Socially Engaged Art and Arts Education

BUILDING COMMUNITY: SOCIALLY ENGAGED

ART AND ARTS EDUCATION

______

A Project

Presented

To the Faculty of

California State University, Chico

______

In Partial Fulfillment

of the Requirements for the Degree

Interdisciplinary Master of Arts

Art Education: Pre-K – Older Adult

______

Spring 2018

BUILDING COMMUNITY: SOCIALLY ENGAGED

ART AND ARTS EDUCATION

A Project

Bobbie Rae Jones

Spring 2018

APPROVED BY THE INTERIM DEAN OF GRADUATE STUDIES:

Sharon Barrios, Ph.D.

APPROVED BY THE GRADUATE ADVISORY COMMITTEE:

Carson D. Medley, Ed.D. Teresa L. Cotner, Ph.D., Chair Graduate Coordinator

Jerome Pouwels, MFA

PUBLICATION RIGHTS

No portion of this Project may be reprinted or reproduced in any manner unacceptable to the usual copyright restrictions without the written permission of the author.

iii

DEDICATION

This work is dedicated to the people that have supported me along the way.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I want to acknowledge the kind support from my mentor and friend Teresa

Cotner, my guide into understanding my purpose, and to all those who supported and taught me the skills in arts I have learned along the way.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE

Publication Rights ...... iii

Dedication ...... iv

Acknowledgments ...... v

Abstract ...... VIII

CHAPTER

I. Introduction ...... 1

The HeART of Community ...... 1 Significance of This Project ...... 1 Methodology ...... 6 Defining Socially Engaged Art ...... 7 Purpose of the Project ...... 9 Limitations ...... 16

II. Literature Review ...... 17

History of Socially Engaged Art ...... 26 Multicultural Arts Education ...... 29 Community and California’s Unique History ...... 32 Democracy in Our Communities ...... 39

III. Methods and Findings ...... 43

Socially Engaged Art Practice 1 ...... 48 Socially Engaged Art Practice 2 ...... 50 MFA Studios and Exhibition ...... 52 Arts and Rural Areas ...... 57

CHAPTER PAGE

IV. Summary, Conclusion, and Recommendations ...... 59

Summary ...... 59 Conclusion ...... 61 Recommendations ...... 64

References ...... 67

Appendices

A. Art Education Unit Plans: Pre-K — Older Adult ...... 72 B. Nurturing Strength: Women’s Stories in Portrait ...... 117 C. Socially Engaged Art ...... 124 D. Rural Partnership: CSU Chico Public Murals ...... 130 E. Art Education ...... 133

vii

ABSTRACT

BUILDING COMMUNITY: SOCIALLY ENGAGED

ART AND ARTS EDUCATION

Interdisciplinary Master of Arts in

Art Education: Pre-K – Older Adult

California State University, Chico

Spring 2018

Art education and Socially Engaged Art as a bridge toward community building is an effective method to unite various populations of people in a multicultural and globally connected region. I compare the roles art education and Socially Engaged

Art can play in supporting mental and physical health in communities, and in connecting people together in social contexts. I examine qualitative research from Northern

Californian educational and community meeting sites. Artists can make art that advocates for the underprivileged and they can build bridges among community members. Art is a source of interaction that artists can use to build authentic and meaningful relationships, strengthening the ties of the people in the U.S. who desire to

viii create an ethical and moral democratic paradigm. Using art as a source of community building can be a successful, peaceful, and powerful method of a nonviolent protest.

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

The HeART of Community

Referring to several artists, including the author, Socially Engaged Art (SEA) and art education are discussed and compared. The people used as part of the discussion illustrate how community building through the vehicle of art creates an ethical and moral connection between peoples, and can be a support for interactions in a democratic citizenry. The artist as instigator of SEA is similar to the art educator in the classroom, as

SEA and art education have similar purpose and goals. Issues connected to, for example, multiculturalism, social dynamics, expression, divergent thinking, personal growth, and identity come to play in both and are discussed in this paper. In addition, art skills are built, artifacts created, meaning is made, understanding occurs, relationships are reinforced, and bridging occur, among various communities.

Significance of This Project

Art skills and aesthetics unite community through the traditional art forms of craft, visual art, music, dance, theatre, and performance. Similarly, in today’s societies, art can be used as a unifying medium, and is indeed used by educators across the subject matters in public education. This is well recognized and theorized in educational

1 2 research. For example, Andrews (2016) investigated teachers using arts-based instruction cross-curricular in primary schools and found that when artists are connected with teachers in-service:

Teachers acquire the confidence to express themselves freely, they are willing to teach the arts in their own classrooms, they realize the potential and value of the arts within the school curriculum, and they develop arts-specific teaching expertise. Further, the teachers’ sensitivity to their own creativity and openness to experimentation is heightened, and awareness of the potential of the arts to develop a student’s imagination, intuition and personal expres- siveness is developed. (p. 392)

The teachers also desire that

the ideal scenario for their personal and professional development in the arts is an environment where discipline-based and integrative curricular activities are offered, and both the creative process and the creative product are valued. (Andrews, p. 391)

Arts education in public schools begins with training the teachers to assist students with instructional methods that use an “artistic mode of thinking and knowing” (Snyder,

Heckman, & Scialdone, 2009, 1924). Arts based-learning imbued in the classroom can help with the success in any career venture. The creative process that arts-based learning

(ABL) offers contributes to developing skills that can be used to solve problems in all careers, from the graphic artist to a doctor.

At California State University Chico (CSU Chico) I assisted, observed, and helped teach Arts 493, Development of Children’s Art (K-8), with professor Teresa

Cotner. The course is geared toward introducing arts-based learning (ABL) to liberal arts students. “ABL is the instrumental use of artistic skills, processes and experiences as

3 educational tools to foster learning in non-artistic disciplines and domains” (The Art of

Science Learning, 2018,). In this class, the history of art and art education is taught, as well as several art activities in various media to use in their future classrooms. Handling of materials and assistance from myself and Cotner supported students in expanding their limited artistic ability, and initiated them into the ability to teach lessons using artistic methods. All of the future teachers were interested in the arts activities that were taught, and some were much more enthusiastic than others. The year following the class, I ran into one of the students at an educational job fair at CSU Chico (March 10,

2018). Enthusiastic to see me again, he mentioned his goal to use ABL across the subject matter when he entered his career.

Prior experiences in arts shape a person’s interest in arts, be it a positive or negative influence; either reinforcement impacts the hearts and mind of attitude toward making and experiencing art. We need educators to use ABL in the classroom and offer an authentic learning experience teaching skills to help solve problems they will be con- fronted with later in life.

Other authors have discovered that ABL in education support success in career readiness. Regarding higher education, Snyder, Heckman, and Scialdone (2009) wrote that “Catterall … found that students that were engaged in the arts had signifi- cantly higher levels of academic performance and behaviors than did those who were not exposed” (p. 1924) and that “similarly, Burton, Horowitz, and Abeles … found a significant relationship between art exposure and both creative and cognitive

4 competencies from students” (p. 1924). Snyder et al. assert that “this research has suggested that artistic ways of thinking and knowing can contribute to cognitive growth and development” (p. 1924). Arts in the classroom support an intelligence that contributes to creating community that can use creative methods to support the diverse needs of the population. In any classroom, multiple intelligences exist related to cultural knowledge, writing knowledge, and relationship knowledge. Arts knowledge in the classroom helps students access a part of understanding that makes the learning experience more enjoyable, and creates an ease of integrating academic knowledge across the curriculum, as illustrated below.

In an interview with Gloria Morgan (February 12, 2018), a former school teacher with 30 years of experience, she explains her need for arts in the classrooms was a relief to the monotony of the school day. She taught for nine years in the 1st grade at

Paradise Elementary, Paradise, California, and 21 years at Chico Unified, Chico, Califor- nia, in the 4th grade. After retirement, she continues to volunteer to assist school teachers in the classrooms. She relates her career experience with the lack of arts in public schools and the need for additional arts implementation:

The emphasis in the classroom was on math and science and there was very little art. As a teacher, this drove me crazy and my students and I tired quickly of the standardized curriculum. We had a fine arts teacher that would come in for three hours every three weeks, but that wasn’t enough. I started to integrate arts across the subject matter. I don’t mean to sound proud...but, on parent night, all the classrooms of the school had the exact same project from the fine arts teacher, except mine. Parents from other classrooms would walk through mine, because the walls were covered with unique and

5 different art projects I introduced to the children. After I introduced art, the schooldays were much more enjoyable for everyone.

Children gain confidence through the process of creating art in the classroom and parents appreciate seeing the results of arts-based learning in the classroom. ABL implemented into curriculum from kindergarten through middle and high school, into higher education, has shown to be successful for students developing skills for career in our competitive society.

The research from Snyder et al. (2009) addresses implementing an arts-based and studio-learning program in technical studies, as well as programs for “informational professions, (librarianship, information systems design, software engineering, medicine, accounting, engineering, etc.)” (p. 1926). The authors argue that “the studio approach is ideal for unlocking the creative element that our students will need to be successful within professional careers” (p. 1925) and also claim that the influence of arts in curriculum “enables an individual to identify actions that can lead to more creative solutions or more creative-thinking processes” (p. 1926) than solely “using the scientific method.”

They say the “scientific and artistic ways of knowing do not represent a pure dichotomy.

Rather, they lie on a continuum…” (p. 1926). “These forms of understanding involve comprehending at a deep level in ways that lie outside the linear, analytic mode of scientific method” (p. 1924), and he goes on to say “by providing opportunities to students that will allow them to experience these dimensions of knowledge, we can enable them to more successfully tackle socially complex and ambiguous problems” (p. 1924).

6 The U.S. Department of Education (2011) mission statement is “to promote student achievement and preparation for global competitiveness by fostering educational excellence and ensuring equal access.” Arts in community and education support our global connections. My sense of place is connected to communities that make up the heart of Chico, which is situated in northern California, identified within one of the larg- est states of an enormous nation. This nation lays on the surface of the Earth, linking us to a global community. The significance of this project is to heighten the awareness of the public in regard to art because people need to understand the importance of arts in their everyday lives, and it is time for a change to occur in the thought processes of peoples throughout all the communities in the United States in regard to art-based learning and the implementations of the creative process in our lives. Art education and SEA are important as they help to create bridges of understanding between diverse members in a multicultural population.

Methodology

Research through various interactive mediums is used in this paper to support SEA and art education as a means toward building a democratic society. In Chico and nearby regions, I engaged in various art-related experiences as part of my research from spring 2017 to spring 2018. Observation, interview, and fieldwork comprised much of the research.

7 The epistemology approach I identified with is the constructivist method of research and investigation, using a qualitative approach. This is based on the constructivist educational theory which proposes that humans construct knowledge and meaning from their experiences, (i.e., reality is constructed by individuals deriving knowledge from interacting with their social worlds). Thus, I report my constructed knowledge of the investigation from the experience in my community, educational communities, self-reflection using divergent thinking, and all other social interactions in relation to arts.

Defining Socially Engaged Art

SEA is also known as social practices (SP): community art, community aesthetics, relational aesthetics, dialogic art, participatory, research-based, collaborative, or public art. SEA, a term coined in the 1970s, is a movement in art that has its roots in postmodern era performance art of the 1960s. The evolution of this particular form of art illustrates the similarities between the artist in SEA and the art teacher in the classroom.

Both use similar strategies. The art in SEA practices does not have the goal as the final product, but is interested in the interaction between the participants. The people become the medium, the interaction is the glue, the final product is a sense of community, resulting in a sense of feeling valued and a participatory-interactive culture created from the process.

Similarly, the art in classroom practice is imbued with educating the student to learn the tools of the creative process. Divergent thinking is specific to arts education,

8 the ability to “think-outside-the-box” is encouraged when solving problems and discov- ering solutions for the making of artifacts. The ability to synthesize information from two seemingly dissimilar sources, and find the bridge or the connection, is another tool found in ABL. Observation is also important; observing oneself, oneself in relation to other, to the world, of the object to be reproduced, the bird to be drawn, the landscape to be painted, for example. These forms of understanding involve comprehension at a deep level.

