Still Idealistic

New Spice | Study like a scholar, scholar

2010-07-18T10:05:00.000-06:00

Valeri Larko

2010-07-18T09:33:00.002-06:00

I am loving these paintings by Valeri Larko. She focuses on the juxtaposition of urban decay and nature. I am facinated by her ability to transform something that is typically considered ugly into a subject of incredible beauty in her use of color and eye for shape and composition. Unlike some works of art that focus on urban ruin or salvage yards for the purpose of controversy about consumption, ect, Larko's work isn't conforntational in that way. It seems to be more of an observation of beauty where others miss it. It does call attention to the issue of waste, but it isn't in such a way that demands change-- it is simply an observation she is making. Click on the title of this post to see her website, which is full of wonderful work.

2010-07-17T08:13:00.000-06:00

This Is Where We Live from 4th Estate on Vimeo.

I love this video from 4th Estate, a British publishing house. Caught it from annekata. Check out her site for more info on the making of the video.

I love you, City

2010-05-12T10:03:00.001-06:00

It is hard to believe it has already been two weeks since I made the trek to Capitol Hill in Denver to apply for my teaching license, but I wanted to post a few pictures I took while wandering abound. Being Downtown reminded me of the things I love the most about cities-- Architecture and this history it can't help but conjure. Architecture! I love love love love it. I love the juxtaposition of the historical and modern, the decorative next to the functional. I love old architecture full of brick and iron because it reminds me of a time when people weren't too busy, weren't in too much of a hury to remember to also make everything beautiful. We've lost something in our prefabricated, concrete and glass world. We've lost the floral motifs, the scrolled metalwork that makes our world more than a place just to get things done and move on to the next thing. There is something about the beauty of the details that helps us stop and look and reflect upon what our lives really are.

I've been thinking some about moving to Capitol Hill. I've been reminded of dreams I used to dream about living in the city, teaching in a school with as little as my own school had, changing the lives of kids who have nothing, who live in unadorned worlds of brokenness. I don't have any idea where the future will lead, what is ahead for me, but I am working hard at listening. As I delve deeper into the reality of this post-grad life means, I am learning that it may be bigger than I thought, it may require more sacrifice, and it might cause me to change my mind about more things that I planned to change my mind about. who knows? We'll see where it all goes, I suppose...

Busy with a few creative things...

2010-05-12T09:52:00.000-06:00

It is official. I am living the true life of an artist. I have been busy at work painting and drawing, getting new ideas and exploring what is next for me in my painting-- as much as I can squeeze in between working, interviewing for the summer, getting ready to actually start working full time at the Y, and also looking for teaching jobs-- and trying to keep up with all of the wonderful people in my life. BUT-- I think I am a bit more of a legitimage artist considering I am waiting for my next paycheck so I can buy some more cadmium yellow. I feel like Monet on a rainy day. Sad sad sad. Itching.

Nevertheless, I am excited about some of the things coming out of me. I am exploring some new colors, really trying to push myself to use more whites, or at least trying to venture up to the higher end of the value scale. I am finding myself needing to remind myself to be very aware of the importance of dynamic choices in terms of amounts in color and value. I am pleased with the way things are coming out. I am exploring a lot with fibers, getting really exciting about what I can do with fabric. I have also noticed a bit of a shift in the scenes I am compelled to paint since moving here closer to the foothills. The images that continually come to mind are less about plains meeting mountains and more about mountains meeting mountins, the valleys and hills that seem to crumple like blankets, ready to enfold. I've been thinking a lot more about cells, about plants, about what growth looks like on paper, on canvas. interesting ideas that haev not yet been fully explored... perhaps more will come.

I have been thinking and dreaming a lot about where life is going. At this point, things feel a bit scattered-- I am stretched, arms wide, between a lot of different things. Trying to figure out what my passions for kids and teaching are leading, how that is all going to play out in this economy that seems to have sucker-punched education right in the gut. I am happy to be wtih kids at the Y, but am really longing to be doing something more with all of this creativity, all of this strength, all of this ability that is just screaming to get out of me. The job market is quite bleak and I feel like I could be doing so much more-- but it is so much a matter of waiting, of patience, of letting my life develop as it does, walking deeper into the woods, reading more words, letting experience build upon experience. But the day will be coming, indeed, it is surely on its way! It is just a matter of continuing on. Continuing the walk, continuing the search.... getting up each day and doing a little at a time.

2010-05-12T09:22:00.001-06:00

back on the perverbial horse...

2010-04-17T22:57:00.010-06:00

It has been a while.... and I must admit that I've been off my creative track a bit more than I'd like. Living the creative life hasn't been working out as well as I had hoped. BUT-- today, today, I took a few hours to draw, spent a bit of time really thinking about the direction I want my paintings to go, where I want to go next creatively, really.

I've been struggling a little bit with how to really speak about the visual life that makes up my daily ritual because things are much more complex and I haven't studied enough to be ableto really speak about my surroundings from memory yet. So-- I've set out to work a bit more on studying.

The thing that I love about being here in Boulder is the overabundance of wonderful residential architecture. Because there is an ordinance that prevents expansion, this city is crammed, jammed full of wonderful old houses that have each been individually transformed into personal works of art. There are so many unique houses and each set against this fabulous backdrop of the flatirons and the foothills-- it is about to make my artistic heart burst. Every time I even make the .2 mile drive from work back home, I can hardly believe my incredible luck at being given the gift of such a beautiful home. Truth be told, every time I find myself being called back to the northern or eastern side of the state, a little part of me grieves as I look over my shoulder before getting in the car. I am becoming quite spoiled and snobbish, I must openly admit.

All this to say, being so close to the mountains and being bombarded with so many wonderful houses to look at, creating a painting that really captures it all without more careful observation and study seems impossible. So, as the weather is getting to be so wonderfully beautiful and plants are popping up everywhere, my goal is to get out more and draw-- maybe even just for an hour or two a week. One or two drawings a week would be a great accomplishment for me now. In the meantime, as the Colorado weather is in the process of making up its mind, I have taken a few hundred photographs that ought to serve as some great resource material. I know, I know, this is breaking two cardinal rules-- drawing from observation and from a photograph, but hopefully it will provide me with a bit more visual insight into what we are dealing with here in order to really speak clearly and beautifully about the environment with all of its homey neighborhoods and wonderful wildlife from a more emotional or intellectual perspective soon!

I've posted a few of my favorite images from the day.

How to read a book you don't want to read

2010-03-14T09:32:00.001-06:00

Although I imagine this video might not be quite as applicable to the art classroom, this could be a great literacy resource. This could be a great way of teaching literacy skills or might just be a good way of introducing a learning activity that may involve the daunting task of reading a book.

NZ Book Council - Going West

2010-03-14T09:24:00.001-06:00

Another great video. It is my hope that i can use resources like this in my classroom on a daily basis to help students see all of the creative possibilities that are out there. As you might have noticed, I Tend to use this blog as a way of collecting these resources so that eventually, when I do have my classroom, I'll have a ready and easy store to refer to. I think that videos like this and other current media might be good ways to start the day-- students can watch the video, look at a work of art, ect and then write a response in their sketchbook, talk to a friend about it, or contribute to a class disucssion.

Eleanor McCain

2010-03-10T10:01:00.003-07:00

I am loving these quilts by Eleanor McCain. I've been saving up old scraps of fabric and old clothes-- I would love to begin working on some things like this... oh how I love fiber arts!

My new favorite

2010-01-25T20:12:00.003-07:00

I am in absolute love with these paintings from John Baird. I love his incorporation of pattern, textures, and textiles in these beautiful still lives. My heart is aflutter at his beautiful use of color and abstraction of ideas.

Wailin' Jennys

2010-01-11T12:14:00.001-07:00

The music of these women makes me hungry for beauty. hhmmm. I've been thinking a lot about the quality of holding desire without the need to grasp or possess. This music brings about in me a sense of need to simply hold the beauty, to breath it in without needing to do anything else. enjoy!

TaaaaDAAAA!

2010-01-11T11:57:00.004-07:00

The day has finally arrived for all of you who have been coveting a peice of artwork all of your own! Now that I've graduated and lived through student teaching, my lack of posting here is beyond excuse, but we could just say I've been busy setting up my shop ;). Anywho-- I have been very busy collecting old and new artwork for your financial enjoyment. Here is a little sneak peak at a few of the array of goods available at my etsy shop, Headed West. It is a bit primitive at the moment, but I hope to develop things as time goes on!

Love it

2010-01-02T13:23:00.001-07:00

I've been admiring this song all season and was so excited to see this video over at poppytalk. enojoy as you start over this new year!

Winter Songs from Crush Design on Vimeo.

2009-11-29T17:54:00.001-07:00

Typography from Ronnie Bruce on Vimeo.

When all you have left to say is, "I'm sorry."

2009-11-28T14:01:00.002-07:00

Finding myself at Thanksgiving and receiving the pleasure of at least two extra full days with which I am able to fill with the ever-so weighty list of things to accomplish, I finally got around to looking over the finished assignments from my students at the high school and the 100 accompanying evaluations filled out regarding my teaching at the school. I made it through approximately 60 of the pages filled with a a smattering of both scathing and kind remarks. I sat there at the kitchen table, head in my hands, stunned, although not overly surprised. Although I did not know quite how strongly some of the students felt, their responses to my solicitation for opinion put many of the unspoken feelings about my experience there into words, as difficult as they are to read. Reading what the students had to say really brought me back to the deep sense of failure and lostness I felt there.

I've debated about being so bold as to reveal my poor reviews here for you to see, but over the last day or so, I find the inability to escape pain-inducing recollections of what I read just yesterday and I feel the need to sort out the emotions and find a footing upon which to walk forward. Honestly, I am still trying to figure out what happened to me there, where I got off track, how I seem to have so badly missed the point.

Reading over the selection of evaluations left me with the sense that somehow I had missed really seeing the students I was supposed to be teaching. I felt overwhelmed. I felt lost. I felt insecure. and I felt threatened and abused by many of the students. I was writing a reflection on one of my lessons from the high school the other day and realized the answer to the question: "What went wrong," to be somehow and somewhere answered in the fact that I let the students walk all over me. One of the more compassionate evaluations actually read, "You shouldn't let students walk all over you. You are the authority in the class." Sage advice from a student that I don't think I know how to apply.

Maybe if I'd had more time there, I could have continued to grow. I do not know. I found myself sitting there yesterday, wishing that I could crawl down into the heater vents where I could hear the mice scratching around. I sat there, thinking, "I wish I could just go back there and say 'I am so sorry.' "

My heart breaks at the thought that I hurt some students, that I left them feeling unimportant, inadequate, or disrespected. I wish I could have found space to just see them before everything else.

I am remembering thoughts shared by experienced teachers about the fact that they learned everything about writing lessons and their content in school, but were not taught the most important thing-- relationships. And thinking of that gives me a bit of hope that perhaps I am not as doomed as I feel, that although the learning curve is steep, that perhaps there is hope for me yet. That somehow I will touch more students with love and compassion than those that leave my classroom feeling hurt. And I find myself hoping and longing that there is forgiveness out there somewhere for me. Maybe even if it only comes from me.

In the midst of all of this, I find myself searching for some sort of footing in terms of classification of blame, causes, and responses. I keep thinking of this phrase that I heard over and over in jr. high and high school: You must rise to the occassion. I've been thinking of this often, about how regardless of the reasons, regardless of what I am up against, regardless of how close student teaching is to being a real teacher, I have to rise to the occassion. I can only meet the challenges with integrity and courage, doing my best to do what I know to be the best.

Much of this semester, especially the first part of this journey, left me with a sense of flail-- I imagine myself treading water. Unfortunately, the stack of evaluations sitting at home on my desk are reminders of the students that I had there in the water with me.

Thier evaluations have shown me again that the essential thing in teaching has little to do with what I teach and much to do with how I am treating, seeing, and loving the group of students I have been placed around. The difficulty, I think, with being a student teacher and being a young teacher, is making the transition between doing the thing you've been taught to be able to do in school and seeing the real people you have chosen to serve with this training and knowledge.

When I was at the school, my mentor teacher tried to tell me that the choices I make about how I actually teach, the learning experience I set up for my students has a reciprocal relationship with the personal connections I have with students. My instructional strategies should be rooted in compassion and a personal and genuine connection with the students for which that instruction is prepared. How I use the time I have in my classroom does actually communicate how I feel about students-- it isn't just about what I say.

Respect is a funny thing. As a young teacher, I am still tyring to navigate my personal identity. I am navigating what it means to be an authority and to gain proper respect. Something I do remember thinking a lot about during my first placement was the issue of posturing. I worked through the tendency to put on a "teacher face," and grew a great deal in learning how to relax and be personal in the classroom. I think I did come a long way, but it is going to take a while to really learn it. I think I get caught up in feeling like I need to figure out what the model of teacher-persona is and then put on that costume, become the expected image. I am starting to see that the difference is in simply seeing my role as a person who is placed in the classroom to serve the young people that enter its door. My role is a person who is able to love my class as a whole and therefore make decisions based not on how I feel about individual students or how they treat me, but simply, manage this little world as a whole, making sure each student is held to the same standard of work, respect, and self-pride. How that works itself out beyond theory is a difficult question, but at least it is an idea with which to work.

As painful as it is to read about my mistakes and failures from the very hands of those I have failed, there is also something about it that drives me to try again. It poses a challenge for growth that is essential for a vibrant life. It is an opportunity to learn how to serve students better in the future because I now can see a little more what really hurts them and what really matters most. Working through the difficulties and messes that define relationships are the very catalysts that teach us to love better, even though it is frightening. Even if the thought of it still makes me sick to my stomache.

