The Dot Project is an art project created by Art Teacher Mrs. Marge for the entire Middle School at Montrose this year. This project was slightly based on the book The Dot by Peter H Reynolds. His book follows a young girl who believes she can’t draw, and eventually draws a dot and signs her name. Everyone loves it and she realizes she can draw! The idea was to make unique dots that represented each of us. 

In Middle-School art classes, we review the Elements and Principles of Art and Design. One of these elements is color. For the dots, we had just reviewed color schemes (Primary, Tertiary, Analogous, etc). Each student was assigned a scheme, a circle, and during the first week of school, we designed whatever we wanted with oil pastels. Each grade received a different-sized dot. For example; the sixth grade received one that was approximately ten inches in diameter, the seventh grade received one that was about one foot in diameter, and the eighth grade received one that measured about fourteen inches. 

We did this not only to practice our elements of color but also to make the walls of the art room more colorful and cheery. Mrs. Marge is going to hang them up to “connect the dots of middle school,” so be on the lookout for them! She said, “The two primary skills developed by the students through this assignment were (a) employing techniques in oil pastel; and (b) understanding color theory, which is a practical combination of art and science that is used to determine which colors look good together.”

The dots look beautiful and everyone had a good time making them, as we got to be very creative in what we ended up doing. At first, it was a little difficult for some to work with the oil pastels, but we got the hang of it! As Gabby Hasenjaeger ‘27 said, “It was tough at first but it really had me open my mind so I enjoyed it.” Another student added that she “Liked the final result. I also worked with oil pastel (which is not my favorite material), and this gave me an opportunity to improve my skills when working with it..”  

Everyone was so creative and there was a wide range of ideas portrayed. The main ideas varied from very abstract to specific images and places. For example, Clare Higgins ´27 said she “drew the ocean in the midnight duck. It looked misty.” Other ideas leaned more towards color. Josie Marcucci ´25 explained the concept of “I had to do something complimentary. I chose purple and yellow. It looked……..interesting.” 

Overall, everyone had a great time doing this project, and they look amazing! Thanks for the fun start-of-the-year project, Mrs. Marge!

Bella Gonet ’27, Contributing Writer

26bgonet@montroseschool.org