Studio-based classrooms are used with hands-on-experience in the various arts medium, depending on the institution and age group. As Dewey (1934) notes,

art involves molding of clay, chipping of marble, casting of bronze, laying on of pigments, construction of buildings, singing of songs, playing of instru- ments, enacting roles on the stage, going through rhythmic movements in dance. Every art does something visible, audible or tangible.… (p. 206)

This translates into an experience of art, which becomes relevant to the individual.

In art education, objectives related to content standards for each grade level are one of the goals of the educator, but many other goals exist. Gude (2014), a public murals artist and art educator explains, “Teachers work in the medium of students … they are able to make dynamic collaborations... and the art educator is a community artist.” The teacher becomes the “artist-teacher” (Gude) creating the art-piece within her or his classroom. The art teacher in the classroom guides the group of students, encourages and supports them, developing understandings among participants who come from a large variety of backgrounds. The intention is to guide students from point A, a

9 point of previous knowledge and familiarity, to travel on the journey of discovery to point B, unknown and unfamiliar territory where new knowledge is to be found. The definition of SEA is similar.

Helguera (2011), a visual and performance artist, says SEA “falls within the tradition of conceptual process art” (p. 3). Helguera defines SEA as

all art, inasmuch as it is created to be communicated to or experienced by others, is social. Yet to claim that all art is social does not take us very far in understanding the difference between a static work such as a painting, and a social interaction that proclaims itself as art--that is, socially engaged art. (p. 1)

He also states, “While there is no complete agreement as to what constitutes a meaningful interaction or social engagement, what characterizes SEA is its dependence on social intercourse as a factor of its existence” (p. 2). “ ‘Social Practices’ has emerged most prom- inently in recent publications, symposia, and exhibitions and is the most generally favored term for SEA” (Helguera, p. 3). “SEA is a hybrid, multi-disciplinary activity that exists somewhere between art and non-art … SEA depends on actual—not imagined or hypothetical—social action” (Helguera, p. 8).

Purpose of the Project

The artist in SEA instigates the project and facilitates and guides the group when necessary. For almost two decades, I have intuitively been involved in SEA and art education. This project investigated how participation in art education and SEA can

10 gestate right, true, and just change. To clarify the purpose of this project, I must first define my purpose in life.

Art is an interest I have maintained since a child, practicing and studying various forms throughout my life. Now with experience in several roles, (i.e., artist, educator, mother, and bodyworker), I have an opportunity to use this valuable artistic intelligence in my community. Each person that engages in the methods of art has a personal experience, one that cannot be measured by an outside observer, but is relative to the person. After learning how to solve problems by creative methods, a person must decide which materials will be used in the process to solve problems, and the form is different for everyone, for example, writing, music, performance, drawing, sculpture, singing, and songwriting.

Sometimes, I observe a shift in consciousness during the process of creating and making. The cognitive, verbal, physical, and even spiritual development are apparent. Arts help people understand and realize their identity to the inner-world and in connection to the outer-world. As an artist-teacher, I help people to stretch and grow in their awareness of self in relation to the world around them, and encourage people to access a growth mindset. With humor and love, my intention as an arts educator and in

SEA is in bringing the arts to all age levels, for everyone between the ages of birth and death, and for everyone to have access to some form of art specific to their needs.

When working with people unfamiliar to the arts, I observe and act on opportune moments. In early childhood education, it is called a critical developmental

11 stage. After the birth of my first child, I took a 12-week course of early childhood education from the North American Montessori Center. I integrated the concepts from the pedagogy developed by Maria Montessori into my lifestyle, family life, home daycare, and now working with people in the arts. Influenced by the course, I raised my children with the idea that play is the work of the child (a unit plan for pre-kindergarten is found in Appendix A). But one can only introduce the new play, or a new skill, when the development of the child has progressed enough to receive the new information. The same is true with anybody at any level of intelligence or age. The student must be ready, and through various methods of instruction, I support the moment of artistic development. The study and analysis of instruction and use of various strategies support the teacher-student interaction in schools and with SEA.

As someone that interacts closely with the public, I continually inform and educate myself as a lifelong learner. Everyone has a unique and special quality, and when love is present in a teacher, anger and sorrow cannot share the same space. I purposely choose to act and think with patience, generosity, and compassion with each student or participant, and continually improve upon the values of highest moral and ethical interactions with relationships in all walks of life. I have studied and taken courses in nonviolent communication, a method of communication developed by

Rosenberg (1999) that is ideal as a communication tool for a democratic citizenry. I used the method in group work for unit plans for 2nd and 3rd grades (Appendix A). This personal commitment to elevate my state also extends to include the whole environment,

12 people, other animals, plants, rocks, water, everything, acting conscientiously and with integrity.

Art is also a means to creating a healthy society, one with citizens that value and serve one another. “As one vehicle through which we communicate with our environment, art and art education contribute to the growth of mentally healthy individuals and act to prevent the stagnating entropy of mental illness” (K. Congdon & D.C.

Congdon, 1986, pp. 77-78). They state, “Art educators need to be aware of the importance of this function of art as they teach skills to help students express themselves visually, respond to the visual world, and solve problems by thinking visually” (pp. 77-

78). After a session of making art, students make discoveries within themselves and their connection to the world around them. They can identify what is their purpose in this society. I have observed during this research project, and through many years in the arts, that a social-consciousness exists regarding arts as a skill or talent one is born with.

I argue that everyone has the intelligence to develop artistic intelligence.

Many people feel that they can’t make art and they are not artists: “I can’t draw, I’m not good enough.” My purpose is not to make artists. If someone wants to draw well and make good art, I know of a good MFA program with excellent instructors

I will direct them to. To be in the art world in a capitalistic market in California is not the topic of this research. My purpose is to help people understand why art is important in our everyday lives. As an educator and artist trained in the academic institution, I find value in a disciplined-based approach to arts education. Some of the essentials in art

13 education, for example, studying the history of art and artists, developing skills in the making of art, art criticism, the elements and principles of design, and divergent thinking, are very important, but I believe more is necessary.

This “more” is sometimes disregarded in various circles, like the push for standardized curriculum across the nation, which precludes the use of the creative processes of ABL and ecological place-based learning. Jones and Runyan (1986) are short-sighted on meaningful art experiences in schools. The authors state,

Art is not a mystical phenomenon that magically transforms a viewer or participant to a higher stage of being: it is a basic body of knowledge with rules, structure, and standards like those of other disciplines. Art can be taught, learned, and evaluated, and the processes can be described in specific written curricula. (p. 42)

Jones and Runyan support a discipline-based art education program. This is valuable and important, but I believe there is more to be understood of arts. Like, for instance, freedom in making art is essential. As Kaneda (2003) states, “Freedom has been regarded as an essential principle of education in the West.… John Dewey stressed the significance of freedom in education. Especially in the field of art education…” (p. 12). Free- dom is essential to verbal expression, and the use of divergent thinking is a skill that arts promotes.

The value in the aesthetics that arts promotes is also important. Kindler

(2000) writes,

recognition of art’s power to advocate, promote, or affect social change should not overshadow the fact that art has a unique potential to enrich our

14 lives simply because it has the power to delight us, to shock our senses oper- ating through the repertoire of visual means. (p. 41)

This shock of the senses can occur in many forms of art, including music.

People listen to music because the ephemeral sound of the melodies affect the person’s state of mind in the moment. The weight of sadness can be lifted with the tone of a beautiful voice. Music is an art, made by artists, better known as musicians. When we listen to music, we are participating in art. This is important to have everyday in our lives as a tool to effectively balance out the doldrums of our “work,” to turn our work into play. Kindler (2000) says,

We need to remain vigilant that in our attempts to frame art as relevant to a society, to make it address and respond to profound human concerns, we do not lose sight of what art can mean and bring to individuals at the level of personal, immediate, intimate encounters. (pp. 41-42)

Kindler goes on to say, “In some cultures, bringing beauty to the forefront of human experience is considered as one of the most significant purposes of art” (pp. 41-42). The essence of my purpose is driven by a simple fact that art feels good and I also observe that art helps others to feel good as well—they are happy doing, making, viewing, or being involved in art. Aesthetics is included in the essence of this my purpose, to remind, inspire, and educate everyday, to connect and use this tool for happiness-arts in our everyday lives.

Axiology, the philosophical study of value, is integral to my lifestyle and worldview, and drives my purpose as an art educator. I analyze my actions in regard to what is right and good in individual and social conduct in regard to other people and

15 my environment. I practice actions, behavior, and communication to better help connect in a positive manner in community. Besides ethics, axiology also addresses the value of objects, or aesthetics, a pursuit of beauty and harmony. My purpose is to elevate my environment, art production, and personal relationships to be of value to what is good and true. I want to actively change social issues like hunger, human-trafficking, racism, poverty and homelessness, in our communities. I know that art is a segue to support this change. I believe everybody needs some form of the arts in their life for optimal health, be it music, visual arts, or dance. Creating aesthetically pleasing artifacts is very pleasing, it brings value to the person making, and builds a sense of confidence in the use of one’s skills.

My professional purpose as an art educator is to bring art to everyone, from young to old, with the understanding of the importance of arts in our everyday lives, through a discipline-rich and academically supported analysis of instruction. I find that the method of creating supportive environments, providing materials for a dialectic interaction for all participants, is one of the best ways of using my innate skills and developing knowledge as an educator, as a means toward building community through the vehicle of art. This in turn, benefits the people, society, and our nation. One-by-one, in education or a SEA, I support the growth and development of confident thinking citizens educated to succeed in this democratic society and exist in a competitive economy.

Skills can be learned to increase efficiency of producing a final product, but art as an experience is really an aspect of the soul. Contemporary artists, such as myself,

16 using nontraditional forms of making art (such as SEA), understand the ephemeral nature of art. The mind that is open and the voice that is silent hears the muse of inspiration when contemplating, creating, and making. This sensation is felt at a deep experiential level. Writers and poets have eloquently described this sensation in the written word for a millennia, and yet, it still seems often beyond the rationale of the academia: “Re- examine all that you have been told … dismiss that which insults your soul…”

(Whitman, 1855).

Limitations

Due to restrictions related to timelines, I was only able to include a brief description of the case study of the public murals project in rural communities. The exhibition for the paintings produced occurred a month after the deadline for this paper, and I was not able to include all the images that were in the show except the first few that were successfully completed. An analysis of the relationships to place, history of

California, settlers, indigenous population, environment, resulting in shaping what is currently contemporary art, was cut short because of time limitations.

CHAPTER II

LITERATURE REVIEW

Artist and Place

Along with analysis of painting technique and color theory, I studied literature from the university library about the history of art, masters, and international movements. I enjoyed reviewing the masters from all the movements in Western art history, and I realized that a lot of emphasis in my academic training was based on the study of European artists. The place where I have developed my skills in arts is important, because all the people I have associated with, teachers and mentors in the arts, have shaped my understanding of art. The term “place-based,” also referred to as

“community-based” (Smith & Sobel, 2010), and “place-conscious” (Budge, 2016;

Gruenewald, 2003)] refers to the cultural, natural and built environments, and the flora, fauna, and minerals that exist in and comprise environments. Place-based also includes past, present, and future contexts of a place (Smith & Sobel).

I contemplated my place, in Northern California, in relationship to the contemporary art community and how place has shaped me as an artist. Place shapes a person in regard to geographical location, public services, cultural influences, population, economy, politics, religion, and so forth. I then recognized and identified personal

17 18 influences from master teachers in my lifetime whom I studied under, as well as the influences of the history of arts and artists associated with my sense of place, the region

I’ve lived in all my life. How did the cultural history of arts (or lack of) in California shape me and shape the belief systems of my ancestors in California? The following is a bit of history that may have been an influence on the social consciousness of arts in

California, and may be why arts culture, as Karlstrom (2000) states, is localized on campuses, rather than in museums, galleries, or other known arts entities.

