Tri-fold album card

Cutting, scoring, folding, pasting, embellishing, drawing and decorating on a scheme of colour and pattern...this is the result!

Fra Angelico: gold and peaceful

Fra Angelico, who was an Italian monk was one of the greatest painters of the early Renaissance. He was asked to paint the walls of the monastery in which he lived with the other monks. His paintings depict stories from the Bible, such as the Annunciation and Christ rising from death in a very beautiful manner, filled with delicate colours and a feeling of peaceful serenity.

Artists of his era often gave halos to the angels and people in the paintings. This golden ring around a figure's head was meant to show an inner goodness shining out for everyone to see. Halos were often made of real gold, not with gold paint. Gold metal was pounded into a very thin sheet called "gold leaf", then glued onto the wall or canvas with varnish. Hence, inspired by Fra Angelico, the children had a look at the angels found in his paintings, and then produced their own on canvas using tempera including gold tempera paint and gold leaf for the halo or for decorating the angel's attire.

Paper mache bowls and plates

The first lesson for Crafts this Summer was about Paper Mache- a wonder for modelling. The children were helped to understand that by using newspaper and glue mixed with water, they can give shape to an existing object.

By using petroleum jelly before starting off to make it easier to peel off the hardened paper mache model from the bowl/plate, they then created layers of newspaper pieces and glue, going round the plate/bowl's shape.

Once hardened, these will be removed from their bowls/plates and painted white to create a clean base for painting.

And here they are painted in acrylic paint and decorated in gold leaf and kite paper mosaic! Just alluring beautiful!