So what am I to do with all of this? The truth is that I am fresh, I am green, and I have been trusted with an unbelieveable number of young people even though the expectation for my failure and mistakes is quite high. The truth is that I am broken. I am humbled. I am repentant and I hope that someday all of those kids who saw my evaluations as an opportunity to unleash the eight weeks of pain and frustration I put them through will find it in thier hearts to forgive me. I hope that they will someday find grace for failures and shortcomings that they did not seem to recieve from me.

There is something refreshing and exhiliarting in the prospect of a second chance at loving people. There is something I find so deeply touching in the idea that even when I've so impossibly wronged someone, there is always a chance tomorrow to make it right. There is always a chance to start again, to stop and remember how much better things are when I choose compassion before my own sense of obligation or responsiblity. It is that painful sense of growth that comes from pruning.

And I am happy to know that there is hope for forgiveness and grace for my failures, even when I feel like I belong somewhere near the bottom of the foodchain.

Art

2009-11-28T07:49:00.001-07:00

COMBO a collaborative animation by Blu and David Ellis (2 times loop)

2009-11-09T21:34:00.001-07:00

Something that really gets me excited about using technology in the classroom is the ability to show students so many creative and artful videos like this one. Today I began a lesson with fifth graders on actual and implied movement and was able to share with them the video on Kinetic Sculpture that I posted here a while back. It was so exciting to be able to see them get so excited over this great video. I simply asked them to tell me a few things that they observed in the video and the complexity of their thoughts and level of interest and intrigue blew me away.

This was a really good day for me. The lessons that I taught today were all "day 2"s for my original lessons and it was really exciting to see how much the kids had learned based both on their memories from last week and also in their continued engagement in the assignments. Today was also the first day that the students started using "real clay," which is a opportunity that makes them feel very grown up and artisticallly "official," if you will. There is something instantly gratifying in seeing students genuinely enjoying and doing well at an activity that you have poured so much of yourself into preparing. And it is exciting to see my own ideas being given new life through the creative genius of children. Somehow, the more I work with children, the more I am amazed at what they come up with. Just watching 24 six-year old decorate tiles shaped like houses today reminded me of how much creative potential lies in one person and how unique each person's vision is.

I think as I teach more, I seeing that perhaps the thing that I enjoy most about teaching art is that I get to look at great art all day long. I just adore walking around the classroom and seeing what the students come up with in response to a single prompt or idea. I love looking at so many different kinds of art, and what could be better than looking at over 100 pieces of brand new art being created each day? It is truly a wonderful thing.

Sunday afternoon physics

2009-11-08T13:05:00.003-07:00

It is getting on towards Sunday afternoon and I find myself contemplating heat, calories, and projectile motion. I've been sitting at a new coffee shop, looking out at the faces of Boulder walking down the street outside the large plate-glass window for nearly three hours and am rummaging around inside my body and brain for the energy and perseverance to keep going. I need an activity for fifth graders tomorrow that will help them understand the concept of movement in a work of art. I have a large stack of lesson plans, essays, rubrics, assessment tables, and analysis to do and I am looking outside wondering if it would be okay for me to get up and take a break, to go to Bliss, one of my favorite stores and look at all the creative, artistic gifts and things that they lay out for me to admire.

I am on the downward slope of this journey. The acceleration is increasing exponentially each day and I am coming to that point where many of those loose pieces are falling into place. Things are making more sense and my desire to do well is becoming more and more pervasive. I am beginning to see how I can, in this strange season, take charge of the sort of teacher I want to be and move towards it.

A month or so ago, I remember sitting at my kitchen table on a Sunday much like this one, feeling angry about the seven hours spent pouring over books and completing the tedium that is the "Art Content Lesson Plan Format." I wanted to be outside, making myself a well-rounded person, engaging in the rest that gives me the right to claim my own humanity. The next few days brought a well of tears and a reminder to be myself, to be personal, to move my teaching out of my head, out of Microsoft Word formatting, into my arms, my voice, my stories. And although this was an important step, I was still missing the balance between intentional planning and hard and fast commitment to something that is still all-consuming.

Something about my new placement at the elementary level, maybe my mid-term evaluation, maybe a simple progression towards a more "grown up" perspective, I am more resigned to putting in the work that it takes to be a really great teacher. A lot of days earlier in this semester left me feeling far from the teacher I want to be for reasons I am still sorting out. But I feel now that I've had more time to organize my thoughts, more of a space that gives me a conceptual grounding of what I am about, that I can set down these goals and follow the path towards realizing them.

I want to be a great teacher. I want students to come away with deep thoughts, substantial changes in their view of learning and life. I want to be intentional about the activity that takes place in my classroom and I want students to walk away with a grasp of the concepts about art and the world that make me see my life as a journey towards the center of the earth. And I want to do the work today that will make me that teacher.

It is easy for me to complain, to say "it isn't fair," or get upseet that the constructs of our over-busy society are doing damage to my personal life. I can say that college is perpetuating a society that is overworked and overly committed to success as a result of production. And although these things may be true at the end of the day, I am being called to a race at this moment that demands everything. This week, my cooperating teacher reminded me that this trial, this last step is a process that is intended to put me through the paces so that when the greater challenges come and I am outside this support system, I will have the muscles to lift it all. And yes, I will have a great deal to learn for the duration of my life as a teacher, but the intention here is truly to benefit the students under my care. And although, mid-stream, it is easy to say that those in authority over me lack perspective or they have failed to see me, I have to remember that thier goals may be different, their perspective is coming from a place other than mine and I must trust that thier motives are pure and right.

It is this strange place between submission and self-realization. It is this moment in which I am being told, "you must be a teacher like this," and it is also a landscape in which I must daily ask myself, "What kind of teacher do I ultimately want to be and what am I willing to submit to in orde to get there?"

Some parts of me wish that perhaps I could go back to the beginning, knowing what I know now, and try things again with more of the end in mind. I wish I had set out first with this question of "how do I want to grow as a teacher" and go back in the environment of support and mentorship that I had earlier in the semester and try it again. But I think this is the thing that time, learning, and perspective provides-- the ability to move forward knowing that the opportunity is still mine. Perhaps this is the beauty of living the life of a teacher-- there are always opportunities to build upon our own learning. There is never an expectation of mastery, but always an expectation of openness to the voids that must be filled in our understanding of what it means to teach.

And so, this afternoon, as the sun streams is across my dusty glasses and I long to get up and leave, I will persevere yet. I will finish this race set before me and work on remembering that the reward of seeing myself as a teacher who lives well will be greater than the momentary rewards of a free weekend of afternoon of less meaningful fulfillment.

I will finish this race and I will continue to run it well.

Child Artists

2009-10-23T12:18:00.002-06:00

Here is a great article written by George Szekely, who was also the keynote speaker at the CAEA Conference this year. He has a great way of honoring the innate power of a child's creativity and his words keep us from the belief that children are lesser contributors to our world.

2009-10-15T20:48:00.001-06:00

MILTON GLASER DRAWS & LECTURES from C. Coy on Vimeo.

Seriously...

2009-10-03T10:26:00.002-06:00

This week has been quite a doosey. After a weekend full of angst over how much work I am expected to do over the weekend, a panic attack over my online class that is quickly getting out of control, and a Sunday composed of a collection of busy work, laundry, and facebook updates displaying an array of curse-words, I entered the week thinking about how to get a ridiculously long lesson plan ready to hand to my university supervisor before she watched me make art look like torture for 24 high school students and then meet me in Fort Colins to sit through a 45 minute talk on student law that I probably could have conducted on my own via the wonders of google before driving the hour and a half back home, during which I realized that Ihad no idea what I wouldbe doing in class on Wednesday. Come Wednesday then, my mentor teacher ventured to ask what I might possibly do to make my teaching the least bit motivating and engaging. After a full planning period of me balling my eyes out in the photo lab, we came to the conclusion that the answer to all of this is simply to stop.

So many people have been telling me that student teaching is essentially a load of bullshit that one must muddle through in order to get to the stage in teaching life that you actually begin to learn how to do it. The terms, "jumping through hoops," "busy work," and "the worst part of life" have begun to ring with sparking clarity these past few weeks for me. i've done my fair share of thinking and reflecting on which end of the meaningful living to wasting time on the "stuff you have to do" spectrum I ought to reside during this period of my life and the truth is that in all integrity, the running far from the wasteful crap area of the scale is what I would prefer. I have a strong aversion to giving into the pressure of waiting to do meaningful things in life until that glorious later. For many years of my young life, I've been dreaming of the day that I'll be a real teacher, dreaming of the day that I get to hang out with kids all day and make art, and now that I am in the place in my life where that dream is so so close to a reality, it is frustrating that the very institution that sets out to give people this dream is the very thing keeping me from the very stuff that makes one consider dreaming such a wonderful thing.

One way or the other, I still have choices to make for my own life, my own actions, my own attitude, and I've found it neccesary to revisit the all-to familiar lessons that have been making up the stuff of my life for a while now.

Being the self-reflective person that I am, I know that when I get to a place of feeling overly-pressured about how I spend my time and energies, I become crippled by the all-too- great sense of seriousness of these actions. The artistic growing up that I went through under the care of the painting department at CSU brought me through the fire of figuring out how seriously I should take myself as a member of said artistic community. By the end of mty time as an art student, I realized that, given my perceptibilty of internalizing too many things, I'd been influenced into living my life based on an assumption that ones' worth in the grand scheme is determined by a ability to find worth in the "almighty they" of the art community. Worth is defined by the percent of ones' soul sold to overworking the self. I somehow got tricked into thinking that the more posturing, the less heartfelt connection and enjoyment to life would result in happiness and success in life as an artist.

And I am realizing that perhaps that thinking has also somehow got muddled up with my approach to teaching. The conversation I found myself engaged in with my mentor teacher between streams of tears brought me to the realization that my students cannot see me as a person who cares for them as people when I am caught up in a system that is asking me to give more value to aligned objectives and assessment methods than the authenticity of a life well lived. And perhaps in my left-brained, performance-based approach to life is allowing me to get carried away with things that are not meant to carry us away. But either way, I am finding myself in a battle of determing how to be true to my own values rather than my perceptions of other people's expectations. And maybe a part of the apprehension is an all-too poignant awareness of the role these people and their expectations play in my ability to get out into the real world and live this life of a teacher totally apart from them. I am afraid that if I begin to live it now, I'll not be allowed to fully embrace the autonomy of "doing it my way" later.

So, this morning, stting at a new favorite haunt, breathing in the wonderful fall air, I wrote down a few good thoughts that I want to live by as I complete this course:

1. Although objectives, assessments, methods, and rubrics are important in thier own right, they are an underlying structure and should be second only to the heart of really what is going on when we come together as people in a classroom.

2. How can I teach my students about living from the heart if I can't find the space to be able to teach from mine?

3. My mentor teacher told me something very good on wednesday. She said, "Heidi, you know all of this stuff-- you know everything about teaching and you know everything about yourself, but you can't seem to figure out how to live it out." Her assertion of this reminded me of the freedom that we do have in simply living out who we really are. As as person who is still a student under the authority of instructors with a role of making all the things I still lack clear to me, it has become easy for me to search for an external "fix" to "doing things right." I rarely find the space to practice just living out what I already am. When I began studying art education four and half years ago, I approached it with the goal of becomming a person full of the things that a teacher has inside of them so that teaching is as simple as being myself. And now, here I am, teaching, but forgetting this idea. Or perhaps not believing that I yet have it in me to do it because I am still being asked to write it out in page after page. I'm still being asked to intellectualize rather than simply do it and do it well.

so, here's to fleshing it out. I've decided this week to stop going through the motions of intellectualizing everything and simply making it my one and only priority to just DO IT. And for the first two days of my student teaching exeprience, I am having a blast!

Rembrandt Autobiography

2009-09-22T17:50:00.001-06:00

I'm working on developing a unit on shading, texture and value, and came across this nice video on Rembrandt.

2009-09-19T11:53:00.002-06:00

Yesterday marked the end of my fifth week at Silver Creek. I am more than half done with my secondary placement and big chunks of my brain are hoping that elementary will be less pressure, more fun. This not to say that high school is not fun and that I am not enjoying it, but I miss the easy acceptance of my elementary kids from BASE Camp. High School management seems to revolve around attitudes, boredom, and legal issues and it is exhausting trying to sort all that out on top of simply learning how to instruct.

Last week I came to a turning point. Perhaps it s simply in part due to my getting the hang of things or starting to teach my own lessons. But I came to this place of realizing how much of my activity centered around all that I had to do. Rather than thinking about what it takes to really get kids hooked, what I need to do to get them interested and learning, I was thinking about how to meet all of the requirements of students teaching. I have been so focused and stressed about filling out paperwork and completing lesson plans with everything worded and measurable that the thought of connecting with my students felt like one more task, one more thing that my overloaded brain needed to work out.

But over the last week, I've been rearranging my priorities. I've decided that if yesterday was the last day that I had to teach, the last day I had to be in contact with these kids, I would want to make sure that they had a meaningful experience with art. The question of whether or not I had every objective lined out clearly was not high on my list of priorities.

Now, I realize that I am still in the place where I am being tested and that I am being asked to submit to the authority charged with the task of awarding me my lisence. And I realize that they are always under the responsibility to submit to the requirements of the state and that these are the tasks that I must complete to move to the next step in my practice as a teacher. But I do not want to waste the time that I have in contact with thess young people still under my care, despite all of the other things that I must do. I am reminded that if I seek the things that are true and right and best, all the rest, the nitty gritty, will come together as well.