I learned that in the 19th century (when my ancestors settled in an undevel- oped and rural landscape), few academically trained artists occupied California. Thomas

Hill and Albert Bierstadt, among others, were the first master painters working in the landscape genre when they arrived after the early expeditions, painting majestic sites like Yosemite. In the 1870s, European influences evident in the California genre painters, like Carl Nahl, who “generally presented a carefree and bucolic way of life, with scenes of the industrial world and poverty rarely depicted” (California Painters, n.d.). At the turn of the century, with the dawn of Modernism, a number of artists focused on painting missions up and down the California coast. California artists developed their own style of impressionism distinct from the movement in Europe. At the turn of the century,

San Francisco was a focus of arts culture and attractive to artists as a “bohemian community” (Karlstrom, 2000, p. 88). After the San Francisco earthquake and resulting fires in 1906 and with other colleges and universities popping up in the state, the gaze shifted to Los Angeles, where much of the attraction has been to this day (Karlstrom, p. 89).

19 California artists participated in the art technique and theory identified with the forward thinking of the period of Modernism through the ‘60s. Karlstrom stated that “California is known for Abstract Expression” of the era of modernism, as well as the “beginning of the feminist art movement headed by Judy Chicago which sprung up at Fresno State in the 70s” (Karlstrom, p. 90). Postmodernism in the ‘60s and ‘70s exploded, giving permission to artists from all walks of life including woman, people of color, minorities, and the LGBTQ+ communities. Postmodernism marked the first time in the history of art that all voices could begin to be heard.

If the universities are a cultural hub for people to experience arts culture, I am an affirmation of this theory. I came from a rural family that lacked an understanding of the importance of arts as an engaging cultural theme. After beginning work in the graduate studio, my initial experience was a feeling of unloading years of jargon, as I felt a sense of value that I had something important to contribute to my community in the form of arts. I am an artist, and a veil was lifted, my vision clear as I felt from my heart that this is what I came on the planet to do. Following that moment, the fine arts portion of this investigation took on a will of its own.

Along with the visual arts, I have participated in theatre, drum, and dance. In high school, and later in college, I began studies in architecture but was dismayed by the push towards drafting technologies on computers and had no interest sitting before a screen to produce drawings for long hours. I was especially disappointed (as the years in collegiate education passed by) realizing my government valued the dollar over the

20 people and I didn’t want to participate in the expansion of suburbia tract houses or shopping malls, so I switched to studio art (drawing and painting) and art history.

Although I celebrated the arts, the experience of disillusionment that descended upon me, caused by understanding the influence of capitalism on my society, community, and family life caused me to withdraw from schooling. In my mid-twenties,

I took a maternity leave for ten years in the remote and rural mountains of Northern

California, isolated from the ever-growing world of industry. Always a student, I also pursued training and study of meditation and I continued to make art, new and different arts and crafts, away from the influences of mainstream academia.

After breeding, eating, and learning how to build a fire and make bread, I returned to the institution of higher learning in my late thirties to study to be an art teacher. Back in urban life, I thrived in my grounded understanding of the simple and essential meanings of life—securing happiness for oneself and others. Unfortunately, disappointment in humanity continued to be supported as I witnessed the urban dilemma of homelessness, human trafficking, and opened my eyes to the hidden history of the indigenous population in my “native” California. But hope removes the darkness of disillusionment, and enlightened soon dawned as I came to understand my place in this world. My mentors at CSU Chico provided me with a direction that advanced into purpose.

My focus for writing about SEA began when sitting with my advisors for the initial meeting of my graduate year. Previous to this meeting, for decades I had resented

21 the influence of the capitalistic economy on art-making. I had felt the purpose of making art was greater than the intention of the “civilized,” Eurocentric values of the art world. I saw the art world as another form of affluent hegemony, the wealthy investing in another asset (fine art can sell for millions at Christie’s), neglecting the needs of a unified society that cares for the needs and health of its citizens, environments, wildlife, and peoples. (I abandoned my first career decision toward architecture for the same reason- ing.) This feeling of disappointment with American society and a failed democracy had been growing since my teen years, and I was losing hope. Broken families, homelessness, human trafficking, wars over oil, broken soldiers: all offshoots of a powerful, ill, and greedy society, full of people competitively seeking personal gain. California was once a land of natural beauty filled with people who found significance in nature and wildlife and, in a very short amount of time, has become an urbanized and mechanized world—a world that neglects nature and meaningful relationships.

Although the process of art making supported me spiritually and emotionally, and I had been valued by others for my skills, up until this initial graduate meeting, I had found no place for my interests as an artist in society. I knew that one significant way for artists to make an income was to become teachers. This seemed a reasonable solution. Although I found that in my early twenties I had no capacity or interest in teaching, teaching now appeals to my drive to connect with and support my community. I mentioned my lack of interest in making art in a market society to my graduate advisors. We also discussed my need to create meaningful experiences within communities

22 and they suggested I look into the art movement Social Practices for inspiration. Finally, a light dawned in my dreary disillusioned view of the Western art world, and this new direction inspired the research for this paper. In less than a year, this research has trans- formed my vision and directed me toward my purpose.

One of the first artists I discovered at the beginning of my personal research was Inga Hamilton, an activist, a fine artist, and a fiber artist (a medium I had mastered in my maternity years). Spinning, weaving, knitting, and felting were an intuitive experience and the feminine arts was, perhaps, inherited from one of my ancestors in North- ern Europe.

Art is like a thread from a giant ball of yarn; this golden thread travels through time and space into all cultures and community. A non-traditional artist, who grew up doing a lot of textile arts, Ann Hamilton (2000) states,

The metaphor the cloth offers up is really beautiful. All the clothes we wear are made up of these individual threads, and whatever their weave, each one of those you can see, and the whole cloth needs each one of these.

Each thread is like each member in the communities creating the fabric, and all are necessary to keep the fabric together.

These traditional women’s crafts came easily to me, as I sat by the wood stove, while snow fell outside my window in a small mountain community. With my children sleeping nearby, a deep satisfying connection was made within me and now I am able to share this connection with students of a range of ages.

23 Arts and crafts, such as weaving, connect us with meaning and are old traditional methods of making artifacts. Another fiber artist, Inga Hamilton (2014) says,

“Craft links us with our ancestors and the processes that they developed over the millennia...all so that we can move this craft forward” (p. 28). The series of paintings created for this graduate program by the author (Appendix B) exemplify the meaning of community discussed by the statements from the two artists discussed above.

Each painting was created from the “story” of a woman, and each from a different generation. As the painting evolved, and I discussed the struggles of our humanity with each participant (a woman I picked from my various communities), a single theme emerged and dominated each conversation: I realized all of us share some form of tragedy as part of our shared human experience. These themes are experienced regardless of gender, and include death and loss, transformation, changing of roles. For each painting, I painted a thread to connect each woman in the series of paintings, as all of these women are a significant and important thread that holds and supports the entire fabric, the fabric of my community, creating genuine meaning and connections.

From my ancestral land of Ireland, Inga Hamilton uses traditional arts, an essential element in any historic community in Europe, in her fine art pieces in her exhibitions. Hamilton uses craft pieces to build art installations from raw fleece, mud, clay, fabrics, and sculptures (Figure 1, Appendix C). For three months she builds the installation, “while her large installations show in galleries, her transient, natural forms are left in woodlands for the elements to reclaim or passerby to take” (Hamilton, 2014, p. 34).

24 Craft merges with high art in her presentations. No longer is craft viewed as only to serve a purpose, like decor, or accessory, but as works of art.

Inga Hamilton (2014) and her husband Andy co-created “Elementals,”

a social and artistic experiment to see if creators can embody in an object feelings of unconditional peace and goodwill towards strangers and tangibly affect the showing environment. It’s the easiest thing in the world to create art that shocks, but Inga tries to touch your heart. (p. 34)

I can relate very deeply to making studio art with a similar spiritual intention. Hamilton

(2017a) says of her SP,

I’m a socially-engaged artist, using my skills to better the place I live by initi- ating grassroots projects. Sometimes folks just need permission. I try to provide these permissions. By bringing people together and encouraging them to make the World an artistically-interesting place, good things bloom.

Conceived by Hamilton, a socially engaged practice, Project 24, is six pods housing 12 different artists making and showing art (Figure 2, Appendix C). Rotating resident artists regularly, the site also has a community garden and hosts parades and various events. Hamilton (2017b) says,

Fed up with the dilapidated seafront in my town, derelict for 20 years, I felt the community deserved something that brought them together that didn’t revolve around retail. Everywhere I’ve lived in the world that was engaging and vibrant had sprung up from the artistic and gay communities moving in- to fringe neighborhoods and regenerating them. I conceived a project that put artists’ studios at the heart of the town and provided the locals with creative activities and experiences that would make them fall in love with their artistic residents. It also provides an art vocabulary in a non-threatening environment.

Art is important in our everyday lives and my intention is to promote it for a focus of community affairs. As an artist who is driven by passion to participate in the

25 local community, I have been making art for many years with the public in craft, dance, visual arts, painting backdrops for theatre, performance, and music, and soon will enter a career in art education. I have access to groups of people in the public classrooms. As

Gude (2014) stated previously, I have access to a “new medium” of students, a new and diverse population, and this is where I use art to benefit the individual, to build community as a supportive measure, and as a means for social change. Social change is one intention of SEA. I have found that many artists, like Gude, I. Hamilton, and myself, pursue various forms of it that coincide with our personal studio arts practice.

The artist instigates the SEA and he or she guides the participants through the process of making art. The connection the participant makes while interacting cogni- tively with the materials—investigating, solving problems, making connections, working with the products—is a discussion that arises. It is the art. It is, as Dewey (1934) coined, “Art as Experience” (p. 204). Art is often a process of self-reflection. Making art with other people can create a meaningful self-reflective experience for each participant.

Providing the space and the materials, the content of the project, inspiration, and direction; the artist guides, facilitates, and helps the participant to connect with knowledge to self actualize, to develop cognitive processes, to develop skills, and to own and embody a sense of value. This occurs in SEA and art education.

26 History of Socially Engaged Art

As Helguera (2011) explains:

Most historical participatory art...has been staged within the confines of an art environment, be it a gallery, museum, or event to which visitors arrive predisposed to have an art experience or already belonging to a set of values and interest that connect them to art. While many SEA projects still follow this more conservative or traditional approach, the more ambitious and risk- taking projects directly engage with the public realm--within the street, the open social space, the non-art community--a task that presents so many vari- ables that only few artists can undertake it successfully. (p. 12)

SEA is a phenomenon that began in the latter part of the 20th century, which more or less coincided with performance art of the ‘60s. Traditional Western art was viewed in galleries and other exhibition spaces of high social status. Before modernism erupted in the late 19th century, art was limited to a few in society. In referring to contemporary practices, Finkelpearl (2013) states, “This concentration of participatory artists in the academy has helped spread the practice” (p. 40). Ewald (2007) said “… Art since Warhol has become less of an elite enterprise, and my approach plays with the viewer’s changing expectations, keeping the question of authorship in the foreground” (p. 22). Some nota- ble contemporary socially engaged artists, who are also full-time professors include

Daniel Martinez, Harrell Fletcher, Pedro Lasch, and Teddy Cruz. Others who also taught extensively are Wendy Ewald and Tania Bruguera.

In the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, in the USA, a series of pedagogical experiments was launched to revitalize art in the K-12 school district, including a cooperative project with a group of 6th graders. These kids were known to graffiti the walls so the educators

27 taped large pieces of paper to the walls and let the kids draw all over them. The kids responded well to the project. This experiment spawned a variety of other SEA situa- tions in schools, including artists in schools.

Allan Kaprow was one of the first leaders who ventured into the K-12 classroom. Kaprow and Herbert R. Kohl worked together in the Berkeley Unified School

District in California district between 1967-71. In a project called “Other Ways,” the two received a grant to open a teacher training program. Within a year, this project developed into a public alternative high school. Working with others, “as a group they wanted to reinvent cultural modes that would overcome hierarchy, racism, and sexism”

(Brown, 2002, p. 126). From the beginning of Kohl’s and Kaprow’s project, there was a question of political versus artistic agendas. Kohl was a prominent social activist and had politics in mind, whereas Kaprow was interested in artistic play, emphasizing the open-endedness of the process and product (Finkelpearl, 2013, p. 22).

