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Open Toolkits

Open Toolkits

OERs composed by MA Contemporary Art Theory Students

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  4. Polka Dot Art: A Symbiotic Voyage of Nature and Art

Polka Dot Art: A Symbiotic Voyage of Nature and Art

A completed polka dot collage, made by simply collaging leaves, with tools such as scissors and a rounding tool nearby.
Reading Time: 3 minutes

Summary

In this activity, you will enter the creative world of polka dot art and nature. Choose one of the two polka dot collage creation methods to make a real or virtual polka dot collage, and experience the process of returning artworks to nature. This practice will help you explore how polka dot art and natural materials can collide to create a unique aesthetic, and feel the interdependent and inseparable relationship between art and nature.

Choose a Creation Method (1 min)

Based on your own conditions, determine the form of participation and choose one of the following options:

① Handmade Leaf Polka Dot Collage

② Digital Polka Dot Collage

That’s get started!

①Handmade Leaf Collage Creation (15 min)

(If you have chosen the second option, please scroll down)

Step 1: Preparation (1 min)

Materials: blank postcards, fresh fallen leaves.

Tools: Circle punch(in different sizes), drawing tools (ruler, compass), envelopes(for holding leaf fragments), blank postcards, white glue, knife, pencil, eraser.

Materials needed for making a leaf collage: wet wipes, a rounding tool, fresh fallen leaves, and envelopes (for holding leaf fragments).Materials needed for making a leaf collage: drawing tools (ruler, compass), blank postcards, polka-dot leaves (can be made on-site), white glue, knife, pencil, eraser.

Step 2: Conceive and Sketch the Shape (1 min)

Combine your understanding of nature and quickly sketch a simple basic shape with a pencil on paper.
Use a ruler and mechanical pencil to draw a square on a blank postcard.

Step 3: Cut the leaves into round shapes (3 min)

Based on the size and shape of your draft, use circle punchs to cut fresh fallen leaves into dots of varying sizes.

The process of using a rounding tool to press leaves into a round shape.

Step 3: Cut and Collage (10 min)

Based on the sketch, cut the dots and the cut-out leaves to the appropriate size. If the leaf dots are the right size, they can be used directly.
Using white glue, paste the materials one by one within the pencil outline to complete the collage artwork.
Use white glue to attach a leaf shape that is missing a few dots to the bottom right corner of a blank postcard.Use white glue to attach polka dot-shaped leaves to form a square around the leaves, creating an artwork.

②Digital Collage Creation (15 min)

Step1: Image Processing (5 min)

Open the photos of natural environments taken with your mobile phone (such as grasslands, woods, flower clusters, etc.).

Step2: Polka Dot Addition (10 min)

Use the sticker or graffiti function of photo editing software (such as Hypic) to add dot elements and adjust their size, color, and position to complete the digital dot collage picture.

 

Reverse To Nature (3 min)

Bring the handmade collage work or open the mobile phone digital collage picture, return to the environment where the materials came from, and take photos of the work combined with the natural environment to form the final artistic record.
(If it is impossible to return to the original environment due to objective conditions, you can use these 3 minutes to think: the connection between natural materials/natural scenes and dot art in this creation, and the symbiotic relationship between art and nature.)
Polka Dot Art: A Symbiotic Voyage of Nature and Art / Open Toolkits by Hengyi Chen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

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