February Fashion
Tag Archives: art teacher
School Fair 2019
Tonight’s the night for the annual Chittenango School Fair at Chittenango High School (150 Genesee Street, Chittenango, NY 13037). It takes place from 5:30 – 8:00 pm. This is my display – set up in the hallway between the two gyms.
Theory Week
I am currently obsessed with Theory cashmere sweaters. I have five and wore them every day this week. Love, love, LOVE!!! <3 . I guess I also love that it is still chilly enough to wear them to work, lol (it is May, after all).
Love how you get one new thing and all of a sudden everything in your closet feels new too.
One more week until the school fair. It is on Friday, May 10, 2019 from 5:30 – 8:00 pm at Chittenango High School. On Monday, I will make final edits on what I will be bringing this year. And after that, we will be on the tail end of the school year!
There is still a lot to do. My Art-8 students are all making papier-mache sculptures or reductive floral foam sculptures. Next week, 8th grade Studio in Art students are going to take a time-out from their still-life paintings to do a clay project and my Art-5 students are glazing clay sculptures. We are very busy/very messy right now. It is really fun! I love my life!!!
Art Room Chic
Here are my looks for January and February 2019.  I started with new students so we are easing into the mess. Three students got paint on their clothes on Friday, lol, and one slapped her painting into her chin while attempting to place it on the drying rack. Another got paint on the back of his forearm. What is that about??? Of course, I made it through the week unscathed. I am a professional, as you know.
Disclaimer – I have a couple of repeats here. I tried to change it up, but you will notice that I have those over-the-knee Karl Lagerfeld boots in two colors and about four or five similar Free People cardigans. And – I just bought the Theory Malinka belted cashmere cardigan in three different colors! I still want the black one too, if I can find it.
I know what I like and when I find something that works, I want it any way I can get it. My new desires include the Joe’s Jeans leather cropped pants in all three colors, more Theory sweaters and I have my eye on a white BCBGMaxAzria gown (for no particular reason) and a couple more Rachel Zoe things. I also have 3.1 Phillip Lim on my radar and, of course, more silk Ulla Johnson dresses.
I <3 fashion!
#fashionintherealworld #fashioninreallife #fashionblogger #fashionista #fashioninrealtime #syracuseartist #arteacher #lovefashion
Photo cred: Katy C.
Dozens
I thought it would be fun to create trompe l’oeil donuts. We made them from an armature of aluminum foil, paper towels and masking tape.
Students then applied Mod Podge with a brush to paper towel bits, adhering them to the armature. They really looked like glazed donuts – so cool!
Cell-u-clay was next. It is a paper pulp that is applied wet in a sort of oatmeal consistency. This was the frosting.
Each student (in two of my 8th grade art classes) created a dozen donuts. Because I didn’t think six was enough, lol. They painted the Cell-u-clay with acrylics and added decorative details.
Some students glued their finished pieces to foamboard and others placed them in boxes provided by the local Dunkin’ Donuts. The projects are currently on display in the library at Chittenango Middle School, Chittenango, New York.
I just loved this project. I think everyone loved it! Students in the 9th period B day class even came in during their study hall to become “donut fairies” – they helped the A day group! Everyone helped each other and it was truly magical. So fun! <3
2018 Fashion Finale
Here are my #ootd pics from December 2018. A few new pieces are in the mix, like the lace tights and my first Milly top. OMG, I love stretch silk, which is a silk blend with a bit of spandex in it. You can tell that I am a huge fan of silk, cashmere and leather.
I wear two smocks while painting and using Mod Podge, which is my new go-to instead of using Plaster of Paris for sculpture. I’m doing a form of papier mache instead and it is amazing. Can’t wait to share my donut project!
The other big project is…Artist Books! My Studio in Art students are creating these very cool books using sports equipment, lunch boxes, ceramic bowls and musical instruments. They will be done by the end of the semester. Then we will start watercolor!
I will eventually clean off the back counter and prepare for new students in February. Art – 8 only meets every other day for one semester. I am able to do about three or four projects in that time – a drawing, a painting, a sculpture and a clay project or some combination of those things. Right now we are finishing up sculptures in the five classes and drawing in the other two.
I did not get any clothes for Christmas, lol. Or did I? Santa was good to me. I know him! (I really do!) <3
Best in Silk
Here are my #ootd pictures from November 2018. The black cropped leg BCBGMaxAzria pants go with everything! I ended up getting a second pair because they are so spectacular. Not sure why they were not made in other colors. I love silk as well, and silk velvet is soooo amazing! I’m sure my dry cleaner loves that I wear it too, lol.
I was able to incorporate my Wonder Woman boots (above) in this one! They are Sorel – I think I paid one third of the retail asking price for them, maybe less!
It is fun keeping track of fashion because I can see what combinations I have done with separates – what items go with what, and as a result, I can assess what one new thing I may bring into the mix that will serve me best. The morning I put this look together (above), I was, like, how do these two things match? – that is so cool! That Kobi Halperin top is embroidered cotton – very wonderful texture in person. There is a version of it in all white hiding somewhere in the universe for me to find.