Another teacher-artist, Wendy Ewald (2007), started her collaborative projects the same year as Kaprow and Kohl. I found a description of Ewald’s early influences under a paragraph titled “A Collaborative Practice: Wendy Ewald as an Artist and

Teacher,” in which the author describes the beginning of Ewald’s journey in SEA:

As a teenager (Ewald) teaching photography to children on a Native Ameri- can reservation in Labrador, (Michigan), she began to rethink the relationship between photographer and subject. She explains, ‘the children’s pictures were more complicated and disturbing than mine, and closer, I realized, to what their life was like.’ This realization inspired Ewald to develop an innovative way of making pictures -- one that is collaborative and blends the in- sider and outsider point of view. (Hyde, 2005, p. 172)

The following statement is a reflection about Ewald’s (2007) role in SEA after 30 years of experience:

My art has grown out of an attempt to pay attention to our visual surround- ings and the deep need to articulate and communicate something relevant about our lives. My methods have evolved gradually during 30 years of working with children, mostly between the ages of 8 and 13, thinking about how we learn and how we express ourselves with images. My work as an artist is intertwined with my work as a teacher. Sometimes I think I disguise myself as a teacher in order to make the pictures I need to see. It’s my secret game--to see the world through other’s perceptions as much as my own, to make my work their work, and their work my own. (p. 21)

In 1989, Ewald engaged in an “artist residency that later became an arts education and teaching program called Literacy Through Photography (LTP). Ewald has opened up her LTP training workshops to educator, artists, community workers and researchers from across the United States and abroad” (p. 175).

Ewald was a presage to Tim Rollins who worked with kids in the Bronx in a project called “Kids of Survival” (Finkelpearl, 2013, p. 23). The project was a high profile cooperative art project in the ‘80s. According to an article in the January, 1987 issue of

Artforum (in Finkelpearl, p. 37):

Tim Rollins + Kids of Survival radically challenge purist and elitist notions. Their collaborative art interprets culture through young people who are generally dismissed as having virtually nothing to contribute to it. Political without being propagandist, the work has a breadth that extends beyond its sub- tle commentaries on white/nonwhite cultural relations, and seeks to disman- tle the representations that support dominant myths.

Rollins success stemmed from identifying the participants in the community he worked within, and serving their needs.

29 Multicultural Arts Education

Rollins’ success in the urban arts project came from working with the kids knowledge and interests. Creating exercises for community building, deciding upon the content of the project and the materials needs to be a reflection of the community and place in which one intends to practice. We live in a multicultural society but the view of the word “multicultural” is relatively dependent on the person or group of people and, therefore, can be problematic. One definition of multicultural is “of or having to do with various cultures” (Webster’s New World College Dictionary).

Educators are taught in certificated programs to be mindful of the diverse population of people that make up the United States of America, our multicultural society. Some educators use a program called Tribes (Gibbs, 2018)1 and various other strategies to create community within the classroom. Gibbs says about the tribes learning community, “Every school should be a model home, a complete community actively developing future compassionate citizens capable of creating, leading and contributing to the kind of democratic communities - in which we all long to live.” Artists instigating

SEA practices and art teachers creating curriculum need to continually educate

1 Due to a deep respect for the teachings and wisdom of native cultures around the world, “tribes” came into use as the name for the developmental learning process developed by Jeanne Gibbs. This process is a way of being together helping each other teach our children to live a life based on time-honored values in caring, safe, and supportive environments.

30 themselves to understand a few different components related to the diverse population in America. This is an ongoing dialectic in education circles.

Joo, Keehn II, and Ham-Roberts (2011) write,

What Is “Multicultural”? The word “multicultural” evokes a wide range of meanings and implications. At its worst, it has been taken to mean little more than a fad that captivated liberals in the late 1980s, launched a handful of careers by allowing a few people of color into the mainstream, and finally passed into oblivion in the 1990s. As early as 1989, performance artist Guillermo Gomez-Pena wrote that “many had already grown leery of the word: [Multicultural] is an ambiguous term. It can mean a cultural pluralism in which the various ethnic groups collaborate and dialog with one another without having to sacrifice their particular identities and this is extremely desirable. But it can also mean a kind of Esperantic Disney World, a tutti-ruffi cocktail of cultures, languages and art forms in which ‘everything becomes everything else.’ ” This is a dangerous notion that strongly resembles the bankrupt concept of the melting pot with its familiar connotations of integration, homogenization and pasteurization. It is why so many Latino and black organizations are so distrustful of the term. (p. 4)

Identifying the diverse population can be helpful, but one needs to also acknowledge the unconscious bias that may be present. Noticing differences can be so deeply ingrained in a person that they are not able to correctly identify the needs of the people they are serving. According to Stuhr (1995), art educators working toward social change explain the social reconstructionist view when teaching students about arts of specific cultures in the classroom. Social reconstructionism is an education philosophy that emphasizes the educational institution as an environment for implementing social change and challenging social inequalities. The curriculum focuses on student experience and taking social action on real problems, such as violence, hunger, international terrorism, inflation, and inequality. Central to this philosophy is the concept of praxis,

31 the idea that actions based on sound theory and values can make a real difference in the world. Strategies for dealing with controversial issues (particularly in social sciences and literature), inquiry, dialogue, and multiple perspectives are the focus. Community-based learning and bringing the world into the classroom are also common strategies. Social reconstructionism is a student-centered philosophy (Stuhr).

This same framework can be used when identifying the members of the community that socially engaged artists might work within. A list of guidelines for relating to art in cultures (especially helpful for teachers of Eurocentric background) is stated by Stuhr: “Cultural boundaries are often blurred, and interactions between cultures are constantly affecting art and aesthetics in their production, forms, viewing, and understandings” (p. 93). Traditionally, in the western societies, educators have looked through the lens of a microscope to study the art and people of culture, similar to a colonizer of the “new world.” Instead of the old hegemonic method of relating, she says to look through “the lens of sociocultural ethics and values. Identify important social issues related to the culture’s religion, ethnicity, socioeconomic class, gender, age, mental and physical abilities” (p. 215). She also says:

To gather data related to the group, and to clarify and challenge students’ values. Help them to make reflective decisions, and take action to implement those decisions. Information from sources can be used to analyze and collect information of the history of the area; cultural, social, political, religious, economic factors that impinge upon it; demographic factors; local values and belief systems; socio cultural/ethnic groups; individual differences (age, gender, sex, etc); and artistic/aesthetic production and resources. (p. 197)

32 One of the art educators to work with the term multiculturalism in art education was June King McFee. Steele (2008) describes McFee’s philosophy:

In all of her writings, she focuses on art appreciation and creation, the importance of reaching each individual student, the relationship between teacher and student, and the importance of each individual’s cultural background. (p. 20)

Steele also said, “McFee’s philosophy of visual art is based on the idea that art has two main purposes: to express oneself and to communicate with others…it communicates the values, beliefs, feelings, emotions and attitudes of an individual or a society” (p. 20).

Steele says that McFee said that in order to reach all students: “We can no longer teach just from a middle class dominant culture perspective, but we must have multicultural avenues for educating children” (p. 20). I think a similar analysis can be used by the artist for SEA to inform decisions when instigating art practices in community, to better understand the public one works within the community one resides in and the place one lives in.

Community and California’s Unique History

Building relationships is an essential aspect to bringing arts to society. Know- ing the community, their needs, economic status, culture contributes to knowing, what content to discuss, what type of media is preferred that is of interests to the group in a particular region. The presenter must maintain a flexible mindset, willing to accommo- date the needs of the public he/she serves.

33 Another perspective to analyze the members in a community an artist works within was found in Zebracki (2013), who performed a case study on several sites where public art pieces were located across Europe, arguing that “perceptions of public art have mainly been framed from the perspectives of its producers and planners” (p. 304).

Data were gathered for “public art as perceived by the public” rather than the artist or developer. Knowing what the public wants is of value to artists interacting with the public to conspire and create authentic public art. Some of the attributes that were important to their study were “revealing urban residents’ responses to public art and the way public art is spaced in the quotidian lives of these residents” (Zebracki, pp. 305-306). The public’s various attributes are analyzed in regard to

educational background and familiarity with the public artwork … appropri- ateness (degree of suitability), socialness (degree of invitingness to meet) and meaningfulness (degree of inciting symbolic interpretations and place memories). (Zebracki, pp. 305-306)

Like knowing the public one makes art for, knowing the students that one teaches in the classroom is important.

From an educator’s perspective on making meaning in the classroom community, Gude (2017) says a good project in the art classroom, has these qualities:

engages students, find themes they are interested in, make the topic relevant to youth and communities, use affective criteria, (emotions and sensations), use conceptual criteria by making it personally satisfying to students using the artistic and cultural practices of the community.

She adds, in a lecture to arts educators at a conference for CAEA, “Ask yourself, is it faithful to the needs of the students?” She understands these phenomena in art

34 education and her ideas can be appropriately applied to working within the public for

SEA practices.

The traditional form of art education was based on a Eurocentric perspective, which are outdated, and lack function in our current multicultural communities.

Andrews (2016) states:

the traditional Western European approach which involves didactic teaching and the teacher functioning as choreographer (dance), director (drama), con- ductor (music), or master teacher, (visual arts) is based on the concept of academic rationalism. (p 398)

He adds that “this approach involves selecting the most important dances, plays, music compositions, and paintings and sculptures of Western Culture…” and that “students are increasingly attracted to arts experiences and resources outside the canon” and work within themes from the culture, influences and place they live in (p. 398). It is important for a person working with the community to identify their interests by prior investigation through contacting the local leaders to connect directly with interests of the public.

“Community” is a word commonly associated with art education and SEA.

Not only does each project “depend on a community for its existence, but such projects are, most people agree, community-building mechanisms” (Helguera, 2011, p. 9). Com- munity building is a method for social change. Art can be a method used to build community. An artist using, for example, art in a park with a group of people to build

35 community is a SEA practice. An artist using art in a classroom to build community with students is SEA.

An educator and socially engaged artist, Helguera (2011) says, “All art invites social interaction; yet in the case of SEA, it is the process itself--the fabrication of the work—that is social” (p. 11). The relationship between the methods of the social practice, the artist and participant, materials, environment, intention, or art product is inspired by the artist(s). He also says,

Most artists who produce socially engaged works are interested in creating a kind of collective art that affects the public sphere in a deep and meaningful way, not in creating a representation--like a theatrical play--of a social issue. Certainly many SEA projects are in tune with the goals of deliberative democracy and discourse ethics, and most believe that art of any kind can’t avoid taking a position in current political and social affairs. (p. 7)

One artist, Leann Crain, uses a community sewing project at an event to unite community: “I wanted to create a craft project that would allow anyone to try embroidery, no matter what their skill level was” (in Hamilton, 2014, p. 160). She created a 5x7 foot canvas to provide the basis for a community embroidery table. Over the course of two days, hundreds of people stopped by her booth at Mini Maker Faire in Vancouver

British Columbia. Betsy Greer says about the stories she lists in the “activating communities” section of Hamilton’s (2014) book: “These stories remind us how important it is to have a sense of ownership in and be a part of our communities, the key to the meaning of craftivism. When we make or take our creations public, we connect with community” (p. 155).

36 People intent on making art for community-building experiences need to consider the place where the art will reside. Understanding the history of the place needs to be taken into consideration as well. Who are the people? What are their interests, culture, experience in arts?

The history of arts in the communities of California predates colonization in

1769 by Spain and a Eurocentric history records data of arts and crafts (California Paint- ers). But one must realize that facts recorded from pre-American history are based on the view of colonizers, when conquistadors and the religious missionaries enslaved

California’s indigenous population. I prefer the verbal authority of the First Nations population (and am curious how the influence of the native population influences the art of today, positively or negatively). It wasn’t safe in American society for people to have pride in their native ancestry until after the 1960s, and much of their beliefs and culture were obliterated and squashed until recent years, when a revival in First Nations culture was reestablished.

