Concepts and Questions

Five Key Concepts -

Multicultural Characters and Themes
History of Race Relations
Importance of Community
Commonality of Problems Throughout Cultures
Importance of Childhood Problems

Five Essential Questions -

How do my traditions compare to those in other cultures?
How does our community compare to those years ago?
How can I relate to people of other ethnicities?
What can I learn from different people?
What do I find interesting about other cultures?

Modern Artist, Identity

Illustrator: Ezra Jack Keats

Keats is a modern artist who writes about the identity of African-American children. He raises questions about what communities and people from this sort of culture look like.

Application Portfolio

"That Hairstyle is Outta This World"

Pen, Watercolor

Acrylic, Pencil, Pen, Tissue Paper

Collage, Acrylic

"Meercat Family Portrait"

Pen, Pencil, Watercolor

Charcoal

Ink, Pencil

"Poison Dart Frog"

Collage

Gouache

Ink, Gouache

Ink, Gouache

Gouache

Pen

"Heroic Fruit"

Oil

Oil Pastel

Big teeth, bear claws and bold colors, oh my! These are all ingredients that
wriggle their way into my paintings and drawings that focus on matters of
whimsy and the imagination, as well as the relationship between people and all
types of creatures. My work finds its roots in two very different areas. First, I like
to create for the benefit and enjoyment of others. I like to amuse people as well
as intrigue them with how I pair up images in a collage-like style. Second, I like
to create work as a cathartic process also using images of people and animals.
Through these drawings, I hope to convey a storyline that can be identified with.
Above all else, I strive for my artwork to connect with others in some way, no
matter how small.

Environment Exploration

A. I am working in the city of Albany. It's very diverse and has it's richer and poorer areas but its streets are increasingly being dotted with "For Sale" and "For Rent" signs. To put it simply, people are leaving Albany. I think that these abandoned and, in many cases, dilapidated buildings characterize the dynamism I have always seen in Albany. On one hand, there are these beautiful buildings but, on the other hand, there is massive depression.
B. I am exploring the relationship between people and their changing and struggling city and the relationship between the beauty and decay in Albany.
C. I plan to investigate this space through drawings, paintings and photography.
D. I am still in the process of discovering different artists from whom to draw inspiration. I was thinking of investigating different artists involved in the W.P.A.
E. I want to collaborate several different media at this point as a collage using Photoshop and different technologies, perhaps printmaking, or as a physical collage with different medium on the same surface.

Trimis and Savva Questions

1. How can classes in unsafe neighborhoods learn in their chorotopos?
2. How can technology be incorporated when learning about an environment?
3. How would the lessons in the readings be different with older students?
4. How could you globalize these hyper-local lessons? Should you?
5. How important is it to show the work of established artists as inspiration before working in their chorotopos?

Kerlavage:

-       Make marks and lines that are unrecognizable to adults but have meaning to themselves and show initial attempts to represent their world visually

-       Uncontrolled mark-making is primarily kinesthetic and usually unintentional

-       Recognize color but don’t use it with forethought

-       Begin to identify their marks and name them and make up stories about them

-       Develop fine motor skills which give them a better control of tools

-       Progress towards making recognizable visual symbols

-       Age 2, Unaware of the marks they make but react to external stimuli

-       Limited attention span so they work quickly in spurts

Swann:

-       Teachers need to emphasize intellectual and expressive values of experiences with materials

-       Prefer materials that respond to the touch or have bright colors

-       Enjoy mixing colors and finger painting, the physical and sensor qualities of a medium

Implications:

-       Speak with the students about what they’re drawing in order to gain a greater understanding of their thought processes.

-       Need to provide many different types of mark-making tools so the student can become familiar with them

-       Incorporate lessons that associate colors with different meanings

-       Encourage storytelling through the lessons

-       Provide types of art supplies that vary in size and shape to improve dexterity

-       Encourage making symbols in different media

-       Use media that create external stimuli, like banging or squishing, to engage the student

-       Have several different activities ready with short clean-up times

-       Create lessons that pair up a traditional skill with an artistic skill that helps express it

-       Provide materials that engage the students interests

-       Use materials that have unique textures

Environmental Project

For this project, I'd like to explore the concepts of housing and housing abandonment in the city of Albany. The city is one of the most heavily abandoned in recent years, with boarded up windows and doors everywhere you look. I would like to take a deeper look at this messy issue and juxtapose it with images of the beautiful architecture that characterizes Albany for me. I will take a multi-media approach and use photographs and digital media, as well as paints and markers. Through this, I hope to illustrate what I love so much about Albany as well as the serious issues that plight its streets.

Post Two

Here are a few older images of my work because my computer died over the weekend so I don't have access to any newer images. As you can see, I like to work with pen, pencil and gouache, although the painting of the fruit is in oil. Recently I've started working in a more whimsical, graphic, storybook-type style and have been drawing comics.

Post One

Our group further discussed the five topics brought up by the class: student actions, student development, ongoing process, contextual environment and teacher actions. We talked about how important it is for students to not only work with the teacher, but with their peers as well as in the community. These types of interactions will result in the class developing useful skills through projects that are more applicable to their everyday life. Delacruz writes about the role of technology in art classrooms. She also brings up available class time as a concern that especially affects technology-based projects such as photography and graphic design. Students need to first learn the technology and then learn how to express themselves using it. The topic that resonated most with me, and the subject of my reading by Elizabeth M. Delacruz, was contextual environment. Things such as class size and duration can greatly affect the types and numbers of projects a teacher can introduce. Another concern Delacruz writes about which we also brought up in class is how a school's budget can affect a classroom. In the instance of technology, an inadequate budget can mean that classrooms are equipped with antiquated technology and, at times, incompatible technologies. As a result, the classrooms are less able to connect with a global community as well as effectively use the technologies they do have. What I took away from this class was how many different factors can affect your classroom dynamic and how you have to pay attention to all of them in order to be a good, effective teacher.