Students explore reverse shading, composition, and mark-making while creating visual narratives inspired by phobias.

Megan Bellucci

In this project, students are assigned the task of illustrating a phobia of their choice. They go through a list of different phobias, research some of them on their own, and make a list of the ones that stand out to them.

For practice, I like to have students sketch out the same phobia in two different ways. This allows them to consider different compositions, perspectives, and ways to present the same phobia to see which approach communicates their idea more effectively. We collaborate by sharing ideas and offering each student suggestions on which composition they should go with.

Another highlight of this lesson is the opportunity to teach students about reverse shading. Students are given black paper instead of white and are asked to create an artwork by building highlights on the black paper with a white colored pencil. This lesson could also be modified by having students create a reverse shading value scale before beginning the project, making themselves a handy resource to use as they work.

There are a lot of drawing techniques that can be applied to this lesson, and mark-making is probably the most common. Prior to this class, students learn about hatching, crosshatching, stippling, and scumbling, and they can apply any of those mark-making techniques to these drawings.

This is also a good lesson for mixed grade levels. Some students enjoy portraiture and can create detailed drawings with a realistic look. However, students can still be successful by choosing other ways to depict their phobias that feel less intimidating to draw. Giving students this flexibility makes the project especially popular among my high-school students. Some finish the project and want to create a second phobia drawing with another idea they didn’t get to explore. In these instances, I let students flip back to traditional drawing with white paper so they can compare and contrast the different drawing options.

After the drawings are finished, we do a reflective piece where students write about their phobia and how their artwork represents that phobia. Some students choose to tell a cathartic story where they are overcoming their fear, while others like to create an artwork about someone else with a phobia. It’s a nice opportunity for students to share what their artwork is about and a good lesson on how an artwork can tell a story.

Megan Bellucci is a full-time art teacher in New Jersey. She has been teaching art for fourteen years and taught grades K–12. She is an active member of both AENJ and NAEA. She is also an adjunct instructor at AOEU. megan.bellucci@yahoo.com

What Scares You? Phobia-Inspired Visual Storytelling