After 1769, during the Spanish period, little art was found except decorative arts found primarily in missions. Some artists and draftsmen accompanied expeditions for topography purposes, and drawings and paintings can be found as the result of these expeditions. Following the Spanish occupation, the Mexican Rancho owners came into power in 1821 and, again, mainly the decorative arts were found. Draftsmen created early maps of the region, accompanied expeditions, and some artists were sent with gentleman travelers who were found to produce some fine art, but this was a small

37 amount. The Mexicans settlements were defeated by U.S. government in the war in 1846 and soon after the Gold Rush brought a strong presence of the arts to California, which influences the art world today. In 1850, California became a state and, by 1860, with 20 years of economic boom in San Francisco, the community could support artists. The first arts academy founded in California, The San Francisco School of Design, opened in 1874 and became a hub for artists, musicians, and writers (California Painters). The first academy in art is less than 150 years old.

Karlstrom (2000) “attempts to show that in California, art history has been dependent upon educational entities more than other traditional components of cultural strength: museums, galleries, collectors....” I agree, as I have found support for my interest in art on campuses, surrounded by expert artists, and supporters who value artists.

I’ve been around arts in community all my life, but never felt valued as an artist, as I do on campus. Karlstrom says, “In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a handful of private art schools were joined by public college and university studio programs that slowly emerged or expanded during the 1920s and 1930s.” He suggests that the inclusion of later expansion of massive state college and universities systems, and local community colleges...were the leading and only venues for development of a genuine visual arts intellectual and cultural life” (p. 85). Arts have been based in the colleges and universities found in densely populated urban areas in California. If higher education is the base for arts in California, why is government funding (lack of) to public

38 schools K-12 constantly under threat? Is this related to my experience as an artist and the lack of value for my perspective that I have experienced from family members?

This research into the history of arts formed perspective on my art history.

From a personal and experiential perspective, researching California’s first artists that studied in academies with disciplined-based training helps me to put myself as an artist and my art in context. I can see the relationship of myself to the development of arts in

California and the history of artists in place previous to me. This information translates to inform the communities I will serve in the future. As an artist raised in California, and reviewing the works of past artists in history, I have been inspired to contemplate various issues related to gender and race inequalities, influences during times of wars, the lives of the artists, and the influence of European art and training. This contributes to reflection on the differences and similarities I experience during my time and early artists who experienced the fresh wilderness and wild terrain found prior to the development of industry in California. Although much of these rural regions exist, industry now covers the land with highways connecting the various urban areas. What ideologies continue to be present that were present with the first settlers, and are mindsets still relevant today? Do they affect the view of arts in communities and in schools?

I am descended from European immigrants that settled in the 1880s and who continue to occupy land in what are still rural areas in California. Place influences community and shapes the inhabitants. The last Indian War was fought on the Plains during that decade, and the native populations imprisoned on reservations. I descended from

39 lower-middle-class blue-collar workers in remote rural and rural regions of Northern

California. My parents were the first generation to obtain a college degree. The mentality of the rural people today influenced my upbringing. Although I was appreciated for my skills in visual arts, a career as an artist was not an option in my parents’ opinion, and this is true for some other people from rural background. As an adolescent, success in sports was encouraged, rather than arts, with the idea that this would help me in a future career. In an interview with a girl in middle-school, for whom I was modeling a drawing exercise, stated a similar perspective, “I play softball, and all my siblings play softball. My cousin just received a scholarship for sports to go to college. We all play sports, and I can work towards a scholarship too.” The competitive and dominating dichotomy that sports provides is a perspective that I have personally experienced and seen in rural communities. The divergent thinking and critical skills development of the artistic intelligence found in an art-based learning environment offers an education for citizens that are thinking and knowing, observing and questioning. Arts supports a citizenship for a democracy.

Democracy in Our Communities

I grapple with understanding what a true democracy is. From the research gained from the art educators, “artivists,” and artists practicing SEA, I see a general theme criticizing democracy. But what are the principles of democracy? I am confused by what I see around me in this so-called democracy and it seems to be a work in

40 progress. The definition of democracy has to do with rule by the people through free and fair elections, along with other forms of participation. What a true democracy could and should be in this day and age is beyond the research of this paper

The American nation we live in is fraught with a history of very undemocratic actions, which include slavery of several races and genocide of indigenous inhabitants. How can I promote principles of democracy in service, knowing certain populations of people in this country are not being represented? I currently serve a Mexican population in my community and I have seen deportation laws enforced on residents of

20 years with established families and careers. Unregistered mothers are separated from their children who are U.S. citizens. I study the current issues in First Nations populations and I see over and over that the people living on the reservations have been treated unequally to the other surrounding populations.

As I have stated before, to work within the groups of people I serve, I must first start with knowing who they are, and promoting discussions within groups. Are they republican, democrat, white, black, rich, poor, native, young, or old? As an educator, to serve the population I attend, to help create a democratic citizenship, I must connect with the diverse multicultural population and model those principles. Ideology is dust and effort, combined with a passionate exuberance mixed with the love of the people, and a focus on those positive attributes of humanity that shine through generation after generation, is the key to devotion of service through the arts. I strive to connect

41 with love, joy, and compassion, and also value all people as equal—the wealthy as equal to poor, the aggressor as equal to the victim.

The ideology of the American people is that we live in a democracy. Coloni- alism and deconstruction of those unconscious states-of-mind in the post-colonial world are lay topics in the contemporary art world and education circles. The USA was founded on principles of democracy, one in which one race of people was enslaved (African), while another race of people were mostly obliterated (indigenous). And then the Irish,

Italian, and Chinese in the west were also a source of spite for the settlers. In the found- ing of a democratic nation, these people (and all women) were not given the right to vote. Has this changed? Does everyone have the right to vote now? Puerto Rico is a col- ony of the United States of America, but the people do not have the right to vote for their own president. Immigrant workers densely populate the various regions in California and contribute to the workforce, with children in our schools—some who have grown from small children to graduate professionals.

As stated by Joo and Keehn (2011), “It is through the ‘indirect’ that the ideologies of democracy, a system of ‘rule by the governed,’ become blurred and ambiguous, creating exclusivity and the dichotomy us/them. With the activist, power struggles are questioned.… Activism is essential to democratic citizenship; without it, democracy would become a static system incapable of looking to the future for change” (p. 339).

Artists and activists are using forms of SEA in many ways. Bruguera (in

Wallis, 2015) has taught extensively, is a contemporary artist who is extremely politically

42 active, and is also involved in the social reform of education. She makes some very pointed statements and has been arrested and detained by government officials in Cuba.

First she defended her right to stage a performance critical of the Cuban government. Then she set up the Instituto de Artivismo Hannah Arendt (INSTAR), “a hub for civic literacy in Cuba,” as she describes it, that works with Cubanos de pie—everyday Cubans—to fight for democracy and social justice. Now, the self-described “artivist” has taken on her biggest challenge yet: to run for president of Cuba when Raul Castro steps down in 2018.” Bruguera has proposed her own utopian candidacy, “to build a Cuba where we are all in charge and not just the few.” Her plan is to transform Cuba’s “culture of fear.” (Wallis, p. 32)

An educator and socially engaged artist, Bruguera (in Wallis, 2015) shares about her art:

An installation, one that is not participatory keeps the audience passive and it makes for autonomous experience. But once the audience is absolutely involved something else happens. Yes, it is autonomous because you have the frame of the art institution that protects you. That is the only autonomy. That is why I go out on the streets. I don’t want that autonomy. I want to gain that autonomy, or that protection, but in the public sphere. (p. 32)

I agree with Bruguera, going out to the streets is a necessity as an artist. As described in the following section, much of the research for this investigation occurs through fieldwork in which I, indeed, to out into the streets.

CHAPTER III

METHODS AND FINDINGS

Observation, interview, and fieldwork comprised the bulk of the methods for this research. Other research was conducted through reading research literature acquired through the vast databases of the university library. I researched various subject matter of interest to support this paper, including community, arts, education, education philosophies and theories, career for arts, business practices for artists, formalist methods for painting and drawing, curriculum development, contemporary artists, color theory, art history and masters, SEA, California art history, psychology, and health.

In addition to the research gained from literature to support the written component, I engaged in an arts project, developing a series of paintings in the CSU Chico

MFA graduate studios. This research in arts processes, history, and implementations to create several paintings informed the second project, a set of unit plans composed for arts education through the ages. The curricula developed for ages pre-kindergarten to older adult primarily use various painting media, but I have also included the new media-technology with the intention of lessons that offer moral, ethical, and ecological place-based learning methods for developing connections in community in a society with group consciousness imbued by a business-centered market mind. The various

43 44 events I participated in, and academic papers I devoured, contributed to concluding this research with the results of curriculum that include environmental education, indigenous education, socio-political education, cross-curricular education, and place- based ecological education.

The creative and ideation process of the conceptual studio arts project (the series of paintings) exhibited in the MFA Gallery informed the creation of the curriculum, but also strengthened social ties and dialogue in community, as I used the research as an interactive arts experience. The artist’s statement for my show, Nurtured Strength:

Women’s Stories in Portrait (Appendix B), reflects the full research. I met with several participants many times to “create the painting together.” In effect, the practice in MFA studios and exhibition at MFA gallery became part of the community building, a SEA practice, that was documented. I interviewed the women, gathered photographs of them, and returned to meet and discuss our painting several times. The process was interactive with community members from the various communities that I engage; CSU

Chico Art and Art History Department, the Pilates studio where I instruct, and friends from the community built as a young mother.

Although research as an artist making art influenced the research, the main portion of the research for developing a set of unit plans through the ages was in the fieldwork, volunteering to assist and teach art in various facilities for age groups rang- ing from kindergarten to older adult (Appendix D). I collected data in various ways: observation, interview, experiential (organizing, teaching, and assisting), reading, and

45 examining related documents. These sites included the CSU Chico Art and Art History

Department, where I assisting Jerome Pouwels in Beginning Figure Drawing and Inter- mediate Drawing, at times teaching the art lessons. I also assisted Teresa Cotner in the same department in Developing Youth Art K-8 and taught a few of her class sessions. As a CAVE volunteer, I assisted Pam Baxter in sculpture and 3D design, Paul Stephens in drawing and painting, Nancy Skadal in Ceramics and Creative Arts, and Shannon Mc

Lean in (one of Northern California’s most advanced) Computer Arts lab at Chico High

School. One benefit of this last position was transporting and setting up for the fine arts exhibition at the Butte County Fair (a brilliant move by arts educators to connect schools to community they serve).

In elementary schools I also independently volunteered and assisted Andrea

Niepoth, the fine arts teacher for Chico Unified School District. She served 1st through 5th grades at Little Chico Creek Elementary and Citrus Elementary. With 20 years of experience teaching 4th grade, she was an excellent model of classroom management. The population consisted of underprivileged students; the schools ranked first and third in the school district. I assisted other children in art lessons in other venues as well.

At the Turner Print Museum at CSU Chico, I taught art lessons for the afterschool program, and toured and educated students from schools visiting the university from various regions in Northern California. I also assisted in teaching arts at the Four

Winds afterschool program, at the site of Step Up Academy, the school that the

Mechoopda Tribe of Butte County feeds into. In addition, I observed Alexey Ledwith,

46 the fine arts teacher at Fairview High School, a school for continued and alternative education.

The previous methods all supported research to create the community- building curriculum for arts education, and working as an artist practicing SEA helped understand how bridging occurs between communities of culture with the use of art.

After studying research literature in SEA and methods of several contemporary artists, I created and facilitated two SEA practices. One was managing the Art Tent and leading workshops at Weaving Women’s Wisdom in Concow, a three-day event empowering women, located in the remote and rural campground around Concow lake. The second practice was facilitated during the event led by Chief Caleen Sisk of the Winneman

Wintu, a Northern California tribe, that occurred along the Sacramento River. Both of the projects resulted in a product using fiber art (Appendix C).

For the case study, I worked with Anne Schulte, Faculty Fellow for CSU

Chico’s Rural Partnerships in the office of Civic Engagement and two CSU Chico departments: Art and Art History and the Center For Healthy Communities. With these organizations we outreached to rural communities that CSU Chico serves. I observed, organized, and participated in the execution of the public murals at the Corning library,

Los Molino’s Nu-Way market, and Oroville Middle and High School. Northern Califor- nia communities are the primary topics of discussion in this paper, as “place” is important, and knowing the public that is shaped by place. Fieldwork takes place in this region, my home region, as part of the research, where I participated in attending a city

47 council meeting in Corning, ideation development session with students at Oroville

Middle School, and other events working directly with community members. The data collection inspired a theme which supported research for this paper.