As the week came to an end,even though my sleep level was well below acceptable levels most days, I began to notice more and more kids greeting me in the hallways, excited to see me, wanting to share thier lives with me. I am seeing those relationships begin to grow and flourish. As I observe the ways that I interact with the students, I see that my conversations are less connected to my stress level or an assumed sense of responsibility and more connected with a desire to really be personal and genuine. I want them to know me-- and I learning to be more comfortable with that line between teacher and friend becoming less fragile. This not to say that I am throwing that sense of professionalism out the window, but allowing myself to be a person to them rather than working on maintinaing a staunch position as AUTHORITY. And this is the place where I am finding myself as a teacher. And I am beginning to see in myself the qualities that I admire the most in the teachers that have inspired me to teach.

two weeks

2009-08-28T10:47:00.002-06:00

Second friday of the school year. I've officially made it through two weeks of student teaching. I am more tired than I thought I would be. Teaching is often harder than I think it is going to be. There is always too much to say and too little memory. There are always moments that you realize there was something you should have said before all 36 students started talking again. And there is always that point when you realize that you really just need to slow down, be calm, and put more faith in yourself. There are so many opportunities to let your intution take over and go with whatever happens. And there have been numerous class periods that make me hope that someday I will be good, confident, personable, timed, and clear.

2009-08-17T18:11:00.003-06:00

I just took over an hour to make and eat my dinner and now I sit in a clean house, dishes done, contemplating what I want to do now. Eleven and a half hours ago, I got in my car and drove through the country to my first day of school-- my first day as a teacher.

Today was a really good day. After meeting with my mentor teacher last week in the midst of the chaos of moving, I was feeling more overwhelmed than ever. Today, however, after getting a few nights of good sleep, knowing there were plenty of groceries at home, and having most of my belongings settled in, I felt ready to take on this crazy life of teaching. Over the weekend, I discovered the one good thrift store in town and scored a nice assortment of professional attire for my new appointment for a price even a student teacher can afford.

Although I didn't get as many lesson plans written today as I hoped I would, I went through the process of figuring out budgets, calculating numbers of students, and ordering supplies. I got the quick and dirty run down on doctoring photocopies to make handouts from books without written directions, but great illustrations. And I had a lot of great conversations with my mentor teacher about how to plan engaging lessons and what to do with kids who finish too early.

Something I've been thinking a lot about is the issue of time management and balance in my life. Even though many student teachers have told me that this thing takes over your life, that it is the most difficult thing of all, and that student teaching is an all-consuming monster, I've really been looking forward to this time as a chance to determine my own balance of time. My way of life up to this point has been dictated by the expectation that 12-14 hour days most days of the week are normal and appropriate. I feel a little like I might need to go through detox to change this standard in my life. I want to change it because I really find that having time to make a delicious dinner for myself and allowing myself time to enjoy it is so good for my soul. I feel better about my relationships when I have time (and energy) to do dishes and keep things clean. And I consider a restful sleep to be something worth fighting for.

For all of these reasons, I feel lucky to have the model that I do in my mentor teacher. I asked her how late she stays at school after the bell rings at 2:15 and expected her to say 4:30 or 5. "I try not to stay much later than 3:30 or 4," she said, and added, "I try really hard to keep work at school and home and home." Other teachers, she went on to say, allow school to take over their entire lives and end up staying until 5 or 6-- and they really are teachers all of the time. "This is a job," she advised me, "that can easily consume your entire life."

So here I am, at 6:29, enjoying freedom from guilt about what I need to be doing for school. I have time to think about what I might choose to do with myself now that I have a few personal moments. Part of me feels like I may be forgetting something, but another part of me tells me that this very act of forgetting is just what my soul needs.

This morning at our staff meeting, the principle reminded us all of a very important thought:

"You cannot take any better care of others than you do yourself."

So here is to a great semester ahead full of learning and adventure!

Gordon Hopkins

2009-08-15T09:12:00.002-06:00

I love the simplicity of Gordon Hopkin's work. I often find that I simply get too carried away with my own paintings and envy artists who are able to leave well enough alone with a minimum of colors and shapes in one painting. Maybe I'll work on that. Perhaps this sort of discipline will be seen in my "later works." In the meantime, enjoy some of these and take a look at the artist's website for more beauties.

Julene Harrison

2009-08-14T07:47:00.002-06:00

I was admiring and getting inspired by Julene Harrison's paper art, but then couldn't help but laugh out loud when I saw this one.

prepared?

2009-07-26T21:55:00.002-06:00

As I get knee deep and face to face with the reality that in just a few weeks I'll be student teaching, I am coming to the realization that learning to teach is something that an infinite number of years in school will never fully accomplish. As I scramble to figure out what the heck I am going to do, I rack my brain, searching for the meaningful things I gleaned from the numerous hours spent in class that will come to my rescue now. And for some reason, the only thing I can come up with is "motivation."

I have been reading some great books, "From Ordinary to Extraordinary," by Ken Vieth, "The New Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain," by Betty Edwards, and "How to Be an Explorer of the World" by Keri Smith as well as this fabulous article my mentor teacher directed me towards. As I read through these ideas about how to get kids creative and how to present problems in the art classroom, I realize that these sort of philosophies and modes of teaching are wonderful and meaninful and great for our kids-- and they are things that I as a teacher can only come to master through experience. As I've been emersing my nerdy little mind in these books, I've wondered how much of these models were covered in my few semesters within the School of Education and the Art Department. Why didn't they give us more training in setting up a lesson this way? I think to myself. I don't know. Maybe they did and I didn't hear because my sensory functions were still recovering from the late night before in the painting studio. Maybe I just need a few more years of "doing" before I really understand.

Regardless of the ability of a classroom to teach me everything I need to know abou the nitty gritty of teaching, I've come to many a good thought. One struggle I've been facing in writing my units and lesson plans for the coming semester has been in the area of organization-- how do I put all of these ideas swirling around down on paper in such a way that my advisors, the state, and administration will understand what is going on in my classroom and in such a way that I know what I am supposed to be doing with all of these young faces looking attentively in my direction.

So, based on the advice of my mentor teacher, these great texts, and what I already know about lesson planning, I came up with this little sequence to help me frame my lessons in a way more conducive to introducing art as a "problem to be solved."

Class:
Lesson:

Problem to be addressed:

Resources Available:
-- Instructional Support

-- Materials

Learning Goals:

--Skills

--Concepts

Assessment:

Sequence/Procedures:

An aspect of Vieth's book that I'm really enjoying is the presentation of art process as problem solving, such as "Given two weeks, how can you transform an ordinary door knob into a work of art?" I think an approach that focuses more on an innovative aim is a great way of getting kids away from seeing art class as a place for people born with the talent of realistic rendering to a place where everyone gets to uncover thier own creative ideas. Art is no longer about creating a marketable product, but engaging in a creative process. Which is really what it is about, isn't it?

I learned the value/concept of pursuing a visual problem a few semesters back through the completion of the final for my figure painting class. The whole time, I struggled through the class, bored and uninterested in painting the figure. Throughout the semester, our instructor was showing us examples of artwork, saying, "look how this artist focuses on pattern, how this artist makes the figures look bony or weighty or ghostly." I didn't get it until the end-- I realized my painting was never going to be a success until I solidified my aim. What was I working towards? The obvious answer was "self-portrait"-- that was the assingment. But as an artist, I realized I have to dig deeper than that. What vocabulary was I hoping to expand? What was the problem I wanted to solve?

I think this idea of "visual problem solving" rarely makes its way into the k-12 classroom. Art is about going in and finishing projects that look pretty. But I think we need to trust our students with more advanced thinking-- and ultimately this is the type of thinking that is going to get them hooked on a level below the surface. Art is not about external experiences as much as it is about the struggle through the process of solving a problem. Making a goal and working night and day, sketch after sketch until our fingers bleed. This is what good artists want-- to move forward, they enjoy the struggle of finding it out. And we need to be training a generation of students who understand the joy found in this process.

2009-07-25T09:13:00.002-06:00

In five days, I'll be loading everything I've decided to keep from the garage sale pile and stacking it up in the basement of my new house. Three more mornings of 4th grade complaints and Theater club, three more afternoons of the aggressively researching third graders. Ten days of travel and reunions with old friends. seven days to unpack it all, finish lesson plans, and then eight weeks of high school. eight weeks of elementary school and then to the open unknown.

I've wondered a lot this summer about whether or not I can compare the challenges of B.A.S.E. Camp to those of teaching full time. I've wondered if much of the stress of this summer has come from the disorganization of staffing, scheduling, planning, and administration. I've wondered if the difficulty of the kids has come from the season, the heat, the activities, the culture of camp, or the population of kids in constant need of all-day care, love, and attention while their parents are at work earning minimum wage. And I've wondered if it is me.

One of the greatest frustrations this summer has been the process of sorting out how strict to be. How tight do I need my limits to be and where do I allow those limits to flex? How do I be firm without being rigid or tyrannical? Where is the line between creating a fun, relaxed atmosphere and allowing children to overstep their boundaries? What happens if students never get to the point where I can trust them with the freedom to take part in certain experiences that I think would be great for them? How much do I need to expand my trust in my students? Where is the line between being in control and being controlling? Am I being too involved in solving problems that students would learn from solving on their own? Is there a place where a student is simply beyond my reach? When is a consequence less effective than simply ignoring a behavior? When are boundaries too controlling and when do they truly create a structure in which a child is brought up in a positive way?

This set of questions seems to plague me daily as I wonder if I will be able to answer them in such a way that allows me to be a great teacher. One of my passions and subsequent fears in teaching is the dangerous potential we have as educators to provide either positive or negative experiences for children in the process of discipline and structure.

One of the first lessons I realized I need to learn this summer was surrounding the issue of consistency and action. I used to think I was pretty firm until I met this group of kids who are constantly challenging me. One of the first things I realized is that I was much too nice. Not being sure about what my expectations are and what is okay and what is not okay makes it hard to stand my ground when kids decide to argue and reason. Although it is still surely a process, I am learning that simply maintaining consistency and following through on my word is so important, even when I haven't quite figured out how important the particular issue is in the grand scheme. For me, teaching kids to trust my words is always at the heart of the issue because it is only in this trust that I am able to provide good things for them in the end. Now that we find ourselves at the end of the summer, I see some students have begun to trust my word and I've been able to spend more time on a personal level with them rather than immersed in argument. Others, however, are still a daily battle and I realize that it may take more time than we have together for them to get to the place where they learn that those in authority are placed there to help them move forward in life rather than simply keeping them from having fun. And all I can do is hope and trust that I have made some small progress that will be continued by their next teacher, mentor, and parents.

Something I often notice when working with the kids at B.A.S.E. Camp is how much power I have. Mostly, I observe this when playing a sport or board game-- how easy it would be for me to overpower my eight-year-old opponent. I find myself teetering on the all-important temperament of how intensely I play, how hard I throw, how much I need to win in such a way that challenges each child without taking advantage of their delicate stage of development. It always amazes me when I sit down and think about how obviously small their experience is and how much I have to come down from my level of age, development, and education to get on thier level.

The other day, I was talking to one of our kids about our Classroom Lead, the person who makes all major decisions for our class group and takes care of most administrative aspects of our particular group of kids. Usually, the class leads wear polo shirts rather than the plain blue t-shirts the rest of the staff wear daily. On this day, however, our lead was only wearing a T-shirt and the child on the swing next to mine observed this, wondering "Does he usually wear that shirt?" I told her no, explaining the wardrobe requirements of a Classroom Lead and explaining what that title meant. "So that means that he get's to do whatever he wants, right?" my dear little friend asked.

I was struck by her question as it reveals a lot about how many children, and people in general, view authority. Power generally means that one is able to use said power in any way they see fit, which one might typically expect to be in a selfish manner. When I was in high school, my mom lent me a book by Max Depree on Leadership, in which I came across the following quote:

"To be leader means having the unique opportunity to serve those that allow the leader to lead."

An elementary view of power and authority views leadership as an ultimate freedom, access to opportunity, and rights to treat others and things as they please. This idea is, in a basic way, accurate, but it misses an essential characteristic of such a role. The ultimate role of a leader requires one to use this ultimate freedom, access to opportunity, and rights to treatment in such a way that serves the good of the whole of the group. Unlike my young friend's assumption that our Class Lead can do anything he wants in a self-serving way, the truth is that much of his job requires a self-sacrifice for the 25-30 children and staff under his care. To be in power in a classroom or otherwise requires the insight into the needs of every person placed under his or her care and the skills to act upon it in such a way that no person is harmed.

That being said, I've had to consider much of my choices in terms of rules, expectations, and consequences in light of the group as a whole. I often find myself asking students to stop doing things that are not inherently wrong, but because if the whole group were to enter into the action, it would be impossible to accomplish the good we as staff have in mind for them. Teaching and management require me daily to think in a more communal, less individualistic way, opening my eyes to the needs and good of many people, including my fellow staff members and the other children under their care.

This summer has certainly been a thought provoking, challenging experience. Working with these kids has provided an ample supply of questions to fuel years of research ahead. It has often been difficult not to be too hard on myself this summer as I come home after a rough morning and wonder what went so terribly wrong. I am excited, however, to take what I've learned this summer and apply it to the next step of my journey as I step, once again, into a wholly different dynamic at a new school, with new kids, in a totally new situation.

a hot summer ends with winds of change

2009-07-19T20:44:00.002-06:00

"How is your summer going?" I've been getting this question a lot lately and the best thing I can think of to say is "fast." It seems like for all the days I counted down towards the end of the season a year ago, I am making up for it now by wondering how I will get everything done before this one turns into fall. Ten days from now, I'll be finishing my last day with B.A.S.E Camp. Eleven days from now, I'll be moving my stuff into my new apartment in Boulder. In twelve days, I'll be leaving with my friend to Kentucky. A few days after that, I'll be catching a flight to Boise for a wedding. In twenty one days, I'll be arriving back in Fort Collins, where my car will be waiting for me to drive down to Boulder and unpack my boxes. In one month minus two days, I'll be walking into Silver Creek High School, dressed professionally, and begin student teaching.

