View the 12.5 min. Thomas Mann segment of the Craft in America Messages episode.
After viewing:
Follow the viewing with a conversation about Mann's work. Allow for students to respond to his work. Ask, what objects does the artist create? How are his various artworks similar? How do they differ?
Bring up Mann's website for more images to evoke further discussion. How does the artist come up with ideas? What materials does he use?
Invite students to consider their own personal responses to the artist's work. What do they especially like about the artist's work?
Finally, direct student attention to the artist's incorporation of the heart. Ask, how does the heart appear throughout the artist's work?
Remind students that the Craft In America video segment focuses on the theme of Messages. What messages might be conveyed by the artist's use of the heart symbol?
Pass out the "Mann Made Hearts" Worksheet. Instruct the students to carefully look at the variety of heart forms and start to consider the following questions:
What does a heart mean?
Does the meaning of each heart on the worksheet stay the same or change?
What messages do you get from these heart forms?
Are there two hearts that you think transmit the same message?
Are there two hearts that you think transmit very different messages?
Try to "read" at least one example that incorporates additional elements along with the heart form.
What role does the heart play in transmitting the message?
Have students consider Mann's approach to the heart symbol. Refer to the quote above in which the artist states, "Maybe I can actually invent a design system, whereby I make objects that appear to be found. Maybe I could develop, what I call a design vocabulary, that could be infinitely mutate-able." Guide students to understand that the artist is suggesting that his heart symbol can be changed in what he calls an "infinite" number of ways. Ask students to consider Mann's talk of a design "vocabulary." How do we usually think of a vocabulary? Help students see the connection between our typical use of the term "vocabulary" and the way in which the artist is using the term. As we arrange words in an "infinite" number of ways to create meaning, so, too, might the artist arrange and rearrange his symbols to create meaning. Thomas Mann has decided that within his design vocabulary the heart is "full of life" and he likes to express that through his many iterations of the heart form. Ask students to think of images/symbols that have widely accepted meaning. For example, a book most often means knowledge, or the pursuit of knowledge; a circle with a diagonal line dissecting it means that something is not allowed. Allow time for brainstorming and record ideas on a whiteboard or chart paper.
Empower the students with the idea that, like Thomas Mann and other artists, they can assign meaning to forms. Instruct the class that each student will choose a form, natural or human made, and make a simple drawing. Encourage students to choose forms that resonate with them, or suggest a story with which they can identify. Have each student contribute an idea using the "Design Vocabulary Worksheet". Each individual student will create his/her own symbol with its associated meaning. These will be combined so that, in essence, the class will be constructing its own design vocabulary. The completed design vocabulary worksheets can be hung together in the classroom so that students will have easy access to the entire vocabulary.
Now that the students are equipped with a shared design vocabulary, present the idea of creating a three-dimensional form composed from this new vocabulary. In sketchbooks, the students should play with these images to begin to build personal messages. For instance, if the students have decided that a star will denote "getting attention," then students need to use that meaning, but can create their own star, or find an already existing star, such as on a bottle cap. Scale and placement of the images can further illustrate the message. A large star will read differently from a small star. A star inside of a heart will read differently from a star inside a fist, etc.
The goal is to combine selected symbols in a way that a message is conveyed. Basically, the students are to carefully compose a "sentence" or two with visual images.
Re-visit examples of Thomas Mann's work for further inspiration. His collage box pieces found on pages 74 through 79 in Thomas Mann, Metal Artist (book listed in resources list) may be particularly helpful at this stage.
This lesson is approached as a jewelry lesson, but is easily translated into any sculptural medium with which the teacher is comfortable. In order for some messages to be effective they may need to be larger in scale than a typical piece of jewelry.
The teacher can choose to have the class create a variation of a single kind of personal adornment such as a bracelet or a pendant. Alternatively, the teacher might open the project to allow each student to choose the jewelry form that best transmits his/her message.
Teach students about cold-connection techniques. Cold metal work involves the connecting of metal fragments without the use of heat. Students can connect found metal objects and metal hardware items by wrapping them with wire, joining, tying, riveting, etc. Gather materials found under Teaching Materials for Studio Production. For more detailed information on coldconnecting techniques, see Joanna Gollberg's Making Metal Jewelry: Projects, Techniques, Inspiration, Lark Books, 2003 or Susan Lenart Kazmer's Making Connections: A Handbook of Cold Joins for Jewelers and Mixed Media Artists, Loveland, CO: Interweave Press; 2nd ed., 2008.
Download the Thomas Mann Messages Guide in .PDF Format. [Get a copy of Acrobat Reader free from Adobe HERE if you don't already have it installed on your computer]
Thomas Mann Education Guide
Thomas Mann Mann Made Hearts Worksheet
Thomas Mann Design Vocabulary Worksheet