The experience as a mother of a 10- and 13-year-old also informed my research. My children attend Plumas Charter School in Quincy, an institution supporting primary, middle, and high schools, all in the same facility. The direct experience of my children’s lack of arts in the classroom also informed and supported my stance of the need to actively engage in supporting and participating in bringing arts into rural areas.

To understand arts in the community, and in the region one lives, one must be an active participant in leadership roles in various organizations. Research also includes attendance at community-building meetings and a two-day workshop, Com- munity as a Global Response, and the annual conference for the California Arts Educa- tion Association (CAEA). At CAEA, specific information that informed research was found at the Higher Education forum, where I was privileged to sit at the circle with leaders from the art education departments of California’s most prestigious colleges and universities. I also visited art museums and attended art openings. One example of a SP was experienced at a local art museum where visiting artist Ramekon O’Arwisters from

San Francisco led a “Crochet Jam.” My children and I had a great family and community experience crocheting with giant hooks on thick pieces of fabric. This event was celebrated at the event Coming Out for Art: Keep Moving Forward, An Evening of Art &

Community Benefiting Chico’s LGBTQI+ Center, attended by many locals at the

48 Museum of Northern California Art (MONCA), Chico, hosted by the Stonewall Alliance and MONCA. I attended this and many other events at this location supporting arts, observing and participating and informing my research.

To describe the relevance of SEA, several contemporary practicing artists from around the world are discussed as participating in leading community art projects, many politically imbued. Some artists use art to create results that are aesthetically pleasing, or present discipline-based arts programs to build conceptual skills, while others are activists who use art to bring about social change. The Chicano mural movement, for example, based in Los Angeles starting in the ‘60s, was a response for a need for social change for people of Latin descent. Many of the artists discussed in this paper in SP are educators at universities or in public schools.

Socially Engaged Art Practice 1

After reading and studying about artists in SEA, I created a few art projects to be practiced at two events, which I attended as a participant in the public realm.

These two venues occurred early in the fall semester 2017, creating a space and place for me to practice, present, and document a SEA practice.

The first, Run4Salmon, was led by Caleen Sisk, chief of the Winneman Wintu, a tribe from Northern California drawing attention to issues surrounding the Sacra- mento River, loss of wildlife, and an annually decreasing number of salmon. I volunteered to help feed and hydrate runners at rest stops during the two-day leg that ran

49 through Chico. I also facilitated an art practice in which attendees created an artwork by each participant adding a strand of yarn (Figure 3, Appendix C). I had contemplated the project for weeks before the event and struggled to find inspiration, my muse. As Gude

(2017) noted, I needed to consider how to “create a project with themes relevant and interesting to the community. How do we present projects in a bigger cultural context while grappling with complex cultural ideas?”

This project primarily involved a group of participants who are radically active in protesting issues of environmental and Native American rights. With so much pain that is still felt within the tribal and related communities, and our American societies’ economic practices continually damaging and constantly infringing on native peoples rights, how could I, as a volunteer, make a meaningful contribution as an artist? As a descendent of the first California settlers, the guilt of my ancestors weighs heavily— what right do I have to offer my skills? My solution was to focus on collaboration, openness of diverse thinking, and making connections with participants of the community.

Although I continually grapple with this issue, I understand that my commitment is the respectful and loving integration of arts and cultures.

Finally, after weeks of a creative dry spell, an idea arrived two days before the event: build a sculpture with a bicycle wheel mounted on a salmon-shaped stand, each participant adding a string to the bicycle wheel, symbolic of their intention to participate in the event. The portion of the run that went through Chico was on bicycle and this would be relevant to participants. Also because of the number of participants

50 involved in traditional culture, the use of fiber to weave beads and materials onto the wheel was meaningful. Feedback was positive and many exclaimed how gratifying the experience was in making the art project. “Wheel of Change” (Figure 4, Appendix C) was received well. The sculpture was taken to each of the six sites of the bicycle run through Butte County than ran almost parallel to the Sacramento River. “Be a part of the change, Art that supports THE MOVEMENT that actively effects the care of our water and salmon in Northern California” was on the sign posted near the SEA project.

This experience informed my research. As an instigator, it was terrifying and gratifying, as I was unsure how the community would receive the art project. I learned that SEA can be educational, a rite of passage, and a place to share information and stimulate discussion. It builds community by bringing the multi-generations of families together with other families from various cultures. When the project has a unifying intention, the art that is made is incredible and makes a mark upon the people engaging with one another, bringing people together and creating significant connections and lasting memories.

Socially Engaged Art Practice 2

The second event happened a few weeks later. At an all-women’s gathering, I had a similar experience as that of Run4Salmon. Helguera (2011) knows and understands that “most successful SEA projects are developed by artists who have worked in a particular community for a long time and have an in-depth understanding of those

51 participants” (p. 20). When I was asked to participate in organizing and facilitating the

Art Tent (Figure 5, Appendix C) at Weaving Women’s Wisdom’s 4th annual event in

Concow, California, in September of 2017, I conceived of a few meaningful and collaborative art projects for the participants. The collaborative loom (Figures 6-8, Appendix C) was a highlight of the Art Tent. I was impressed with how quickly I ran out of supplies for embroidery as I discovered that women and children love sewing needle and thread on fabric.

At both events, I watched, observed, assessed, took cues from participants, modified, and reassessed my methods. I felt much more comfortable during the on-site inquiry for the research of the second event, because I knew and was a member of the community. Connecting SEA to education is intuitive, natural, and very important to me. As a community artist and art educator, the experience of making the art within a group is the same. I feel a similar sense of worth and inclusion as a valued community member. It is not enough for me to create art (although I have my personal ongoing and developing studio practices in drawing, painting, and fiber arts), participating in the community is perhaps, more valuable to me. Offering my skills and services, insight as an artist and community member, and participating in elevating arts in our region is essential for me. I derive purpose and personal value from the experiences and serving people with intention and heart is my overall purpose and commitment.

Artist Krystof Wodiczko (2005) inspired my interests further in SEA. Since

1980, he has created over 70 grand-scale audio-video projects on national monuments

52 and architectural facades. He collaborates with communities to get people to “break the code of silence, to open up and speak about the unspeakable” (Wodiczko, 2005). The way he interacted with the community is an essential attribute of what I hope to share with the public in future projects and initiatives, healing that occurs through expressing the anger, loss, and grief of our human experience. Once these emotions surface, and are expressed, a sense of freedom is experienced as the limitations of these emotions no longer strangle and inhibit individual potential.

I continue to persevere to maintain my purpose in arts, although I am disappointed in much of the development of our technological society, the wars between people, neglect of people, I continue to act with love in this consumer-driven society that

I call home. Although I dislike it, I understand the violence acted upon others is an incli- nation within humanity that has been present before and will be present after my lifetime. I find hope in my service to community and sense of place, and will continue to ascribe to promoting ideals of a democratic society and work religiously to imbue the institutions with these ideals. “The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the light of letters, is simplicity” (Whitman, 1855).

MFA Studios and Exhibition

Understanding my purpose in arts and as part of the fieldwork research in arts education as a community-building tool, I applied to use a space in the MFA Stu- dios at CSU Chico. The interactive process with serious MFA students and studio arts

53 faculty challenged and invigorated my identity as an artist. The objective of this aspect of the project was to create a series of paintings through serious study, analysis, problem-solving, risk-taking, criticism, and superior mentorship with veteran art professionals, culminating in an exhibition in the MFA gallery. This would inform the creation of unit plans for arts education, as well as brainstorming other possibilities as an artist in service to SEA. The womb of the Art Department nurtured and molded my artist identity, and events like Open Studios shaped my work (Figures 5-6, Appendix B).

A writer and expert of the art world in California, Karlstrom (2000) states with conviction the necessity of the educational entities in California as the only structure to support the culture of art (p. 85). I agree with Karlstrom, the art community on campus dynamically support arts, and there is a freshness of ideas that swirls through air and connects with the minds of artists, professors, and students. This structure of the culture of art found on the university campus reinforces pathways of the arts culture into the broader public realm in California.

The studio area of the Department of Art and Art History at CSU Chico is known by its faculty to encourage conceptual art, as opposed to an aesthetic-based approach to art making. I began the ideation process with the concept for the series of paintings prior to entering the studio and began work on the paintings immediately after entrance. The pace was rigorous, but I felt confident about the body of work I was creating and received the necessary criticism from mentors to define and refine the art I was creating.

54 Developing the subject matter for each painting was an interactive process between myself and community members. The process was socially engaged. This body of work began with the questions: How can I cope with this feeling of loss, the recurring sense of disappointment? Where is my support? Who is my support? What is my support? For background research, I attended community-building events and painted a series of animals. I contemplated support and support systems through times of tragedy and disappointment. I then asked several women to work with me and we “created a painting together.”

After a woman agreed to participate as the model for the painting, I sent her a document with two primary questions, What animal and environment/place does she identify/associate with and why? After our initial meeting, where we discussed significant and meaningful topics in each of the lives of the women, I suggested that she reflect on and write down thoughts from the conversations we had. The conversations, reflections, questions, research, and images compiled as part of the ideation of the design process was stored in a Google doc for each model. I chose to share the Google doc with the model in hopes of an interactive and insightful process for both of us that also included information collection, realizations, and subject analysis. I reviewed the document and notes from our conversations, picked out several keywords that could be used for imagery, contemplated, brainstormed, and reviewed information again, before identifying a theme. With this information I began composing the piece. Each of the paintings in the series is a reflection of the story that was given to me over this period of time.

55 Through the painting process, I realized that the stories of the women are similar to my own, in that we all share the common themes of humanity, (e.g., loss, betrayal, celebration, transformation, coming of age), themes that are shared by all people from different walks of life. There is a tendency to focus on the differences between groups of people rather than focusing on similarities that we all share. I built my community, and more importantly, understand the emotional necessity of a supportive and loving relationship to oneself and the other. The members involved in the painting project contributed to the strength, vibrancy, functionality, and beauty of the series. They supported me as I supported them.

This is significant considering the current political environment, where issues of racism, deportation of Mexican immigrants, and women’s rights are heated topics. I also sadly see a dynamic division between people of higher and lower economic status.

The intention of the series is to focus on the similarities found in the themes rather than the differences that people tend to focus on. But the theme is not what I depict: I did not depict the feeling of loss the woman felt after the death of her son. I depicted the support found and the strength needed to endure emotional pain. I depicted where we can find our strength that is needed in the intense moment when the painful emotions related to tragedy grip us like a vice. The content is intended to be supportive and empowering of women, and the documentation included is to assess if this research is meaningful. For each painting, I researched and wrote at length, and for the first painting, I used myself for the first portrait.

56 This first painting was a process and an emotional journey toward self- discovery (Figure 1, Appendix B). I realized, after viewing the work by Frida Kahlo,

Portrait of Miguel N. Lira, that I was creating a portrait of myself and these women, not of their face but a portrait of the women’s stories: stories that we can all relate to. While sketching to develop a composition for the painting of Loss (Figure 4, Appendix B), unconscious material that had been buried in my psyche since I was ten rose to the surface, from the time of my parents’ dynamic and violent divorce. While sketching ideas for the composition of the painting, I physically and emotionally experienced the loss of my father as a child. By contemplating the loss of another women’s story, I identified with it so deeply that it triggered my own experience of loss, pain that had been buried for decades, which had, unknowingly, dictated all my social interactions. I was freed of the festering sensation, the disturbing emotions had surfaced and expressed, and grace descended thereafter. Another conclusion confirmed once again, as a result of the fieldwork in the MFA studios: one of the many purposes of art is to connect us to our essential nature, to help us to be better functioning people in our democratic society.

Preparing for exhibition, I also created an online presence to connect to the global community (website, social media, blog, etc.), a business plan, and a brand with the intention to work and grow for many years in my ever-evolving studio practice, another support of my contribution to offer my skills in arts to my community. My ties to the university strengthened, as I contemplated teaching art during the process of making art. The research in the studios informed my purpose in writing this paper.