But before any of this, though, so much of summer has happened. Between learning all kinds of lessons about relating to kids and classroom management, I've been preparing my psyche for student teaching and I've been thinking about the personal goals involved in the complete change in lifestyle that lies ahead for me. I've been thinking about student teaching in light of the habits that I want to develop in terms of personal balance when I enter a life of full time teaching.

Throughout my coursework, in both my studio practice and teacher education, the issue of balancing your life as an artist and a teacher has been constantly on the table. And throughout said coursework, I was thinking to myself, "I don't really care about maintaining a personal artistic practice-- I want to teach more than I want to take the risk of putting myself out there as an artist." I think, truly, I'd been telling myself that I'll never be a "real" artist anyway, but a "real" teacher, now that I could forsee.

But something funny has happened to me-- in the last six months or so, my whole view of myself as an artist has totally changed. I feel as though I've been swept up by a current that I cannot control and yet it is carrying me to wonderful places. A lot of people say that even in the summer, they don't get the artowork done that they want to do. And yet, somehow, in then midst of my crazy schedule and all I've set out to do this summer, I've completed almost six paintings. I've almost done as much this summer as I did during the Spring Semester for my four credit class. There has been a shift in me that can't help but paint. Without any pursuit on my own, I've ended up showing my work for the entirety of June and July and have been so encouraged by those who see it. I've sold two paintings and have a few more interested offers.

As for my work with kids this summer, I feel like I've learned a lot, but many days I hope that teaching doesn't require this constant dilligence to provide consequences. Some days, I feel like the full extent of my day is expended on warnings and consequences that there is no room left for fun or relationships. It is hard.

What to do with one big group of arguers...

2009-06-27T10:00:00.002-06:00

The last month or so has been quite the ride. Finished my last education class, painted my last graded painting, lost my job, got half the job back, ended up working a few full-time weeks with a bunch of exuberant and testing kids. Learned a lot about myself. Got a nasty illness. Ordered a book called "Setting Limits in the Classroom," and started following through and giving out a lot more consequences and started having a lot more fun.

Even though I am looking down the barrel of July and a move to Boulder in four or five weeks, it feels like summer has just started. The time feels long, but the distance feels short. Although I've worked a lot with kids over the last year or two, this has been one of my first real experience with managing an entire classroom of kids for an entire day. I've been challenged-- to say the least-- in more than a few ways.

Being in a class with a majority of boys, a majority of which are continually testing the limits, has taught me a lot about myself, my managment style and the importance of consistency and follow through. I feel like most of my headspace is occupied by questions about how to get these kids to simply do what I say. Figuring out how to keep a simple "pick up the trash around you" or "stop whapping your neighbor with that towel" from turning into an epic battle. Luckily, I have the privalege of being on a team of people all working towards the goal, but teaching children to follow my directions is still an individual project always at work.

Working with these kids this summer has been a big reminder of how broken people are and how much it takes to gain the trust of many children who have already spent the 8 or 9 years of thier short lives in environments that teach them that the words of others are not neccessarily safe. It has challenged me to remain continually cognizant of each word I say, how I say it, and the actions that follow my words.

These last few weeks, each day has been a reminder about how much I love working with kids. The thing I love about teaching is that there is such a strong connection to the creative process in it. you must be innovative in the way that you use your words, actions, and classtime to form these young people into the beauties they were made to be. You are part of creating so many lives-- and yet that seems so beyond your own honor. Who picked me for this co-creation, anyway?

So, I am learning how to refine my words, my actions, my expectations. The way that I love each of these kids changes as I learn more about what they really need and how I can provide that. Even this week as I've really tightened up my management in terms of word and action, rather than feeling like a tyrant, I've felt more free to really focus on building relationships and having fun with these kids. And I've even recieved a few compliments about how great of a teacher I am.

Who Does She Think She Is?

2009-05-31T18:01:00.002-06:00

I came across the website for this film that looks like a great way of getting the story out there of many women artists. Take a look at some of the videos of the artists featured-- I love hearing artists talk about what they make art about and how they got there because it always helps me figure out where my own art is going and how to talk about it.

www.whodoesshethinksheis.net.

2009-05-31T18:01:00.001-06:00

A few new creative things

2009-05-22T15:44:00.000-06:00

Now that school is out and a have five minutes of freedom before summer camp starts, I am filling the day with as many creative things as possible. I've set up my studio in the garage and have begun the greiving process involved in leaving this wonderful house. I am working on selling a painting from the show a few weeks ago and hope to get a couple more done before the end of next week to start posting on etsy.

but TODAY-- oh today! After looking at the sparse selection of new machines available in this area for as close to $300 as possible, I found a nice little Kenmore sewing machine in craigslist for a whopping $35! According to a local servicer with now monetary involvement in my decision, Kenmore's are made almost exactly the same as a Janome and other basic sewing machines. And so, although it is no bernina, I am happy to have a small collection of metal peices that will happily aid me in all the sewing endeavors I've been dying to undertake for God-only-knows how long.

Also in honor of my school-work-lesss freedom, I discovered a fabulous new thrift store bursting with vintage delcious wonder. Leaving the school cafeteria this morning after work, the bins of silverware inspired me to create this whimsical little windchimes. After a little conflct with a bottle of gorilla glue , I reign victorious and am enjoying the chimes of spoons and other kitchen acrutaments as I write. One will go with my co-worker to camp on Calalina Island and one will stay right outside my door. hhhmmm. I love love love summer!

2009-04-24T18:06:00.002-06:00

Hey Mom and Dad--

This might be another idea for that *small* graduation gift.

I think I am turning into a small child a bit more each day...

2009-04-19T15:37:00.000-06:00

Look what I found instead of studying...

Difference is An Artist's Game

2009-04-18T15:53:00.002-06:00

Here is another wonderful video. This was made by an 8th grader for an English project entitled "This I Beleive..." and is a great example of what students can do when challenged with wonderful opportunities to be creative.

Difference is an Artist's Game - Funny blooper videos are here

What defines art?

2009-04-17T21:13:00.001-06:00

Man! I am a blogging fiend today! Anyhow, I just came across this video while doing research for my sculpture class and had to share it here. This would be a great video to include in a lesson discussing presentation or conceptual art. check it out. you will laugh, I promise.

Subway Art Gallery Opening - For more amazing video clips, click here

Human Development and Teaching Abstact Thinking

2009-04-17T10:05:00.002-06:00

As I work through the experiences provided by the CSU School of Education and the Professional Development School while simultaneously completing the university coursework for my content and bachelor's degree in Fine Arts, I seem to be increasingly challenged by the level of abstract thinking and complex understanding I can expect from my school-age students. I am sitting here this morning captivated by the research I'm doing for my paper in a class on Art of Mexico in the Age of Conquest, a 400 level group study in Art History and simultaneously reveling in the fact that I've learned that I can do just about anything simply by being able to read at a high level of comprehension (welcome to my nerdy brain.) While reading about the genius of Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala and his ability to play the game of his Spanish captors in Peru while actually outsmarting them, my teacher self is going through the dialogue of how to get students to the point of being able to (and wanting to) perform the same analysis I am doing while reading a book entitled "Art and Architecture in Viceregal Latin America, 1521-1821" because I can't help but marvel at my own power. It is a funny thing to get to the end of four years in college and realize all the skills that you've gained. And it is sometimes a scary thing to realize that you have chosen to embark on a lifetime of inviting other people into the same endeavor without knowing exactly what steps have brought you to the point of intelligence you have now reached.

And yet that is what I've chosen. And it is the thing that I am most excited about doing, this career of teaching people how to use a bundle of nerves that are beyond visual understanding because it is housed sometime inside the head.

As I've worked with third and fourth graders at the Lab School for Creative learning, struggled with Drawing I students at LHS, and daily battle with the behavioral frustrations of children who spend a great deal too many hours at school every day, I am learning at increasing intervals that there are certain capacities of children at various ages and as a teacher it is my job to figure out what layer of the essential foundations of learning need to be laid for each child who enters my classroom or charge. Parts of me want to present to them all the thinking processes that my 22-year-old brain has gone through in deciphering complex information about the Spanish Conquest from hundreds of pages of tiny symbols, but then I remember recieving a photocopy of my own 8th grade English teacher's scrawled notes from pages of literature and having absolutely no experience with which to apply interest to such an example. I wasn't ready for the complexity of that thinking yet.

And so I find as I get deeper into the field of education, the more I want to know about human development and how the brain learns. I feel myself entering the "trendy zone" with this statement as brain research is all the rage in Educational circles these days, but I think such research is becoming more prevalent for good reason. Being the education nerd that I am, I want kids to understand their own brain capacity and educational potential in a blink, but the personal side of my spirit wants to remember that kids are still kids and brain development takes a lifetime.

So-- what is the point of this diatribe? I need to remember as an educator that learning takes time and we are still restricted to the development of the brain over time, regardless of the vastly growing pool of information that is brought so close to home through the wonder of technology. I have a growing passion for literacy and the thinking strategies that accompany it, but I want to increase my understanding of the art that is developing this skill in effective ways appropriate to the development of each student. I want to grow in patience and understanding in my role of adding one building block at a time and trusting that with the right foundations, students will continue to grow.

In the meantime, I think I'm going to make it my goal this summer to do some more research on human development and studies of the brain. who knows where that may lead, hm?

"Making Marks" May 1, FCMOCA

2009-04-17T08:28:00.000-06:00

Come enjoy the class show for my Senior Painting capstone. It has been a long school year of carving out what sort of painting I am going to be, but I'm feeling quite proud of the worlk I've done this semester.

Details:

May 1, 6-9 p.m.
Fort Collins Museum of Contemporary Art, third floor

Design by the Book

2009-04-17T08:05:00.003-06:00

I was really excited about this project from Design*Sponge. This semester through my own art study as well as my work with the Drawing I students at LHS, I've gotten really excited about using technology and different media to expose students to all different examples of what art can be and how it can be used. I think exposing students to historical examples of art is really important, but something that really gets me inspired is the the huge world of possibilities for creativity presented by artists who are working today in spaces ranging from their basement while their two-year-old naps to fancy studios in New York. The tie that seems to bind this world of creative artists together is the simple capability of posting videos and images to the internet for me to consume straight from my igoogle homepage. All I have to do is open my browser and suddenly I am transported from the pressing need to do research on Mexico in the Age of Conquest, resources for which take a great deal of searching to find, to hours and hours of exploration of what an artist just created 30 minutes ago. Anyway, to return from my bunny-trail, examples like "Design by the Book," open up all sorts of ideas about how students can be invited to enter the art world through community engagement like this one. I'd love to try and incorporate at least one community-oriented art project or assignement to my classes each semester. I could be as simple as partnering with the local library to create the same sort of collaborative project as a class and this would easily lead to an combined project with a videography or graphics class.

An issue I am really passionate about is getting students who may not think they have any artistic place in the world to see what art can be for them. A great class to offer for students who might not be interested in the arts as a career but would still be open to developing artistic attitudes, as we say in the art ed world, would be a class that focuses on community engagement and the arts. The class would focus more on broad artistic possibilities, aesthetics, and multi-media creative expression.

Anyway, enjoy this video. I hope it inspires you as much as it did me to see what sorts of things these artists create. If you are interested in the series, there are a number of episodes already posted on youtube!

Lisa Hannigan

2009-04-17T07:57:00.003-06:00

This is a great video that combines music and fine arts. This would be a great video to share with a class to talk about negative space or mixed media. Maybe even a discussion about the link between content and delivery. And--- this is one of my favorite songs and just a really cool video. Enjoy!

I Don't Know from ATO Records on Vimeo.

Henrique Oliveira

2009-04-08T15:11:00.002-06:00

Another facinating artist is Henrique Oliveira. This mornining in my sculpture class, we watched the Art 21 video on Janine Antoni, who also does a number of interesting things with her body and personal identity and our role in society, life, and the world. I was mostly facinated, however, by her work entitled "Moore," which is a very long, handmade rope made from materials reclaimed from the lives of her friends and family, including a red dress belonging to her father's mother, electrical cords, and flowered leis. Oliveria's work is so interesting to me because of the source of his material-- he takes wood from the streets of his home, all discarded and old, and creates these beautiful works that the viewer experiences in totally new ways. Over the last year or so, I've grown increasingly interested in the craft of quilting in its connection between the finished artwork, this sort of isolated thing of beauty, and the layers of tradition and meaning behind the use of the fabrics both before and after the quilt is made. Quilts are literally bound to the very fabric of life for those who make and use them. I think anyone who has ever made, owned, or used a quilt knows this strange personal power found in these blankets.

Anyway, I am developing an ever-greater facilnation with artworks derived from materials collected from that which has been used up. There is something beautiful and deep and unspeakable, I think, in these materials that have been whittled and worn by the continual steps of everyday life.

