[SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2011]

THE ARTS IN YOUR CLASSROOM [9] @ Montalvo Arts Center

CAPTURING CREATIVITY 15400 Montalvo Road, Saratoga
8:30am – 4:00pm
Presented in collaboration by Montalvo Arts Center,
the Santa Clara County Office of Education,
and the Lurie College of Education at San José State University

Stories through pictures:

Elizabeth Gomez and Jorge
Argueta
Cal Cullen
Community School of Music and Arts

Grade 4

CONCEPTS
• Art can reflect where someone has
been, what they have done, and
where they are going
• Pictures can tell a story

OBJECTIVES
• Students learn about Elizabeth Gomez and her paintings
• Students illustrate a story from their life using sharpie markers and watercolor

MATERIALS
• 12” x 18” or 18” x 24” paper
• Fine point black sharpie markers
• watercolors
• Copy of book A Movie in My Pillow, poems by Jorge Argueta and images by Elizabeth Gomez

INTRODUCTION
Elizabeth Gomez uses her art work to illustrate the colorful poetry of Jorge Argueta. Her use of
bright colors and creative details reflect both the stories told by Argueta as well as his cultural
background. Many of the stories in this book relate to the act of moving and experiencing new
things and a new culture.

PROCEDURE
Read a poem or two from A Movie in My Pillow. Focus on poems that relate to moving to a new
place or family heritage such as When We Left El Salvador and Voice From Home. Discuss the
images in the book.
• How do they relate to the poems?
• What do they tell us that the poems don’t?

Download additional copies online at www.montalvoarts.org/learn/study_guides 1|Page

 • How does this book reflect the life of Elizabeth Gomez and Jorge Argueta?
• How can it relate to other’s lives? (Standard 3.1)
Have students think about a move or a trip that they have taken.
• Did they move to a new place?
• Have they been on a trip where they saw new things?
Students will use this story as inspiration for their drawings. Have students brainstorm in pairs or
small groups about trips or moves that would make a good story.

Sketch out their drawings.

Instruct students that they must include themselves in the drawing. Have students draw
themselves first, either as a close-up portrait or as a full figure. Use classroom models or images
of contour figures for reference to gain accurate proportions (Standard 2.5). Once the figure is
finished, have students concentrate on the background and what needs to be included to tell their
story. Encourage students to be creative in how they include elements that reflect the new things
they saw on their trip or things that were new to them when they moved to a new place with their
families. Instruct students to consider what is close up in their drawings and what is far away.
Think about what needs to be included in each drawing and where on the page it should go to best
illustrate their story. Sketch the basics of their drawing out in pencil and then use a sharpie marker
to go over their pencil drawings as well as add details. Encourage students to switch over to a
marker as soon as the basics of their drawings are done. If they spend too much time working in
pencil this portion will take too long.

Watercolor.
Once students are finished with their marker drawings, have them paint in their work with
watercolor. If their drawings are very large and detailed, this may take 2 weeks. Encourage them
to use bright colors such as the colors used by Elizabeth Gomez. Show them how by mixing their
watercolors with less water and more of the paint they become more colorful.

Variation:
Using the classroom teacher’s assistance, students can produce poems or a short story to go with
their drawings in their own classrooms. These can then be brought to the art class and collaged
onto the art work, put under the picture, or organized around the boarder or on a frame.

Evaluation:
Share completed artwork, noting the unique qualities of artistic style as well as the diversity of each
student’s story (Standard 4.5). Did students accomplish what they set out to do? If there is time,
have a few students share their stories with the class.
© A4S, Community School of Music and Arts, 2011

STATE STANDARDS:
Creative Expression: Students use accurate proportions to create an expressive portrait or a figure
drawing or painting (2.5)
Historical and Cultural Context: Students describe how art plays a role in reflecting life (3.1)
Aesthetic Valuing Component: Students describe how the individual experiences of an artist may
influence the development of specific works of art (4.5)

AiYC9: Story Portraits with Cal Cullen 2|Page

Portrait
The portrait in western art has been the traditional format for the exploration of human
personality since the Italian Renaissance. Through the artist's choice of clothes, pose, and
setting, the individual's high position in society was affirmed; the artist's handling of media
and style captured a likeness that flattered the sitter.
In modern and contemporary art, the examination of individual identity has been a major
theme that expands upon the traditional portrait to include imagined beings, symbolic
figures, and specific people from all aspects of society. The modern and contemporary
"portrait" probes deeply below the surface. It seeks to reveal and comment upon human
character shaped by personal biography and by race, ethnicity, and gender. Individual
identity is also associated with the traditional self-portrait: the artist's own image as a
vehicle for personal reflections.
The conventional portrait is realist in style, the artist seeking true physical appearances. If
modern and contemporary studies of human personality may be realist in style, they also
utilize expressionist, abstract, and conceptual styles.
*From MMOCA’s web feature on portraiture
http://www.mmoca.org/mmocacollects/themes_details_page.php?id=1

Chuck Close, Self Portrait, 1997

AiYC9: Story Portraits with Cal Cullen 3|Page