57 According to artist Chris Burden, a member of the faculty at the University of

California of Los Angeles, “People think that its collectors that support artists, but its really universities that support artists” (Karlstrom, 2000, p. 86). “Many of the prominent artists in California” from the 19th, 20th, and 21st century “work from the colleges and universities” (Karlstrom, pp. 86-87), people like Richard Diebenkorn, David Hockney and Barbara Kruger, to name a few, and “California schools have traditionally provided a focus for art community activity” (Karlstrom, pp.86-87). The research of this paper supported my interests in art and service, as I have learned to become an artist-teacher, mixing paints and writing lesson plans simultaneously. My interests in working as an art educator and using the schools as a bridge to connect arts and community strengthened.

Arts and Rural Areas

Some of the fieldwork accomplished was with a group of fellow students painting murals at local schools, libraries, and community centers. I conducted a case study of the partnership between two CSU Chico entities, the Art and Art History

Department and the Center for Healthy Communities (CHC), and the rural community that welcomed the mural at its site. This partnership worked with local rural communities to bring CSU students to work with community members to create public murals

(Appendix D).

In the classroom, we engaged in a dynamic dialectic in regard to current socio-political topics prevalent in the contemporary art world and hot topics in the

58 larger political sphere of the nation. All of these were present in and related to the communities we served. Such topics include the current government’s impact on education, arts education, immigrants, migrant workers, environmental issues, women equality, gender equality, and use of public resources. As discussed earlier, the public one works within and place is a topic of research for artists in education and SEA. We found that some of the populations we served were composed of minorities, a high concentration of students were using food benefits from social services, a large Mexican population working in the farming industry, and a majority of white populations established from early European settlers. This informed the production of the subject matter in each mural that we designed. While I worked to create large-scale works of art with my team members, a theme arose as I interviewed students, families, and community members.

They all agreed on the same point: they all want more arts in their communities.

CHAPTER IV

SUMMARY, CONCLUSION, AND

RECOMMENDATIONS

Summary

In this study, I pursued a better understanding of how participation in arts education and SEA builds community with the people who desire to create an ethical and moral democratic paradigm, and how this community building can be a successful, peaceful, and powerful method of a nonviolent protest, gestating right, true, and just change. I have engaged in classroom and community SEA. I have observed and interviewed arts teachers K-Older Adults and I have created a body of original paintings.

Art engagement can have positive effects on the character development and essence of a person. The sphere where Arts Education meets Socially Engaged Art has a thin line of division. Both use art, both work with groups of people, both invite views, welcome ideas, and stimulate discussion using the creative process. An interactive and social gathering takes place with a sharing of knowledge. Both inform and create connections within the individual, and can build community within the participants. Art skills, aesthetics, and divergent thinking and knowing are used in both

59 60 entities. These connections can unite the diverse population of people to create a holistic and collaborative environment to encourage principles of a true democracy. Schools have a responsibility to be a source to unite the community. Educators implementing place-based and community-building curricula that connect to people in the school’s geographical location is an opportunity to bridge differences in a diverse community.

Democracy can be attained by the active participation of people. In America, we have no one singular unifying idea to keep us united, but I plan to work together with others to continue to find a solution. I know we all equally share the human condition of loss, transformation, coming of age, and more in this diverse American public.

Art is also a method for developing skills that can be used throughout a lifetime for people with artistic inclinations, as well as for people that have no interests in the arts. The creative process that art-based learning offers accesses intelligences that help in any career. Uniting people with SEA around an aesthetic theme, or other public arts project, is a great method to build community and support a system with thinking and knowing peoples. Art education and SEA are methods that can support an effective democracy. They create an environment to give people permission to engage in using a method that connects a person with their essential nature. This connection, in turn, gives a person the ability to confidently express with purpose and voice feelings, needs, and convictions (a reflection of the experience of the person’s inner world) to connect and, if need be, effect change in the person’s outer world, the place one inhabits.

61 We live in Juneau, Alaska. Some people say to live in this climate you either have to drink a lot of alcohol, or meditate often, but I find that consistently making art and creating art together has the same effect. We artists feel the greys less often. (Creative Capital Blog, 2017)

Conclusion

When I moved to a remote and rural mountain town 20 years ago, I was drawn to the community of artists, the people that purport to bring arts to small-town life. With effort, they made the time to be immersed in arts as they continued to participate in the mundane events of daily life, sometimes in a cruel and harsh environment, amidst the consumer mentality of our capitalist society. One of the community members is the father of my first child.

After visiting the music scene in Ireland, he brought back the tradition of musicians and community members meeting weekly in a local pub, by starting weekly public-music sessions in a family restaurant in his small hometown. That occurred decades ago and to this day, musicians continue to drop in each week for this community arts event. As is common in Ireland, the site is a public restaurant and bar where families can safely attend. The feel for the connections between community members in a lively and celebratory environment had been what I craved and was seeking in my youth and something I continue to invest energy into now. Art in the form of traditional melodies passed down from generation to generation connects us to what came before and what will follow after. These moments connect us to our essential nature.

62 Recently a large mural was commissioned for the outdoor wall of the small theatre in this mountain town. The mural depicts a plethora of artists from a diverse multicultural background (a reaction to current themes of division in the political climate). One of the subjects depicted is my daughter’s father and good friend, Kenny

Davis. When asked about the mural, he commented, “If anyone is a community musi- cian, I guess it is me.” Davis has played at various events, many times voluntarily and without pay for over 50 years. Every month he plays old rag-time for the elderly at the elder-care home. Sometimes he shows up to play and finds that he has lost another friend and then his melodies are imbued with the feelings of loss, traditional songs written centuries ago by people experiencing similar themes.

I wasn’t able to stay in that small town for economic reasons, but my goal is to bring more funding for the arts to this community’s schools. My children attend the rural schools and my daughter currently receives photo copies of art activities for the portion that is art curriculum because her school currently cannot afford arts education in her middle-school classroom. I would like my children, and all children, to have access to art that educates and promotes successful, thoughtful, considerate, confident, proactive, and critical thinking people with vision.

I support and identify with the mission statement set forth by The National

Art Education Association (NAEA, 2018), which promotes the advancement of “visual arts education to fulfill human potential and promote global understanding.” The mis-

63 sions and visions set forth by the NAEA and the aforementioned U.S. Department of

Education are goals to strive toward.

In the future I would like to create a project that reaches underprivileged and underserved individuals. My target is specifically minorities, indigenous peoples, and women. The latter population includes survivors of human trafficking and women in prison. I consider what and how arts could be offered to assist and support mothers in places like half-way homes and shelters to help release them from what can seemingly become a prison-like mental state, a space where lack of nutrition and poverty deadens the spirit. How could SEA and discipline-based arts education influence success in their life and their children’s lives? Art brings value to the person, and a sense of pride and accomplishment. Critical analysis, divergent thinking skills, and art connect us to our essential nature and to our identity. From that body-mind-spirit connection, a person has the ability to accomplish great feats. Art education and SEA can help build community and character. They can be a form of non-violent protest against an unjust, undemocratic world. Using art as a source of community building can be a successful, peaceful, and powerful method of a nonviolent protest. As Margaret Mead said, “Never doubt that a small group of people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

64 Recommendations

A list of curricula is available in Appendix A for educators to use to build community with democratic principles in arts education. I suggest continuing to build community and use online resources, collaborate with others of similar interest, and invest time in developing relationships, such as arts associations and blogs found on the internet. In the nation, and globally, educators are concerned with similar social issues of current events and can network to offer each other ideas and solutions regarding how to implement topics in an arts-based learning environments. Some of these people and others are activists with the goals to change the limited social consciousness view of art, to a vision that is knowing, embodying, and understanding of art as an essential aspect in our everyday lives, a need that is similar to food, shelter, and water. A voice that is expressive, and united with other voices, becomes a shout to address concerns of social issues of neglect, rape, and abuse of people and the environment and illness that are rampant.

For people to understand how to express this voice, it begins in the home.

For parents and caregivers of all populations, I recommend providing materials, as a source of creative exploration to be available in reach of tiny and large hands at all times, that can be included in the family home, community gatherings, and journals for trips of any kind. The ability to process and digest information using a creative process, by simply expressing with graphite on paper, is easily accessible and available. I’ve seen the results in my children of an arts-based environment. Giving people the freedom,

65 support, encouragement, and permission to access these skills is the role of the parent, community member, caregiver, and politician. If unfamiliar with arts-based processes, seek out and access the expertise of people active in arts, such as educators and artists in the local community.

The qualitative research in the MFA studio practice informed my knowledge of academic and discipline-based arts so that I can enter into service to community with convictions of the importance of art. The artist’s statement for Nurturing Strength:

Women’s Stories in Portrait and images of paintings are found in Appendix B. This may be a support to artists interested in projects that are in the studio but engage with community. The time in graduate art studies reinforced concepts learned in studio arts from my undergraduate years. Reinforcing my convictions that arts-based learning is a necessary part that all subject matter needs in its curriculum. I noticed the similarities in my undergraduate education in studio art and previous science classes like physics.

I studied architecture as an undergraduate with years of rich and dense study in physics and calculus. When I attended 2D Design for a studio arts degree, the instructor introduced the book The Universal Traveler: A Soft-Systems Guide to Creativity,

Problem-Solving, and the Process of Reaching Goals (Koberg & Bagnall, 1974), whose methods and processes were similar to processes I learned in architecture and I realized the connection to discipline-based art education. The similarities between the sciences, math, and language arts are already in line with studio practices found in art classrooms, although at times they are faint. A union of arts-based learning and scientific

66 method is an ideal learning environment and I believe arts in the classroom is essential to a holistic education and a student’s success. To access arts as a community-building tool is part of the research in this paper. SEA events occur regularly and attending these events is recommended to promote the bridging that occurs within a diverse population that is necessary for a democracy. The intelligence that is developed in the realm of art should be accessible to all peoples in society and I would like to make it more so.

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APPENDIX A

ART EDUCATION UNIT PLANS: PRE-K – OLDER ADULT

PRE-KINDERGARTEN

Unit Plan: Our Work Is Our Play Media/skill: Finger painting Grade level: Pre-K Time Frame: Two hour period, twice a week for one month

(Stage 1) Description/Overview Children fully participate in the process of art: preparation, making and cleaning with guidance of a nurturing teacher.

Goals 1. Enduring Understanding Using arts as a building block for life skills and creating a foundation for love of art, children are supported in an environment with a teacher who is supportive and encouraging co-creating a fully participatory art experience.

2. National Core Arts Standards: Creating: VA:Cr2.1.PKa Use a variety of art-making tools. Connecting: VA:Cn11.1.Pka Recognize that people make art.

3. Objectives ● Student paints a work of art with hands. ● Student practices practical of making art: preparing, making and cleaning. ● Teacher is completely present to be an encouraging and supportive model toward student learning foundational methods for life.

Essential Questions ● Teacher: How do we prepare children in early childhood to understand and incorporate basic processes of living within, and working equally with others? How do we model, use cues, facial expressions, tones of voice, touch, interaction to encourage a healthy life-long love of arts in early-childhood education? How do we encourage interaction with objects in practical life settings?

73 74 ● Student: How do I care for myself and others, the objects and my environment? What are respectful and courteous actions to people and to the objects I use in my environments?

Knowledge ● Caregiver preparation is to review Maria Montessori guidelines to methods to create environment with access to practical life skills. Caregiver engages with making art as a way of life, and encourages child to use materials respectfully and with care. ● Caregiver reviews concepts from Nurtured Heart Approach to encourage and support success of all students.

Skills Demonstrated/Outcomes After several weeks of methodically practices the same steps of an art project, student will demonstrate understanding of painting skills, care and handling of environment and objects, and social skills.

Materials/Resources ● Non-toxic finger paint in bottles that have squirt top. ● Large thick paper ● Board for project ● “Clean-up” song or other ○ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFE0mMWbA-Y ○ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXPTN-Iw46I ● Teacher resource to review: ○ Practical Life methods for creating space in Montessori ECE pedagogy: http://montessoriguide.org/an-introduction-to-practical-life/ ○ Nurtured Heart Approach. Use the “3 Stands” developed by Howard Glasser ■ http://bookbuilder.cast.org/view_print.php?book=118152 ■ http://bookbuilder.cast.org/view_print.php?book=118152

(Stage 2) Assessment ● Student demonstrates ability to participate in art activity. Student demonstrates ability to handle objects with care. Student demonstrates ability to prepare a work space, by bringing items to table. Student demonstrates ability to make a painting with hands. Student demonstrates ability to care for body by cleaning painting material off hands in sink. Student demonstrates ability to place work of art in place to dry, to clean up area with a towel and spray bottle, and to remove objects from workspace and return to designated area.