On a slightly unrelated note, I've been doing some soul searching in terms of where I want to go with my own art. I ran into an art friend from school a week or two ago and we were talking about the Undergrad show on campus-- which I did not enter this year. I decided not to give the show too much thought because I felt, given my history of rejection from on-campus juried shows, the likelihood of me getting in was not large enoughto make it worth the effort of putting anything in. My friend's response to this attitude fell somewhere along the lines of calling me super lame, and got me to thinking more about why this is actually my attitude. So I set out to think it through a bit more.

I won't go into al lthe details of my thought process now because I don't have enought time to write all that, but after a conversation with an artist I met earlier this week, I've been thinking more about being the sort of artist that is an artist for reasons other than money. The conversation earlier this week made me realize that not al artist show thier work nor should there be a great deal of stressput into it. If I'm more interested in art as a means towards the end of creative thinking and personal expression, it doesn't have to be as cut and dry as I try to make it.

Furthermore, I'm excited to see my work going in an interesting and captivating direction. I'm really happy about a lot of the work that I've done this semester. I am feeling like a great deal of my work has become a lot more personal while also incorporating the technical skills I've been working so hard to aquire. I've set some goals for myself concerning letting other people see my work more as well as thinking more about what kind of artist I want to be.

It's All White

2009-03-26T18:39:00.000-06:00

There is nothing like a snow day the week after Spring Break. It is nearing the end of quite a full week and after a tedious drive to and from Loveland this morning, I've enjoyed a relaxing afternoon trying my hand at cinnamon rolls from scratch, making a lot of dirty dishes, as well as spending some time working on my altered book. I was hoping to get in some extra hours of painting today as our Senior Show at FCMOCA is quickly approaching and we're all feeling a little behind.

As of this morning, my student teaching placements are set for Silver Creek High School in Longmont and Mary Blair Elementary School in Loveland. Although i'm a bit aprehensive about the commute between the schools and the decisions that come with where my life might be moving next. But I am also excited about what is on the horizon.

It has been a great experience working with the drawing I students at LHS and on Monday, I gave a bit of a lecture on all the types of perspective and how to begin a one-point persepective drawing from observation. We are guiding the students through making their own "Zines" outlining the steps, which I hope they will be able to refer to as they begin their drawings. It has been very exciting and challenging to work with the classroom teacher in solving various problems and trying new things with the students and curriculum. Although it sometimes feel like starting and stopping given the craziness of meshing my college schedule with the schedule of the high school, I feel like I'm being challenged to really figure out the logistics of getting my ideas fleshed out in actual lessons and activities. I am finding that my idealistic thoughts on teaching take on a whole new life when applied to 20-30 students. I hope too that once I get in a place where I can build more consistent relationships with the students I am working with, it will be easier for me to plan lessons that really connect to them.
I am really excited about the continuuation of this lesson. If the weather clears tomorrow and I am able to make it down to Loveland for the fourth day this week, I'll be leading the students through an activity exploring Urban Sketchers to give them some ideas for thier sketchbook assignment. I've been thinking a lot this week about finding more creative ways of presenting information that gets students really involved in their learning rather than having them just sit and listen to me talk. I thought the Zine would be more interactive, but the students were not as engaged as I hoped they would be. I'm hoping a Jigsaw type activity with the urban sketchers will get them more involved, but we'll see.

Anyway, on this snowy day, I was also able to get some painting in, although I'm feeling a little ADD. I'm finding too in my own artwork, that I need to be careful about overworking things. I think sometimes I just nee to stop on things. I've also been really inspired by the artist I posted about yesterday. Just taking a few minutes' look at her work has given me quite a few ideas about the types of things I want to explore in my own work.

2009-03-25T13:58:00.000-06:00

Is Spring Break really over?

2009-03-25T13:53:00.000-06:00

Since they are predicting a foot of snow tomorrow and I'm suddenly burried in work, I thought it would be nice to remember Spring Break and post the photos I promised from our trip down south. I picked out a couple that I thought might be my favorite today. Enjoy!

Jane Filer

2009-03-25T13:38:00.002-06:00

My newest favorite artist discovery is Jane Filer. As soon as I saw one of her paintings on the "Artist of the Day" Wiget on my iGoogle, I knew I needed to get better aquainted with this woman's work. Her whimsical landscapes and scenes of houses and pets and memories are a great deal simliar to what I am about in my own paintings. I hope to adopt some of her imagination. Take a look at these beauties and I would encourage you to visit her website and take a little look. I have a feeling it might greatly improve your day.

Has Spring Sprung?

2009-03-19T14:03:00.002-06:00

It is spring break and surprisingly divergent from most spring breaks, it is actually incredibly and mind-bogglingly warm! This morning around 1 found Angelia rolling in to the spot in front of our house after an IncRedIBle few days exploring the near entirety of Southwestern Colorado. We found this adorable little place in Ouray, where we stayed in the Imogene Cabin, which was complete with tiny bathroom, kitchenette, screened porch, and loft with some matching tiny windows. It was so refreshing to wake up to the rush of a little creek right outside our windows. After an amazing drive through Gunnison and the like, we hung out at the Ouray Hot Springs before crashing into bed.

Tuesday morning brought the realization that the stove in our kitchenette lacked the ability to light and therefore no boiled eggs to fuel our day, but that did little to quell our excitement as we embarked on another (smaller) journey down south to take in the splendor of Mesa Verde National Park (nearly loosing our breath at the fabulous San Juans and mesas we drove through along the way). Although I've seen a thousand pictures of this incredible ancient city, I am proud to have a vast collection of my own images-- we even got to climb down into an underground kiva and it was a wonderous experience to put our hands in the same places that Anasazi put their hands to pat down mortor and decorative plaster. Whenever I visit a new area of creation, I can't help but wonder how these people survived the land before we tamed it with our asphalt and speed limit signs. I wonder what it must have been like to be the first one to ever see it, the first ones to learn the footsteps of the land and make it thier own through the toil and sweat poured into the sheer effort it takes just to walk through it.

After exlporing the ruins, we headed east to Durango, where a friend has recently moved. We ate some gigantic slices of Pizza, dodged St. Patrick's drunked revelers (although I was tempted to take one girl up on the face painting, but resisted when I realized paying a drunk person $5 to draw on my face might be less fun that it sounds) and bought a thouristy T-shirt because I think it is important to have at least one article of clothing proving that you have visited some areas of your own state. As nightfall set in, we ventured north on the Million Dollor Highway, which I think must be called this as a result of a recent shooting of Fear Factor on the trecherous highway characterized by sheer cliffs outlined by the white line on the road and a complete lack of guardrails. Lets just say I was actually happy that it was too dark to see how far we might fall to our eminent deaths. We did however, find a few minutes to get out of the car and marvel at the abundance of stars erased by our addiction to light here in the city. We made it back to the cabin all in one peice and quite proud of our bravery.

Wednesday, as Angelina slept off the terror of the night before, I got up and took a short walk down the river and then returned to create the most beautiful stack of waffles that have ever come from my hands (photos coming soon). We spent some time exploring the quaintness of Ouray and also developed a bit of a treasure-hunt, searching for the shops that were actually open after runnning into more than one shop-window bearing signs scrawled with "out to Lunch" or "back in May." Amoung the shops that were open, however, was perhaps my new favorite bok sotre in the state of Colorado, which houses a vast array of books on the history of Colorado, the west, and women in the west, as well as an eclectic collection of anitque glass objects, shards of indian-painted pottery, and other rusty objects seemingly dug from the mountainside out the back door.

The day's outside-the-car adventures concluded with a ride on the Gondola at Telluride, where we scored some cool drinks (Carmel Frappe-- me, Mango/Rasp Smoothie-- Anglina) from "The Coffee Cowboy," a little drink bar housed in a horse trailer parked beside a collection of picnic tables covered in colorfully-printed vinyl. We then headed back up towards I-70 for a long and arduous ride home, which was complete with a pow-wow with a prisoner transport at the Conoco in Georgetown sometime around 11 p.m.

The last couple of days were a nice opportunity to get away from the phone and computer and regularly-paved streets. It has been a long time since I've really had the chance (and the money) to get away to a new place. When I started college, I remember hearing someone talk about how travleing just opens you up to all sorts of new ways of thinking. At that moment, I decided to make it my goal to experience as many new places as possible while in college, including deciding to move 800 miles away for a few months. But since getting back from Idaho, I haven't had the money or time to get real far away until now and it felt so good.

The thing I've been thikning alot about the last couple days is the importance of risk-taking. Putting your toe out there, into the cold water. For me, just staying up past 11 is risky. Being outside after 11 is even more outof the ordinary for me. So it was good for me this week to get out into a new place for me. I did a lot of visual research for my next bout of paintings, which was nice, but now I'm going to have to figure out how to sort it all out in my head to decide where to start.

If you'd like to buy me a present...

2009-03-10T10:27:00.002-06:00

from Imogene

Her Morning Elegance / Oren Lavie

2009-03-09T21:52:00.001-06:00

And this is also awsome.

feelin' good

2009-03-09T21:31:00.002-06:00

I am feeling especially good tonight-- maybe due to the relief of a finished Exam in my Art of Mexico in the Age of Conquest. I was thinking as I was writing my essay that for me, writing, especially writing about art is like making a painting. I love the creative act, even if it is an exam. I'm weird, this I know.

Anyway, I've been fantastically inspired by a recent stream of new bloggers and artists websites. I feel like each day I find way too many wonderful creative things to look at and each day I feel more alive to the possibility of being just as creative on the outside as these people are. So, here's a little video from a recent new blog, Swallowfield, which I found quite wonderful indeed.

Feeling Good, Nina Simone
by mrfnk

2009-03-07T18:12:00.004-07:00

I realize that I've abandoned this blog a bit, but as I've been reading more blogs about creative inspiration and such, I think I am going to revisit this space and work on posting more on my creative endeavors and processes as well as reflecting more on my teaching experiences, especially as I get closer to student teaching and then on to other things.

This semester I've been working at Loveland High School with Brain Causer in his Drawing I classes. Now that we're midstream as far as the semester is concerned, I'm really enjoying working with a teacher who is constantly asking questions about how he can improve his classes. Each day I visit his class, I look forward to the interesting question he poses about how to solve different problems or the challenges he shares with us concerning developing an art program.

As for my art, this semester finds me much more inspired. I've been working more with landscapes and am exploring the relationship of memories and emotional understanding of these spaces. I have also begun working on an Altered book, which also deals with the idea of environment, space, and the interplay of self and these elements. I am also excited about exploring all kinds of color relationships and approaches to the emotional knowledge we store up about the places that fill the every day parts of our lives.

A couple of goals: As I hope to develop this blog a bit further, I want to be more diligent about writing about my art and posting photos and ideas. I've been really inspired by a number of blogs I've been reading and want to develop my skills in creating the same sort of inspirational space here. As I have also received a fabulous toy for my 22nd birthday, I hope to post a "Photo of the Day," as I pick out the little visual joys in my life.

To start things off, I posted a little pic above I took about a week ago that epitomizes the joy in the midst of everyday-ness. Maybe this blog will become more of a photo journal... we'll see

Opening doors of discovery

2008-07-23T20:20:00.002-06:00

Of all the things I hope to do as a teacher, one of the most gigantic convictions I hold is the need for educators to open students to the outside world. Too often, the walls of school become places of control and formula that leave students separated from all there is to be discovered in the big world outside. There are a myriad of resources available to teachers and students that get us all outside the classroom, but unfortunately, it seems most teachers/administration lack the creativity or bravery to take advantage for fear of insurance risks, or the complications of field trip politics, or the limitations of funding. However, I really think that with a little creativity and determination, there are a lot of meaningful experiences we can provide for our students that will affect them in significant ways for much longer than traditional classroom instruction.

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to do just this for the student I am tutoring this summer. Luckily, the student's mother is more than willing to provide every opportunity for her son to succeed and was willing to drop him off at an ice cream shop across from the university. We then walked down the street, observing signs and advertisements, discussing what real estate is and how to figure out where we are on a map based on street signs. Because I am still a student, I have many connections and knowledge of all the resources there are on campus and was able to set up a tour of the advocacy office for Latino students, El Centro. As the student I am working with has a very strong Hispanic background, this was an excellent way to engage him and will hopefully motivate him to do well in school. As we've been planning our trip to campus, he has often mentioned a tutoring program he took part in at the University a few years ago-- obviously, this was an experience that he enjoyed and remembers well.

Think about your own experiences in school. Which ones do you remember the most? Are there specific trips or opportunities provided while you were in school that opened an area of passion in you that you never knew you had? I remember in high school taking a trip to the university in the town I grew up in to see a Batik exhibit before starting a similar project in my own class. I still remember the beauty of the dyed-fabric images of Italian cities, being awed at the complexity of a medium based in fabric dying. Being exposed to the work of such an artist at such an age definitely gave me an inspiring glimpse into what I could be as an artist.

A significant component of being able to expose your students to the accomplishments of others and the resources available to them, teachers need to be utilizing and aware of them themselves. It is shocking to me to find out how many students there are even on campus that know little about the town in which we live. As teachers, we need to be living lives that put us in a position of learning so that we have ample life experience to offer our students. If we rely upon the curriculum and resources that only come from inside the school, we are robbing our students of the knowledge they need to lead meaningful lives. Additionally, we are modeling a way of life for our students that avoids true and meaningful learning.

What are some of the resources that you have found to expose your students to the real world? What are some of the reasons that teachers neglect this?

