attached its water, which I created on a separate frame. I then wanted to make my fish out of bottle tops, in order to make a stronger statement. In the end, I ended up with a pretty sturdy fish tank. I am thinking of using a more adhesive glue, because the paint that I used before is pealing off. Other than that, my project cam out better than expected.

With this fish tank, I was trying to show how important it is to collect bottle tops. My fish tank represent a fish haven, but the fishes inside the tank are made out of bottle tops. This represents the many fish that have died because of the caps they have ingested. These bottle caps are tossed in the trash, which eventually gets tossed into a body of water. This is where fish wind up eating these un-recycled bottle tops, causing them to die, because of our negligence to collect bottle caps and reuse them. This is what my fish tank represents. I call it “Fish haven”.