Pencil Artist of the Week: Harriete Estel Berman

Today, we bring you a pencil artist of a different kind. Rather than using a pencil to draw, sketch, or illustrate, Harriete Estel Berman is making art out of the pencils themselves.

She’s creating a giant bell curve 27 feet long and 12 feet tall, entitled “Pick up your pencils, begin”, commenting on the impact of standardized testing in the US. Check out the page about it on her website, here.

“The pencils were donated by individuals all over the world, though mostly the United States. Students, teachers, entire classroom, artists, friends and people I didn’t even know sent me pencils,” she says. “Despite the stated goals of education to teach problem solving, most teachers apply one teaching methodology to all students. We know that people learn in different ways, and that there are multiple levels of intelligence, yet the current academic focus is for everyone to do the same assignment the same way.”

No matter your view on the effectiveness and efficacy of standardized testing in her art’s message, if you’re a pencil lover, you’ll enjoy this piece. There are pencils from all over the world. We spotted a Yikes! pencil (one of this author’s favorite brands from childhood), and many personalized pencils from various events.

Work by Pencil Artist Harriete Estel Berman

Check out her site for many, many more pictures and a narrative about creating this piece. It’s a great example of the many ways pencils can contribute to creativity of all sorts.

On a related note:

This is the time of year a lot of students take their standardized test. So they can fill in the bubbles nice and dark, we are having a testing pencil sale this month. Many of our pencils are 15% off! Follow the link above to check it out.