Literacy Resource 4: Oragami and Paper Airplanes

2008-07-11T00:26:00.003-06:00

A great resource I have discovered for working with creative students reluctant to apply themselves to reading is activities such as origami and paper airplanes. I found a simple book in the Juvenile non-fiction section of the library giving directions on many different types of paper airplanes. In attempt to draw out some more visual and artistic interests in the particular student I am working with, I also brought along a selection of markers to decorate our creations which. There is something about the opportunity to add decoration to something that makes people feel more at ease-- a lesson I learned through the many class presentations in my art education methods class. The nice thing about books on paper airplanes is that the directions are not as complex as traditional origami books, which makes the process a bit less intimidating.

Literacy Resource 3: Logic games

2008-07-05T11:22:00.002-06:00

After the discovery of how successful Mad Libs are at engaging students as well as the realization of all the learning opportunities involved in this fun puzzles, I took a trip to Barnes and Noble in search of more games like these and found a wealth of mind-stretching activities that are fun ways of building literacy. Here are a few books and activities that I found especially valuable:

"The Everything Pencil Puzzles"
"Martin Gardner Perplexing Puzzles"
"Gladstone's Games to Go"
"The Everything Word Games"
"DistrAction"
"USA Today Logic Games"

Some of the activities included in these books and others are as follows:

Logic games
Picture Puzzles
Story prompts/ endings
Scramblers
Fill-in Cartoons
Picture story-prompts
Rebus puzzles
Cryptograms
Word Searches
5 Minute Mysteries
Word Ladders
Chronograms
Riddles
Twenty-questions

There are ample resources online for these types of games that can be found with little searching. If you have some money to spend, Barnes and Noble has a fantastic selection of books in various formats, or most of these books can be found on Amazon for as little and $0.01 plus shipping. You can also have students make up their own.

These can be great activities for ELA students in part because of their use of cultural or common knowledge that can help build vocabulary in areas cultural understanding. I find that a major barrier in reading is a misunderstanding of these social conventions that native speakers take for granted. These are also great resources to keep on hand in any classroom and any content as they can be great educational time-fillers for those students that get done early or for days when the lesson plan runs a little short. Students can also build social skills through working through these activities by working together to solve these puzzles.

Literacy Resource 2: Spooky and Disgusting Fiction

2008-06-16T21:24:00.002-06:00

In attempt to build my literacy experience further, I ventured out to the local library to seek the help of a children's librarian and was brought back to the middle school world of Goosebumps and Captain Underpants. When the librarian brought up these books, I remembered being 12 and not being allowed to read such literature being instructed by my mother to stay away from things so disgusting and ugly. But the librarian was very adamant about how popular the books were with her own children, who refused to read before discovering the thrillers.

I'm sure at some point in even my own middle school life, I disdained literature written for 12-year-olds as juvenile and unsophisticated, but am now gaining a new appreciation for the genre and the authors who wok hard at creating wonderful plots in simple language.

So, I am not sure if these books are yet too intimidating for the student I am working with, but I feel more confident about presenting some material that is at his level in hope that he may yet be enticed by it.

What sorts of books have you used successfully with reluctant readers?

Literacy Resource 1: Board Games

2008-06-16T21:16:00.004-06:00

All though right now I am feeling a little overwhelmed by the challenge of my tutoring assignment for the summer, I imagine that by the end of the season, I'll have built a bit of a repertoire of resources and I think I will post them here as I discover them.

This morning, in a flash of genius and desperation, I remembered all the times that I've been told that board games are excellent resources to keep in the classroom for down-time or time fillers and realized that perhaps using fun as a purpose for reading, I might get this student motivated after all. After coming to this realization, I then remembered that the only games that I own personally are Scrabble and Balderdash. True, these are both reading games, but are not quite appropriate for this student. And then-- my third memory-- I have little to no Money.

So I ventured out to my favorite local thrift store and was shocked at the selection of games that they carried. I came away with at least a few really great games for about five dollars. And the best part? The time flew by as we did Mad Libs, played scrabble and made our own sentences with wood blocks. As soon as I emerged from my car with arms full of games, I could tell from his eyes that it was going to be a good day.

Never underestimate the power of a good game...

Convincing students that reading is worth the work...

2008-06-14T20:45:00.003-06:00

This summer I find myself working for the school district's ELA department as a 1:1 Tutor for a sixth grade boy. When I found out that I actually got the job, I was excited about the opportunity but am now seeing why a majority of the people hired for this position are ELA certified teachers: this is hard work and requires a lot of brilliance AND resources.

It has been interesting to see all that I have read in literacy books about students who are a) reluctant to read b) don't understand the letters they are decoding and c) don't see the value in learning to read, materialize in the form of this exuberant boy.

I find myself having to make the decision between laughing and crying when my student explains all the tactics he has developed just to avoid reading. If he wants to know what a news article is about-- even if it is something of interest to him-- he simply finds the one with the most pictures. If he wants to use the family's video camera, he simply asks his brother to explain it. If an error message comes up on the computer, he would rather take the risk of loosing his work than reading and understanding the message. What to do?

When I attended the two hour training session before I met with this student(which, unsurprisingly, was dominated by instructions on how to administer pre and post exams), they told us that for the duration of the eight to ten hours a week we spend with the student should be dominated by practice in reading, but should not feel like school. So what do you do with a student for three hours a day that will do anything to avoid reading? To say the least, I think we both find the time equally excruciating.

So what to do? How do I help this boy understand that reading is a beautiful and essential skill to hold? When I left his kitchen on Wednesday, he was fairly upset about my weekend homework assignment: finding one piece of reading material that was both school appropriate and something he would be interesting in reading. Somehow he gave me the impression that such a request would be unreasonable.

So... I don't even know if people read this blog, but if you do and you have any ideas about activities that might interest an eleven-year-old boy who wants so badly to be about 17, but unfortunately is quite intimidated by the sight of text, please share your ideas. I know that this scenario is not unique nor unusual, so please do share your own experiences. I'm looking forward to learning a great deal this summer, but am still waiting out the learning curve.

Entering New Worlds

2008-06-05T13:39:00.002-06:00

I walked through the doors of Lincoln Jr. High School for what felt like the 100th time on Monday-- except this time it felt a little closer to being real. As I settled into a seat in the lecture hall, I looked around and thought to myself, awed, There are real-live teachers all around me. Strangely, I felt like I was standing on the Red Carpet in Hollywood or something-- all sorts of my own heros were all around me and I was one of them.

This summer, I am working for the school district as an One on One ELA tutor. I am scared out of my wits and stoked out of my mind. I was "hired" without interview and with little information about what the position would entail, but in a nutshell, I'm broke and will take any experience I can get. Typically, the people they hire for this job are ELA-Certified teachers. I'm a "Teacher Candidate" with a content area in Art. But I got it anyway and here I am.

I don't know what this summer will hold and all that I will learn, but I think it will be definately a great learning experience, if not an exciting one. I let you know how it goes!

Conversations about Passion

2008-05-21T08:54:00.002-06:00

Yesterday I interviewed for an was offered a job working in the school next fall. No more wondering how I am going to land a job in a place I don't want to work and still be happy about it. This interview was the second or third education-related interview I've had in both the last three months as well as my entire life. As I've sat in these interviews, I couldn't help but excitedly think to myself that the questions I am asked are actually questions I get to answer with my whole heart. As I was driving to my appointment yesterday, I realized that whether or not I even get the job, I enjoy going to these interviews with people because I get to have conversations about the things that really get my heart burning. It felt good to know how to answer questions about classroom management and differentiation and the freedom of creativity, now that I know what that means and I've actually had experience in the classroom dealing with these things.

Although I really struggled throughout the semester to see it, as I observe who I am this summer in relation to who I was last January, I see growth in my own stature, my face, the way I stand. The never-ending job search doesn't seem as difficult and I am less intimidated. I feel like I have more of a right to ask for a job than I have before-- I am more confident in my abilities and qualifications. My resume has changed over the last five months, but so has something in me.

I've been thinking about risk-taking, you know, the steps that you have to take to delve into something you've never done before. Like putting eye drops in your eyes-- you know it is going to change how you see everything (haha) but the idea of putting a foreign object in your eye seems to scary to actually do. I like to say that I'm an advocate for trying new things, new experiences, but I'm finding these days that I'm not so eager to put myself out there as much-- I'm too tired, my arms too weak. Perhaps the steps that I'm taking these days are much smaller and it makes me feel as though I am defying my own advice simply because the risks are small enough that they seem invisible. Yet I am trying to remember that in the long run, the smallest steps add up into some wonderful growth.

selflessness

2008-04-16T21:48:00.002-06:00

I am daily being reminded that teaching must be a selfless profession. The things that I study, the time I spend, the energy I conjure-- it is not for me. I find that daily I am faced with decisions that affect more people than me-- kids who are depending on me, looking for me. My choice of what to risk, new doors to open are more for the benefit of those I will impart my experience to rather than simply my own life. There is something about that that keeps driving me, forcing me to keep going, even when I am so tired. When my eyes do not even stay open on their own.

I'm finding that I am more tired this semester than I think I've ever been. The light at the end of the tunnel just blends with everything else that it still speeding up. I was thinking today-- this semester started up immediately, no lull before the storm, I hit the ground running. And I'm still running.

I've found myself being able to identify in new ways with people who give out in the end. I've always held myself to high standards, always been driven to be the very best, but this semester, it seems it takes everything I have simply to keep up. I'm behind on a lot of things and am too tired to care. For the first time in my life, I don't care waht grade I get at the end of the semester as long as I pass. I've never really been in this position before and it is strange. In some ways it is frightening, in other ways, it is freeing.

But lately I've found myself pondering fears like-- what if I am this tired as a teacher. How will I ever make a difference?

I'm tired. Sometimes I wonder if I've ever been this tired in my life. The end of myself is very near and I feel my eyes doing their best to scan the horizon for what could possibly next, how things will be provided when I feel so small-- I feel as though I've given everything and yet still so much more lies ahead.

2008-04-12T20:07:00.002-06:00

"In the end the experiment failed... but the experience of thinking a project through and trying it out was an educational success. What the teacher needs to focus on is how students need to think in order to get the results they did and what they learned as a result. In assessment and evaluation we need to penetrate the surface features of activity to get at what lies beneath it. As long as the visual arts are regarded as occasions for students to make things for the refrigerator door, they will be marginal in our schools, and if they are taught as if they were simple occasions for making things for the refrigerator door, they should be marginal."

--Elliot W. Eisner, "The Arts and the Creation of Mind"

I don't think I could have said it better-- but somehow I feel as though I've said almost exactly the same time somewhere before....

The New Questions

2008-03-27T19:02:00.003-06:00

This week I started a new job working with Kindergarten class at a local school here and as I observe the school and its culture and each of the students, I can't seem to organize all of my questions and thoughts, but I hope that I can sort through a few here.

I've been doing my fieldwork at an IB Junior High known for its high population of minority and at-risk students-- openly and obviously the school with the greatest diversity in the city. The elementary school I am working at is also an IB school, but certainly does not have the diversity of the Jr. High.

Each day, there are parent volunteers in the class, helping with small groups and classroom management. Earlier this week, I was grading some homework and overheard one such parent talking to the teacher about her 5 or 6 year old son, who is "getting confused because he is reading too many chapter books at a time." There are two students in the class who came in without knowing any English-- it is exciting to hear them saying two and three word sentences now. You can pick out the girl who is the socialite-- always organizing relationships, always seeming to know just the right thing to say. There are the kids who may be a bit developmentally delayed. The student who is in constant need of attention-- not getting in trouble, just being a bit disruptive. Even in Kindergarten, you have the social structure. You see immediately the kids who have everything, the students (I will repeat in kindergarten) discussing who has their own phones.

I have to confess my own bias, my own tendency to get angry or judge. I was one of those kids who had support from my parents-- I was a child who had access to books, reading, writing, learning at home. But I don't like kids like that because I wonder if they will ever learn to see the kids who don't have it. I hate to see it when students are saving seats for each other at snack time for reasons outside of true, heartfelt companionship. I hate it when children fight over who gets to sit next to one particular student. Sometimes I walk into a class of kids and one of the girls will look up at me with her big, adoring eyes and say, "I think you're pretty." (Trust me, it's happened more than once). And although I want to be open and approachable, I never want to be liked or admired just for that. We have this system in our society that seems to build in admiration for surface while the marginalized get lost.

I don't know what to do with this cumbersome thing that is division. I suppose I just need to give up on "fairness," but I hate this group of privileged elite that don't see that disadvantaged that are there, ten feet away. This sense of disconnect between the haves and have-nots.

Even in the two days that I've been spending time with this young class, it is impressed upon me the reality that this is the place where these children are being introduced to society and the way the world works on the most primary levels. These kids are learning not only how to read and write, but social realities, hierarchies and norms. Kindergarten is the place where children are beginning to see how the world works. And I just wonder, how much of that social education is colored by the academic aspect of learning. Will the students who have parents to give them extra worksheets at home ever learn that this does not have to create a distinction between them and the other human beings in the classroom who may happen to only have access to books at school.

Do the students who ride the bus home have the opportunity to be known by the students whose parents are actively involved in their schooling and are there to pick them up each day?

I was thinking today as I noticed the brand new TV and DVD player present in the kindergarten class how different this IB school is from the IB Junior High that I am at in the morning, with old technology and awkward classrooms. I found it slightly jarring to realize firsthand the inequality between schools within this small city, within schools that both proudly adhere to the standards of IB. How different things are. As I looked at these two wonderfully creative spanish-speaking girls sitting on the floor, disoriented by a room full of language they hardly know, I almost felt sick to my stomach thinking about how unfair it is. Struggling not to be angry at these precious, intelligent children, who do not even understand the gifts they've been given in parents who can afford to focus on them.

