Welcome to the Visual & Performing Arts Winter Showcase 2020! It is my pleasure to invite you to explore the creative flair and artistic talent of our wonderful student body, represented here for your enjoyment across a variety of artistic disciplines. Throughout the school divisions, our students have wholeheartedly embodied the notion of embracing new opportunities and challenges. By producing such wonderful art, they have demonstrated an admirable level of resilience and adaptability to overcome the adverse circumstances faced within our current educational landscape. I invite you to join us in celebrating each and every one of their achievements, of which our community can be proud.

Robert Kilvington-Shaw
Visual & Performing Arts Head of Department

Elementary School Art

Our elementary artists have been hard at work this year. Grade 1 have produced beautiful drawings from observation, memory and imagination. Grade 2 have explored a range of natural forms and scenes, including the beautiful mountain scenery of Hong Kong. Digital design skills have been at the heart of Grade 3’s work, where they used drawing tools on Google Drawings to create colourful and unique avatars. Grade 4 have explored visual symbolism through the concept of animal form and produce wonderful, original Art work of their ‘inner animal’, using their own choice of subject and media.

Elementary School Music

Although we’ve had many changes and challenges due to Covid restrictions, that didn’t stop our EC and ES students from learning music! Lower-grade students have been dancing a lot in music class. ‘Music and movement’ activities help children develop coordination, understand rhythm concepts, and build motor skills while allowing them to practice self-expression. We also incorporated American sign language (ASL) in songs to keep students actively engaged and to help with their kinesthetic learning. This also encourages students to attach meaning to the word. All EC and ES students learn to play the musical instruments. They explore and practice rhythm and melodic concepts using unpitched and pitched percussion instruments. Upper-grade students have been hard at work composing music and making musical instruments. Students created their own steel drums on old pots, pans or cans of various sizes found at home so that each instrument has its own pitch. They then experimented further with wooden or metal strikers to identify the sound most like the steel drums they heard in music class.

Middle School ART

Our Middle School artists have been busy this year making fantastic art. Whilst it’s been a trying semester being stuck online, that hasn’t halted the creativity of our Grade 7 and 8 students. Grade 7 kicked the year off with some stunning experimental pieces based on mark-making and mixed media. We had huge fun looking into the history of colour and making our own paints with condiments and spices found at home. Unit Two focused on patterns and print-making and we were able to utilise our classroom/studio space time to make some tremendous lino print pattern design. Unit Three was short and sweet, but our artists really encapsulated the fun of typography design considering formal elements and principles of design. Grade 8 started the year producing a range of different drawings, both observational and imaginative. Students then explored the ideas and theories of the surrealist movement to create fun and exciting compositions. Unit Two was focused on portraiture, painting and the techniques and styles of the Renaissance that still inspires artists today.

Middle School Music

Grade 6 Middle School students have been composing original music using an online digital audio workstation called Soundtrap, as part of the “Music For Spaces” project. To begin, students had to consider the driving question: how can music add value to the spaces within our school? Students identified areas of our campus where music could add a sense of peace and tranquility. Inspired by the ambient pioneer Brian Eno, they then created ambient works to enhance the atmosphere of selected spaces in our school. Unfortunately, school closure has postponed the exhibition of the music being played in these spaces for the time being. In the meantime, some selected works have been specially curated here for you to enhance your online experience. We hope you enjoy the calming atmosphere that they create!

Middle School PERFORMANCE

Middle School Performance has had an interesting challenge this year, transitioning from the stage to the screen and audio. Exploring dramatic elements including tableaux, process drama, audio drama, voice, and scene study, students have worked with new technology to perform in a variety of ways. Students are now professionals in using Zoom as a rehearsal space as well as a way to capture their performances. They have also learned how to edit audio and video in apps including: Garageband, iMovie, Audacity, and other applications.

High School Art

Here is a collection of students work that has been made over the past months at American International School. These students have explored various medias and themes whilst over coming the challenges of making art from a distance during hybrid learning. Please show them some love by reacting on their post with a ‘like’ or a comment.

High School Music

High school music classes have looked very different this year due to Covid-19. Band students were not able to play wind instruments and choir students had to sing with masks, which made for challenging classes. Students overcame these challenges beautifully through learning and reviewing the basic fundamentals of music theory, working on some percussion instruments and trying their hands at composing and arranging. All work submitted here shows the determination and dedication of all the high school music students to rise above the limitations of our current situation.

High School Drama

Join the HS Drama students of AIS as they explore what it is like to be a teenager in the time of Covid in the form of individual pantomimes (silent films). Watch more here. Our HS Drama students also gathered together in groups to perform, so come and enjoy seasonal laughs brought to you here.