Rebecca Taylor has a new concept right now where you can pay a monthly fee and rent up to four garments at a time to wear until you want to give them back and then get more. I have my eye on a few pieces from her holiday collection right now. Go to www.rebeccataylor.com for more information.
This top (above) is from 1999! It is my first Trina Turk, the reason I fell in love with her work! Mine is a size Medium, which is a bit large for me now but I still love it and wear it often.
This BCBGMaxAzria gown (above) was my outfit for my annual Friendsgiving dinner. About twenty-five of us dined together at Delmonico’s Italian Steakhouse. It had been hanging in my closet for two years and so, I was very psyched to have an opportunity to wear it. I sewed bra cups into the lining because the bodice neckline made it difficult to find undergarments that worked. Easy-peasy!
Here I am wearing Rachel Zoe (above) at my friend Tracey’s pre-Thanksgiving house party. I have this top in black too.
I found this Alice + Olivia silk-velvet halter top on a final sale on saksoff5th.com. I think it was $40? Something like that! It is my new favorite thing. I paired it with those black cropped pants seen in every other pic, lol, for a trip to the movies last night.
What will I wear next? Stay tuned….
No Air/No Problemo in Oz
There is no air-conditioning in school. We take my #ootd pics early in the morning and by the end of the day I am sometimes somewhat of a hot and sticky mess. I am grateful to have two fans mounted on the walls in my classroom and I have been drinking tons of iced coffee, water and a Gatorade every day.
No complaints though, as Syracuse, New York weather feels like Florida right now and we are on the verge of summer vacation!
Here are my most recent outfits. My Rachel Zoe dress needs the dry-cleaner stat, as Friday was a particularly muggy day. It is currently a silk version of what my hair looked like later that day – that frazzled ’80s rock star effect that we all discarded with the invention of flat irons. Seriously cringe worthy, lol. I wore boots that day because I was sure it was going to rain mid-day, but that rain did not appear until I was driving home from work. It lasted all of fifteen minutes leaving us with perfect outdoor festivals weather for the weekend – Ozstravaganza in Chittenango and Taste of Syracuse downtown.
The Beauty Within
The year was 1996: the bartenders at Empire Brewing Company on Walton Street in Armory Square/downtown Syracuse, New York used to slip me handfuls of coasters all the time. I used them as collage material in my oil & collage paintings. I’m not a beer (or any alcoholic beverage) drinker but still – I was a bit of a barfly back in the day. I really love that place!
Well, they opened a farm brewery on Route 13 in Cazenovia, New York a while back. It is a magnificent venue in every way – you must make your pilgrimage if you haven’t done so already. It is the power of Empire times infinity! I was there this evening for Kara Daviau’s art reception.
Delicious food and drink specials, of course, and – who knew? a spectacular basement tasting/barrel room with brick walls and the most splendid ambiance for an art exhibition. Kara’s work is a perfect match for this space.
Her new series is titled Keep Me Where the Light Is. Kara is continuing her journey of discovering abandoned places and summoning them to life with music. She captures the essences of the forgotten beauty while listening to specific tunes, adding sheet music as collage before tackling the canvases with vibrant acrylic hues.
Her new mantra is expand. She is voraciously seeking new places to show and sell her artwork, (which includes merchandise – magnets, notecards, T-shirts and other accessories – you can find these and more at Wildflowers Armory in Armory Square).
As of very recently, her paintings have been accepted in juried exhibitions at galleries in New York City and in Connecticut and Maryland with the opportunity for solo exhibitions in all locations on the horizon. I asked her if she would seek abandoned spaces in these areas to create new work that resonates with people who live there. Not yet was her response.
She is at a crossroads, both personally and professionally. Her focus is on healing and with that a strong urge to self reflect via self-portraiture may be the next leg in her journey. She’d added a mini self-portrait to the lower corner of one of these paintings then wiped it out, as if to say she wasn’t quite ready for that leap…yet.
I trust that Kara will visualize the success she deserves with any step she takes on her path to get there. She is a beautiful person both inside and out. I love the trailblazing spirit that guides her choices – such an incredibly talented artist and a wonderful role model for both her own children and her students. <3
Kara Daviau’s art studio is located at the Delavan Center (Studio 249), 509 W. Fayette Street, Syracuse, New York. For more information about this work and more, contact her at KLDAV@HOTMAIL.COM.
School Fair 2017
Last night Chittenango Central School held their annual School Fair at the high school. Â Each year, my colleague Katy and I spend several hours installing the middle school art show on the walls of the hallway between the two gymnasiums.
Then at 8:00 pm we take the whole thing down and pop the art into our cars to return it all to the middle school on Monday. Â We displayed around three hundred pieces of 5th – 8th grade artwork.
This was my twentieth year of said fair. Â Here are the pictures I remembered to take! Â It is pretty cool to see this visual representation of what we do all year.