I have been struck by the reality of what it must do to a child to be thrown into a school without understanding the language. What a disadvantage they have. While the other students are struggling with cutting, gluing, handwriting, these ESL kids are dealing with language. I watch them as the class sits in a circle listening to stories and having discussions, and hope that their eyes will somehow loose their gloss, that somehow they will be able to understand and engage. What brilliantly intelligent kids these are! And how heart wrenching it is to be unable to connect to it-- how tragic it is to hardly know the sound of their voices.

Although I am not planning to teach at the elementary level (although that may change) being able to be a part of this class has been wonderful in its display of the earliest foundation laid for students in education. This is the place where we get to see exactly how much of a head-start students have or how difficult the road is going to be ahead for them. It is exhilarating and heartwrenching, all at the same time.

I still have this question though-- what do you do with the inequality? How do you, as a teacher, help students keep from walking over each other or feeling the invisibility imposed by prior knowledge or intelligence? How do you help intelligent students understand there is more to them than what they know? How do you keep advantaged students from separating themselves from those who could benefit from their experience? How do you set up a community of learning in your classroom that bridges the gaps between those with resources and those who simply have less? How do you communicate to the marginalized, the disadvantaged that they are wonderful and brilliant, just like everyone? How can you empower them, even as 5 and 6 year olds-- to be all that they can be? Is it really possible to teach a system that does not place value on what you know, but rather creates a community where everyone has beauty and value? Here-- an even bigger question-- how do you help those parents who are involved in their children's education see that they may be perpetuating system in which some students are getting marginalized? How can we get parents to be resources for other students who may not have that same parental support rather than encouraging their children only to build relationships with other students who are like them, with kids whose parents they may know because they are at school too.

So, ther are a few of the same old questions that are still there, waiting. Lurking in the shadows. What do you do when you can see it, but human beings are a bit more complex than a simple fix?

I've been thinking this week that maybe the challenge/ struggle/ intrigue of teaching is the breadth of complexity there are in human beings and teachers are the people who get to sort all that out. We are the people to try to make at least a little bit of sense out of what makes a person become who they are and then jump right in the middle of the mess. Its a paradox of love and hate-- exhilaration and difficult, difficult struggle. Am I up to the challenge? Oh, Lord, I hope so.

How to Mount Your Own Canvas

2008-03-21T20:22:00.002-06:00

Because I've found it very difficult to find good resources for new artists on things like how to effectively and inexpensively present your work, I'd like to devote some parts of this blog to sharing my own discoveries on this topic. So, since today I made a few discoveries of my own about mounting canvas and Masonite, I'll go ahead and share them with you. You can use some simple lattice to create an nice frame for your work-- keep in mind that your frame will only be as wide as the thickness of your lattice. I apologize for the absence of photos, but I hope this will at least give you a start.

Materials:
1. Lattice trim (you can find this at a local home improvement store or lumber yard in the trim section: look for things like molding and door jambs. You can also find lower quality lattice for a smaller price if you are going to paint it or look through it to find some good peices)
2. Hand Saw
3. Wood Glue
4. 5/8 inch nails
5. Pencil
6. Clamps
7. Measuring tape
8. Painting on Masonite or Stretched Canvas

Process (canvas)
1. Find a place with a hard floor and level ground (since I do this in my apartment usually, the kitchen is the best place for me)
2. Place first piece of lattice upright next to the edge of your canvas and another piece on top. Mark the upright piece of wood where it meets the top of the lattice on top (you want the cut edge of your upright lattice to be flush with the other lattice to create a seamless edge.)
3. Cut the first piece of lattice with a handsaw where you marked it
4. With one end of the cut wood lined up with the edge of your canvas (the other side should go past the end of your canvas as much as the width of your lattice) nail the wood flat to the edge of the stretcher bar in the center and on the ends. The front edge of the lattice should also be flush with the face of the canvas (it will look like a shadow box on the back side, depending on the depth of your stretchers)
5. Set the canvas upright with the lattice you just attached on the floor. Set another piece of lattice upright on top of the overhanging edge of the side you just nailed. You can clamp it or get a friend to hold it next to the canvas while you grab a third piece of lattice. Set this piece on the top side of the canvas. Mark the upright piece of lattice as in step 2 so it is flush with the third piece of lattice.
6. Cut and nail.
7. Repeat steps 1-6 all the way around. You may want to apply a small amount of wood glue to each corner to seal the joints.
8. At each corner, set with nails (from the outside of the overlapping piece into the end of the wood of the meeting lattice.)
9. Sand each corner to smooth any uneven joints.
10. If you want wider frames, you can also attach lattice to the front side of the work by nailing it flat to the frame you just created (and covering a bit of the painting as well)

You can also paint the lattice black (or any color you want, really) or choose a color of wood that will suit your piece. Also, be careful to measure carefully. Due to my own carelessness, I found that even if I am 1/16th off in my measurement, it is the difference between a professional presentation and a home-made hack-job. This is why I recommend measuring and marking one piece at a time, especially because sometimes stretcher bars (especially ones I make myself) can have a few irregularities that will affect the way the lattice sits on the edge.

For Mounting Masonite or Panel:

Repeat the same measuring steps as above, except instead of attaching to the outside edge, I just used wood glue to attach the lattice to the back of the panel. Again, the lattice will be sitting on the skinny edge (it creates a shadow-box effect on the back). You can use some C-clamps to set the glue or apply some small nails at the corners (if you don't mind putting the nails through your painting).

It is amazing what these small touches can do to a painting-- when you take time to present your work with a frame, it demonstrates your own care in how others enter it. This method is fairly inexpensive, depending on the wood you choose and a fairly simple process. I've done all of this in my apartment.

First Steps

2008-03-21T20:09:00.006-06:00

Today I spent the day framing and installing hanging hardware to a few things to submit to the Local Emerging Artists Show at FCMOCA-- although after doing all that work I found out that they moved the show until June, it still felt good to have things done and ready to go. I feel ready to start putting things out there. Something I've learned about myself is that sometimes I feel like I ought to be able to do certain things right away, but it takes me a while to really get to the point where I am actually ready. And oh, what a wonderful thing when I get to that point.

Strangely, this semester I see myself "growing up" a little bit. It is beginning to sink in that after this semester, I'll only have one more year of classes before student teaching. It's crazy to think about in a year from now, I'll be taking my last set of classes in my undergrad.

With that comes with a bit more confidence about what to do with my art, what I want it to be in my life. It also makes me feel like I know a little more about what I am doing and makes me feel more equipped and empowered to do it. I'm to that point where I am ready for a lot of things, a ready that can't be pushed, but must be waited for.

So, I'm waiting for the MOCA show, but am also planning to submit something to the undergraduate show that will be coming up very soon here!

Thanks to my ever-researching roommate, I also found a wonderful artist blog. Check it out.

Wondering What I Read?

2008-03-18T08:52:00.003-06:00

For those of you who are interested in what I read, you may subscribe to my Shared Items here. I'm required for my technology class to read and share information about education and/or art and have been learning so much. It is amazing how we are being asked to take part in the ways that our students collect so much information each day. I can hardly get my regular homework done because I find so many interesting things this way. Take a look! (I'll also be posting a feed on the sidebar if you would just like to look there.) Enjoy!

Another Reason to Continue Marginalizing Art Education

2008-03-13T20:37:00.003-06:00

This week's reading for my Methods in Art Education class comes from the article, "Negotiating 'Fit' in Student Art Work: Classroom Conversations," which discusses the art educator's dilemma regarding how to negotiate with students in how they approach and complete their artwork (see citation below). The author sets this discussion in the context of a field study and a specific example of one student's approach to the assignment of an "Expressive Painting," involving the representation of how people are or are not relating to one another. The focus of the study is on how the student and the teacher may interpret the "requirements" of the assignment differently and how these two differing approaches may affect the outcome of the project.

Although the article deals with important aspects of student-teacher conversation about the work, I found it frustrating in its failure to address the importance of keeping students from dwelling in their comfort zones and challenging them to take risks so that learning takes precedence over product in the classroom. Throughout the narrative, the teacher is working with a student to decide between a concept that features a generalized over-head view of a crowd in a stadium and a face-on representation of the same group of people. When the teacher asks which sketch would best express his idea, the student advocates for his bird's-eye representation by saying, "It's just that i like to draw more like this, like stadiums and structures than people's faces." The teacher didn't press the student much further, but in a later interview with the researcher, the student said the following:

"She was asking me which sketch I like better. And I guess I said the one with the faces because it brought more people's faces.. And I said since we were all, like, in one stadium, we didn't know each other, that's why I didn't put faces cause I can't put each one's face, so there was nothing really. But then, I wasn't good at that kind of thing. I like drawing, like, structures and overhead views and stuff, so that's why I did this one." (emphasis mine)

The teacher ended up allowing the student to work in a more generalized way because she recognized this was "the way he liked to draw," but I find it very strange that she did very little to probe the student further on the reasons why exactly he liked working this way. Based on his later interview (and some common dialogues that artists must fight concerning fear) it seemed fairly obvious that his decision making came out of his product-motivated beliefs about his own abilities rather than even addressing the question posed by the teacher: Which idea better conveys the idea?

As I've been discussing already here and pondering quite extensively as I move about my day to day life, I find a primary problem with this way of teaching and working in its dependence upon product rather than process. Throughout the article, interviews with students and the focus on the teacher's interaction zones in on the issue of requirements. The teacher provided various methods of creating certain expressions, the how of the assignment, if you will, but most comments made by students revolved around what the teacher asked them to complete. Furthermore, the crux of the article seems to fall on the ways that teachers and students negotiate technicalities of how the project can be fulfilled. The question is not how the student can improve, learn, or move out of previous patterns, but rather how the student is able to move inside the boundaries already set by the teacher to create an object they feel comfortable with at the end of the unit.

The problem that I see here is that there is an important requirement missing that should supersede the entire class. Based on the format presented in this single assignment, it appears that the class is built around a structure in which the teacher dictates a a series of certain parameters and the students must navigate their way within this perimeter to manufacture a "successful" product. Although this structure makes sense in terms of class organization, it stifles a more important goal: challenge and learning. Although the class may be technically abiding by the rules, it ignores a more important rule the teacher should be following: never allow fear to keep students from learning how to best communicate what they have to say.

If this teacher had questioned the student further (and dare I suggest she employ some insight as a thinking adult) she probably would have discovered that the student made a choice based on past experience that told him that he has produced something successful before and therefore could do it again, rather than the motivation of how to most effectively communicate his message. I find it interesting too, that she didn't seem to notice he didn't even answer her question at all-- She asked which idea better conveyed his idea and he responded with a defense of the way he liked to work. It is as if she asked, "How do you feel about war?" and he responded with, "Well, I just love the color purple."

The problem with the way people are taught about art is that it often perpetuates the idea that realistic art automatically means good art (a notion that naturally develops in the upper elementary grades and often serves to squelch the natural creativity of children and causes many people to quit making art altogether). Many people who draw on the identity of "artist" throughout school rely on old schemas of making that have gotten them praise and attention before and fear risking the demolition of assurance of their success, and therefore never push through to learning how to really say things that are meaningful. The problem, I think, is that art has become about earning kudos and shallow searches for identity rather than communication. As artists, we want to find our identity in our image as "art-maker" rather that allowing our art-making to flow out of who we are outside of the studio. Maybe this is why some self-portraits of artists in their studios seem so prosaic and circular. Maybe this is why it frustrates me so much when "art-people" dress quite abnormally in order to express a creativity that is not really present in their artworks.

Imagine this: Visual communication is the same as writing a novel or giving a speech. Do you give a speech just so that you can call yourself a "Speaker"? Or do you speak because you have something to say? How many people do you know who go around proud of their ability to emit sound from their vocal chords that actually sound like words? Or is it more important that they actually communicate ideas worth listening to? (I suppose there is one stage that the ability to form words is quite a novelty, but last I recall, that ends at about age two or three). And then there are those people who talk just to hear the sound of their own voice-- they are a little annoying, aren't they? So then why do we encourage people to make art that only proves that they have mastered eye-hand coordination? Perhaps the person who speaks for the love of their own voice is the vocal equivalent of "art for art's sake."

I wonder what would happen if we began to teach students that art has this incredible capacity to provide the means by which we can say deeply meaningful things to one another. And I wonder what would happen if we stopped trying not to step on toes so much and start giving students the power to push through their fears to speak in the best "words" possible. We don't avoid helping students write better sentences for the sake of their handwriting, do we? When we ask students to increase their vocabulary, we don't allow them to excuse themselves, saying, "No thank you, I'd rather just keep using these same five words because I know they sound really good in my voice." That would be absurd, yet we allow students to settle for small visual vocabularies for the sake of their feelings.

When we challenge students to push through their comfort zones, we aren't asking them to change what they have to say, we are just asking them to communicate in a way that other people can understand them. I've heard many people say they have decided not to study art formally because it will "destroy their natural creativity." They claim that an institution will somehow keep them from saying whatever it is that they want to say. And, I suppose, as long as teachers keep pussy-footing around "what students like to do," this will be true. Students will never gain the benefit of the criticism that hones their ability to speak powerfully.

The problem I see with the example in this reading is the failure of the teacher to give this student the power to really speak. Instead of finding out that the student just was afraid of the failure he may when he tried to draw faces and giving him the tools to learn it, the teacher let him stay in an old comfort zone. As teachers, our jobs are not to let kids keep doing what they already know they can do-- that is just a waste of time. If we are creating classrooms where we are more concerned with having enough finished masterpieces to hang up at the year-end art show than we are passionate about sending brave, risk-taking students out into the world, we are doing a service to no one. Not all of the students who pass through our classrooms are going to go on to become artists, but each one will be valuable members of society with important things to say, and it is up to us to instill in them the value of pushing through obstacles to lead their most meaningful lives. We do no favors by allowing them to settle for mediocrity for the sake a few minutes of pride stuck to their parent's refrigerators.

