On Friday, Sept. 8, Mandy Knight’s painting students practiced their painting skills in preparation for their big project this week. To help prepare for this project, Knight’s class has also been practicing with acrylic and watercolor paints for the past few weeks.

“I’ve made some shoes with watercolor,” sophomore Abby Korte said. “We did water color landscape, that was cool. We’ve just practiced with different types of paint.”

Knight introduces a technique and a prompt to the students, then they create a painting from an original idea of theirs that relates to the prompt. Prompts can be a hidden message or simply a pair of shoes.

“We painted celebrations and seasons,” senior Tommy Brown said. “I did Christmas. It was pretty good.”

Knight wants her students to practice using the paints before their big project this week, because she wants to make them comfortable with the paints before they use them. The students can experiment and get a feel for the materials. It’s important for an artist to know how their materials work and feel before they use them on an official project, according to Knight.

“Experimenting with the paints are steps of the full painting process,” Knight said.

Once comfortable with the tools, on Sept. 13, the class will start their big project, using the materials and techniques they have learned. The students will be able to use pencil, watercolors and acrylic paint on their official project.

“It’s good to be familiar with how the paint works,” Knight said. “Learning the baby steps will help their painting outcome become stronger.”