Lesson Brainstorm: Secrecy

I'm playing around with the big idea of Secrecy in the art classroom, and how that could be connected to a painting and drawing lesson. So far, this is what I've come up with:

     - I like the idea of narrative in 2D artworks, and I also like the exploration of symbolism and metaphor on a more complex level with secondary students. I'm thinking about having students create a work that symbolizes or secretly expresses a secret of their own, or even their feelings about a secret that they keep/have kept
     - I read once that Dali claimed that dreams and surrealist works expressed the secret desires of the unconscious. I think I could tie his narrative and symbolist works into the above-mentioned nicely. Now I just need to think of a contemporary artist that does something similar...
     - I would like to introduce the concept of layering painting and drawing on a technical as well as conceptual level. What does is mean to work in layers? What about embedding writing or other "layers" into the work?
     - I think it would be beneficial to do some research on cultural iconography and symbolism as well as look into possible ideas of "universal" symbols
     - It could be interesting to have the students explore a stream of consciousness approach to beginning their work, instead of the typical well-planned composition
     - There is a book called A Blue So Dark, a young adult fiction story, that deals with themes of art and secrecy (among many others) that would be interesting contemporary fiction to bring into the right classroom. Maybe a reading and reflection group would be a good way to spark some insight and promote some conceptual foundation-building.