The power of the art classroom is only maintained by the transcendence of deep and concentrated thought over a shallow dependence upon end result. When students are allowed to do "what they like to do," instead of challenged to more effectively say what they want to say, we communicate that they are powerless, incapable of doing what they ultimately want to do in the world. But we will never endow our students with this power until we give them freedom to explore, make mistakes, and make discoveries without regard to the "cleanliness" of their product. No matter the "museum quality" a work of art is, no product will be more valuable and long-lasting than the lessons in self-discovery and risk that take place throughout a process of true searching and risk.

Until we do the hard work of digging into our own fears and experiences, we can expect the arts to continue to become marginalized white-noise-- speaking simply for the pleasure of the sound of its own self-soothing voice, rather than for the sake of the healing words art speaks to both the viewer and the maker.

--Hafeli, Mary. "Negotiating 'Fit' in Student Art Work: Classroom Conversations." Studies in Art Education; A Journal of Issues and Research, 2000, 41 (2), 130-145

Great multimedia art history resources

2008-03-04T15:19:00.002-07:00

I found a link via The Carrot Revolution to some wonderful youtube videos that would be great for presenting art history information to students in a way that they may more readily engage in. I think some of these videos are just wonderful tools for presenting information in a way that students will be interested and will help them make connections with the material you are presenting.

Art as an essential enrichment

2008-03-01T20:28:00.003-07:00

As this semester I find myself more deeply emersed in my eduction studies, I find myself combining all sorts of observations about art and what it means to people and the classroom from different classes to books to everyday conversations. Something I have also been sorting out is my own art education and some differences and similarities between the painting class I am in now and love more than maybe any other class I've taken and a very difficult (in a non-academic way) last semester.

The question that keeps emerging is this: What is it that makes the art classroom so marginalized these days and how do we as teachers go about the difficult task of making art appropriately rigorous? Often, I have struggled with the question of how do deal with the issue of talent versus skill in the art classroom-- how do you deal with the concenption that the art class is really only for students who already love art naturally?

They tell us over and over that our focuse as content teachers must go beyond content, that the walls have to come frown between contents as we teacher students to be learners. In light of this advice and my own studies, I find a lot of answers to the questions above in the difference between approaching art as product and process.

As artists in our culture, it is difficult to get away from the notion of art as commodity. We are taught that our art making must always serve as a means of selling ourselves-- students are taught to hone their skill in order to create a product that will sell just like a clothing designer or car manufacturer.

In Chri Tovani's book, "Do I really have to Teach Reading," she includes this quote from Marcia D'Arcangelo in "The Challenge of Content-area Reading: A conversation with Donna Ogle":

"Many middle and high school teachers think of themselves as content experts. When I started teaching, I thought of myself as a historian. I wanted to teach history, and I really didn't think much about how students learn. I always focused on content. A lot of secondary teachers enter the field because of their passion for what they are teaching. It's an unusual teacher who comes into secondary education wanting to teach students how to learn. Yet, if we're going to be good teachers, that's really essential."

This quote interested me because it is a strong call to teachers to consider their motives. Am I an art teacher because I want all students to love art like I do, or do I want to open possibilities to students to disvoer things that they lovesas much as I love art? It is so easy to get into a rut of thinking that my content is best without thinking about the greater level of learning in students. What is best for them?

Art become much more meaningful when we allow it to move beyond the product. When we restrict our work in the art classroom to teaching students how to make a product that pleases others, we rob art and the student of all kinds of more important learning that goes on beneath and beyond the artwork. Art is so important because of all the exploration and discovery that takes place in the process. Art making involves all sorts of risk-taking and problem solving in a deeply holistic way that is not present in other subjects.

There are some art classes that I have observed or heard about that make me understand why people view the arts as enrichment or recess-- not necessary for people who are not naturally artistically inclined. When we treat art as only a means of producing a pleasing product, we are naturally going to eliminate many students in our classrooms or else make our own lives a great deal harder. Many adults do not know how to connect to art because they were only taught to view it as a measurement of acceptance in the class.

I used to think I loved art because I am creative and I love to paint, but the more I study art making and the more I learn about education, I realize that perhaps I love art more because of all the depth and possibilities it holds for my life as a whole. It challenges me to think deeply about my thoughts and experiences and moves me into a space where I am able to communicate my own senses of life for others to see in a deeply beautiful way. I love art because it is hard and it is intellectual and I hope that as a teacher I am able to instill a bit of the passion I hold into my own students towards their own loves and dreams. When we are able to use our art classrooms as places for students to hone their skills in creativity and deeper abstract thought, then it is appropriate to call it enrichement-- I believe the exercises the mind goes through during this process (regardless of the judgment attributed to the product) is an enrichment out world cannot do without.

2008-02-12T15:13:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, sometime before my most difficult and most respected professor told me I was doing a good job, a thought that I had never considered before came to me: I think I may be more interested in being a teacher than I am interested in being an artist. And to write that here, in this place I have devoted to reflection about being an artist, feels a little like blasphemy. I mean, I love art and I especially love painting, but in that moment with my eyes stinging from mineral spirits, I realized that the thing I want to do is touch the lives of kids in real and direct ways-- that I don't want to be in a studio alone all day-- I want to be schools, opening the world to young people.

Yes, my drive to do well at the trade that art and painting are is strong-- but often I find myself being driven to do well for the benefit of the people who will be looking to me to help them do my best. I do not work hard in the studio for collectors or currators, I work hard for students who will come after me, for the lives that my art will allow me to pour myself into. That is what I want.

I've thought often about the near sense of repulsion I feel about a life of petitioning to galleries, painting and showing. But in light of this new opinion I have discovered within myself, I wonder if may that just means that my gift is slightly different from other people who study art. I think my desire for my art has always been to communicate, I have always been drawn to it for the joy that it brings other people and for the capacity that it has to fulfill the longings of my loyal and relational soul.

Maybe this is why we are so careful about others being pleased with the things we create-- maybe we have this innate quality that makes for the purpose of seeing joy in the eyes of other people who see what we create. Perhaps.

Contrary to Popular Belief: We are all in this Together

2008-01-28T21:09:00.001-07:00

Funny how you ask for transformation and then discover it. The semester is in full swing-- unlike many previous semesters, I have not found the first few weeks of classes greeted by a lull or an anticipation of when the hammer will fall. The hammer fell at 7:40 a.m. last Tuesday when I was ten minutes late for my first class and the pendulum has been swinging ever since. I have wondered multiple times already this week if I will ever catch my breath again.

Despite the constant adrenaline supply I have discovered pumping through my veins for the past seven days, I've begun to sense a few changes in my vision. I am in the process of picking out frames for my new glasses, I think. I wrote a bit about this on Lessons in Freefalling, but I think it applies in other ways here, too.

Community again. It seems as though in the last couple of years as I have plunged into all of these community-questions, I find that every so often my view of what that means gets turned easily and suddenly on its head.

I've been thinking this past week about the issue of community in my classes and what are more aptly becoming my "professional communities." And I've noticed a radical shift in my thinking from isolated contender to team player. I am seeing my classes less as personal breeding grounds for merit-based attention and more as communities of learners-- we are all here to learn. I think it is often our natural tendency (I know it is mine) to compete. I love the concept Don Miller writes about in Searching for God knows What in which an alien comes to visit earth and finds our systems of competition absolutely absurd. "The point is just to see who is better?" the alien asks, bewildered.

The Art community is so often a place of bitter hostility-- the hurting and broken mask their insecurities under pretension and standards of what makes art "fine" and we all fall in line so quickly, don't we? But what if, like Miller suggests, we buck this cycle of self-preservation and begin to root for each other? I mean, doesn't it make sense for everyone to work towards the goal of everyone being the best that we all can be together. Wouldn't I become a better artist and teacher if I was working just as hard at helping my neighbor become a better artist or teacher too? I don't see how we could ever loose if we all decide to walk in the same direction rather than fighting each other?

If we are called to subvert culture, wouldn't it make sense to turn around this system that keeps us in isolation so that we can all discover that we were not made to be alone?

2008-01-20T11:01:00.001-07:00

I've been thinking most recently about the idea that when we think we are being strong or selective or careful about what we choose, we are actually being afraid. When we (and by we I mean me) say things like, "I just don't think that showing my art work is something I want to do, it is not something I make art for, it is not something that I really have any intention of doing," the dialogue is really about fear greater than my desire. And although sometimes this may be true that it is okay to lack this desire, I must face the demons and ask myself how much of my spirit on the matter is tainted by fear.

And I know at least a little corner (or maybe a larger chunk out of the center) of my excuses is this fear of entering into the intimacy that comes from the community involved in showing your art to other people. I've never really been a collaborative artist. For example: few people know that I am a musician. I don't write music and I'm not in a band-- I am a pianist. And in my case, piano isn't exactly a team sport. It can be, surely-- there are duets and people who add pianos and keyboards to guitars and drums, but it also is quite solitary. The bench only occasionally holds more than one. In the almost fifteen years I've spent at the whites and blacks, the recital allows your back to be to the audience most of the time. It soothes my introverted soul I think.

And when I walk into the studio, oftentimes it is face to the canvas-- I struggle alone. When it comes to my work, my natural posture a stance of defense. Somehow when I enter the studio and there are other artists there with different histories, artists who have gone to different elementary schools, I become afraid. I feel alone and I feel as though my little squrae around the easel is my own-- I hold this imaginary rule in my head that no one should be allowed to enter and I am to enter the square of no one. It is a deep intimacy that we risk as artists together.

I get jealous easily of people with edgy haircuts who wear mismatched clothes from the 1940's-- I like to call them pretentious, wearing their creativity on their sleeves to make up for the insecurities they feel about their actual artistic ability. But a voice deeper inside of me reminds me that this insecurity is actually probably my own. I am secretly jealous of their ability to flock together, to happily make art together, enjoying one another's talent. And I am haunted by the question: "Why can't I fit in there?" I like to say that these people judge me because my clothes all match and I don't make a visual spectical of myself of how surprisingly this never really satisfies.

The truth is that I want to be in these circles, something in my deepest-made parts knows I was made for community. And I think that even though I do gravitate towards an introverted self, I long for the ability to share secrets, to be free from jealousy and comparison so that I can stop fearing that judgment from other people.

I went to a concert last night featuring Laura Goldhamer, this wonderful artist who vibrantly and whimsically writes songs accompanied by stop-frame animation and puppet shows and I found myself sitting there wondering how someone is so free to just let the creativity spill all over the place and wondering where I could get this. I couldn't help but wonder how I lost this-- when I decided to hide behind the canvas and then hide it away in a closet. And there were all of these people there who were absolutely in love with her-- all these friends. And I felt really lonely, like I was standing on the outside, peering in the window with someone next to me, holding my hand, whispering in my ear, "you will never be in that circle-- you may only stand out here, alone." And somehow that doesn't seem right as I write it here, now, 13 hours later.

I often meet those people who's creativity has not been crushed and hidden away-- they are full of ideas and ideals. And I shake my head-- they do not know what the real art world is like. And I wonder if it will crush them too or if they have found a secret that I have not yet found to circumvent this terrible fate.

I used to feel this way about just about everything-- that I do not belong anywhere, that every circle is made for my exclusion and I feel as though this shell has begun to disintegrate, but it still feels firm in this area of my creativity. And maybe it is just one more layer that must be dealt with in due time.

As I write this, I wonder why I am actually confessing this here, but I suppose I have heard that freedom comes from confession and so here I am, in the booth, the faceless monitor the screen and you, the readers, my priests.

And this thing I have started perhaps is my way of walking out into the light, daring to show my stuff to all of you, and maybe with this little step I will find the courage to keep walking-- to take another step and enter those other circles. Perhaps that will be my prayer-- my walking chant for the next little while-- that this wall too would come down, that I would find community with this gift I have been given, that I will take the lid off the box and be brave enough to allow others to see what I've been hiding.

Last semester I came to the realization that if there is an artist's work that I like, I can just enjoy it-- I'm allowed to. And I decided also that I am going to make a concerted effort to start stealing. If I see something that I like, I am going to take it-- if there is something I wish I could do in my artwork, I am going to work hard until I can do and then follow that rabbit wherever it leads.

So this is my prayer-- I often ask the Father to change me, to move me, to warm my heart again to be remolded and here I need a little remolding-- Abba work on me here. Show me the steps towards the art communities that I need. Take my fear and turn it around into love. Make me brave enough to love, because this is what art and creating are about-- love: for your great pleasure, you said. So Abba, I ask in this semester, in this next leg of the journey that you would be moving me closer, take me into those communities that I need. How deeply I need you and your spirit that you have put in those places.

The Artist Journey

2008-01-15T09:39:00.000-07:00

The time has come for me to venture out into the art world. After much encouragement from family and friends to get some art out of the closet, I suppose you may mark this as a beginning of sorts of a journey to face my fears and realize that I can indeed make something of myself.

I hope to use this space as a chronology of the steps I take towards sharing my art with the world, so that maybe later, some young artist like me might not feel so alone and so that while it is all unfurling, you all can watch and cheer me on. I don't think I can do it alone.

I hope to use this space to compile links and resources on art, art-making, and art-loving. I may use this space to vent frustrations and to record musings about what art is in our world and in our culture. I will most likely post some images of my own work in the near future.

So please, enjoy, and enter the journey with me. Lord knows I need you.