75 (Stage 3) Sequence For the first two weeks, use one primary color of paint. Add a primary color to create a secondary color the third and fourth week. Use visual language to introduce colors, and teach child new words. Use this lesson for the first day by modeling actions and leading child through movements. Allow time for young student to wander, and gently guide and request child to return to and participate in activity. After several lessons, teacher uses verbal and physical cues to transition through activity. Towards end of lesson, teacher asks child to prompt the steps through the activity. ● Two-hour period: Teacher organizes supplies in easily accessible area for child to reach and handle, such as a low shelf or table. ● Teacher models preparing the art activity, and asks or assists child to follow the actions: a. Find the board and set on table. Find the paint to set on table near board. Place the paper on board and place hand towels near board. ● Teacher models handling paint bottle and pouring paint onto paper, and then demonstrates using hands to spread paint. ● Teacher asks child to demonstrate actions. If child is unresponsive to process, teacher holds child and gently guides child's hands. ● Teacher gives a cue when approaching time to clean up. A song and melody can be used such as the “Clean up” song. ● Teacher models washing hands in sink and assists child. ● Teacher models cleaning up area, and assists child In: a. Placing artwork on area to dry b. Wiping down area c. Returning materials back to designated area

KINDERGARTEN AND FIRST GRADE

Unit Plan: Painting a Word: Knowing Letters Are Simply Marks Built From Lines and Curves Media/skill: Watercolor Grade level: K - 1 grade Time Frame: One month, twice a week, One hour period

(Stage 1) Description/Overview Student will create a painting of the first letter of a word in watercolor. Prior to painting the letter, student paints line and curve marks and embodies shape in full-body movements.

76 Goals 1. Enduring Understanding The foundational learning process for the young child is through the freedom of movement accessing the essential nature, and with freedom marks are created on paper and are the building blocks to literacy.

2. Standards: A. VAPA: 2.6 Use geometric shapes/forms (circle, triangle, square) in a work of art. 5.1 Look at and draw something used every day (e.g., circles, squares, triangles) and repeat them in dance/movement sequences.

B. California Common Core State Standards: a. English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects—Writing (W or WHST) Traditional Notions of Text: W 2 Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing to compose informative/explanatory texts in which they name what they are writing about and supply some information about the topic. Expanded Notions of Text in Visual Arts: Use a combination of drawing, dictating and mark-making to compose a painting in which they name what they are painting about and supply information about the image.

C. National Core Arts Standards: ● Creating: VA:CR2.2.KA Identify safe and non-toxic materials, tools and equipment ● Responding: VA:Re.7.2.Ka Describe what an image represents

National Core Arts Standards: 3. Objectives ● Students will form shapes with movement of the body. ● Students paints line and curves with paintbrush in watercolor ● Students will make a work of art that resembles a letter. ● Students will participate in practical life skills of project in a workspace: preparation, making art, and cleaning of tools, body and environment.

Essential Questions How do we care for our living environment? How do we care for our work space? How do we care for our tools? What is a line and a curve? How do these shapes form a letter? How do we use intention when creating images with materials?

77 Knowledge Vocabulary 1. Form Drawing is the representation of a movement come rest and is brought forth from within and supports writing in that a child has the opportunity to practice different combinations of straight and curved lines.2 2. Primary color is any of a group of colors from which all other colors can be obtained by mixing. 3. Line is a long, narrow mark or band. 4. Curve is a line or outline that gradually deviates from being straight for some or all of its length.

Materials/Resources ● Board ● Paper ● One inch paint brush ● Watercolor paint, ○ Prang watercolor set: remove all colors except two colors designated for the painting. ○ If use tube paint, place small amount of wet paint in a small cup with water. ● Water cup ● L M N O P and All the Letters A to Z by Howard Schrager and Bruce Bischof ● Waldorf Alphabet Book by Famke Zonneveld ● Early childhood learning material for building shapes, letters and numbers from Waldorf Methods of Form Drawing ○ https://thewaldorfconnection.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Form-Drawing- Writing-Expo.pdf 3

(Stage 2) Assessment (Rubric found at end of plan) Student demonstrates ability to: ● Make marks with a paint brush to develop shapes and forms to create a letter. ● Form a mark with movement of body in shape of straight line and curve. ● Use a combination of drawing, dictating and mark-making to compose a painting in which they name what they are painting about and supply information about the topic. ● Students identify painting materials and paper in preparation of setting up work space. ● To describe what the image represents.

(Stage 3) Sequence 1. Student uses body movement to make lines and curves, by walking and drawing with feet, laying and standing in the two forms.

2 Anne Cleaveland, Letters & Form Drawing for First Grade, 4 3 Anne Cleaveland, www.lifebalanceforparents.com/sessions

78 2. Teacher prepares environment by making materials easily available for students to reach on low shelf or table, then asks student to begin preparing workspace for the painting project. (Throughout activity, teacher demonstrates process of preparing activity, making art, cleaning, and returning materials to shelf). Student identifies and places materials in workspace. 3. Teacher models the care and use of a brush: a. Wet brush in paint by gently dipping tip of brush in cup of wet paint (or wet brush in water, and drag tip of brush over paint tray). b. Applying paint to paper by gently dragging fibers of brush tip across surface of paper. c. Demonstrates formation of lines and curves d. Clean brush by gently swishing brush in water, then wiping the fibers of the brush across edge of cup 4. Teacher asks student to perform skills, guiding and directing student in care of brush. If child misunderstands processes gently hold child and/or gently guide hand. Student forms a series of lines and curves, in various directions. 5. Use cue to prepare students for the transition to end project. When student has completed painting, teacher asks student to describe what they created. 6. Teacher guides student in care of materials: a. Take brush to sink and gently rinse fibers in stream of water 7. Teacher guides student to wash workspace and return materials to storage area 8. Practice the previous lesson several days, then when student demonstrates understanding of practical methods of making lines and curves, move onto next step: 9. Read book to child from Waldorf methods library of letters:4 10. Teacher assists student in creating a painting by preparing workspace. 11. Create a painting with two primary colors, using a letter with from a word, for example, M for mountain. Voice the sound of the letter and word while painting the letter and picture. 12. When painting is complete, teacher asks student to describe painting. 13. Practice sequence of making a letter painting for several days, using a different letter every day. 14. When unit is complete, showcase all the letter paintings and as a class, point out the successes of each painting.

4 http://www.waldorfhomeschoolers.com/waldorf-alphabet

79 Rubric Criteria Not Proficient Developing Proficient Exemplary

Work of Art: No attempt Student attempts, Student makes a Student makes Technique of but unable to line and curve several lines and line and make marks of curves in various curve straight line and directions curve

Work of Art: No attempt Student attempts, Student uses one Student uses both Letter but image does color to make colors, names painting not represent a shape of letter color, and creates letter shape of letter

Participation Student makes no Student Student Student in care of attempt. participates in participates in participates in environment care of materials. preparing of preparing of and materials work space, work space, cleaning and cleaning and returning returning materials to materials to designated areas. designated areas. Student also helps other students.

SECOND AND THIRD GRADES

Unit Plan: Painting Nature: Collaborative Discussions Make Awesome Social Art Practices! Media/skill: Acrylic Grade level: Second and third grade Time Frame: 3.5 hours (unit can be divided over several days to use each activity individually in smaller lessons)

(Stage 1) Description/Overview Students practice interactive communication skills while composing a work of art.

80 Goals 1. Enduring Understanding Artists develop relationships working in a community with other artists to ideate, create, knowing that communication skills are essential to creating bridges between peoples.

2. Standards:

A. VAPA: 2.3 Depict the illusion of depth (space) in a work of art, using overlapping shapes, relative size, and placement within the picture. 1.3 Identify the elements of art in objects in nature, the environment, and works of art, emphasizing line, color, shape/form, texture, and space

B. California Common Core State Standards: a. English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects – Reading (RL of RST) Traditional Notions of Text Acknowledge differences in points of views of characters, including by speaking in a different voice for each character when reading dialogue aloud. Expanded Notions of Text in Visual Arts: In small interactive groups of four, using Nonviolent Communication5 (NVC) skills, students are sharing and responding with different art vocab words for critiquing art. b. English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects—Writing (W or WHST) Traditional Notions of Text: W4 With guidance and support from adults, produce writing, in which the development and organization, are appropriate to task and purpose. Expanded Notions of Text in Visual Arts: With guidance and support from adults, students produce drawings, in which the development and organization, are appropriate to creating a painting.

C. National Core Arts Standards: Creating: VA:Cr1.1.2a Brainstorm collaboratively multiple approaches in an art or design problem

3. Objectives Students depict the depth of space using overlapping and size, to create composition acrylic paint. Students will use NVC skills to communicate effectively during group and critique work. Students discuss ideas to develop a composition. Students ue art vocabulary words (visual language), during critique sessions.

5 Marshall B. Rosenburg, Center for Nonviolent Communication, www.cnvc.org

81 Essential Questions Why develop visual language? Why use respectful communication skills? Why develop observational skills and apply to drawing? Why design and ideate a composition? Why develop relationships within our community?

Knowledge 1. Vocabulary a. Composition is the placement or arrangement of visual elements or 'ingredients' in a work of art. Elements of composition are line, pattern, contrast, movement, spatial organization/perspective. Types of perspective are overlapping, linear, atmospheric, modeling, isometric, foreshortening, and color. b. Depth of space- space, as one of the classic seven elements of art, refers to distances or areas around, between, and within components of a piece. Space can be positive or negative, open or closed, shallow or deep, and two-dimensional or three-dimensional. Sometimes space isn't actually within a piece, but the illusion of it is. c. Overlapping- when one object is positioned in front of another object, part of the object behind it may be blocked from view. This is called overlapping d. Size- objects that are closer to a viewer appear larger than objects that are further off in the distance. e. Placement on the surface- generally, objects that are positioned lower on the picture plane will appear closer than objects that are positioned higher on the picture plane. f. Non-Violent Communication (also called Compassionate Communication or Collaborative Communication) is an approach to nonviolent living developed by Marshall Rosenberg beginning in the 1960s. g. Art vocab words: i. Visual elements of art and design: line, shape, texture, value, color, space ii. Principles of design in art: unity, variety, balance, emphasis, rhythm, proportion, scale h. Community art refers to artistic activity in a community setting. Social Practices is an art medium that focuses on engagement through human interaction and social discourse. Socially Engaged Art aims to create social and political change through collaboration with individuals, communities, and institutions in the creation of participatory art. 2. Skills/Techniques a. Discussion b. Ideation formation, divergent thinking and critically thinking c. Observational drawing d. Communication skills: verbal expression, sharing, listening and responding. e. Cutting, drawing, painting 3. Historical Context Community art, or Social Practices was developed with the performance art in the sixties and seventies. Social Practices or Socially Engaged Art is an art style where the art is the interaction that occurs between the participants in the group.

82 Materials/Resources 1. Principles of Composition Slide show by K. Swetha: https://www.slideshare.net/shwetha_srm/design-principles-24807533 2. Non-violent communication form, for teacher review: http://www.nonviolentcommunication.com/pdf_files/4part_nvc_process.pdf a. List of needs and feeling: https://www.cnvc.org/Training/feelings-inventory b. NVC concepts https://www.cnvc.org/Training/NVC-Concepts 3. Materials for critique, list of art vocab words. a. Art vocab review for teacher: http://corbettharrison.com/documents/lesson- docs/Chasing-Vermeer/Art-Vocabulary.pdf b. “Giving and receiving feedback from other learners.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZsJKQqqN9J8 4. Elements of Art: Line https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDePyEFT1gQ&list=PLiOil1qP- cMURN_8baOr3QWfySmIjqKIj 5. Elements of art poster. 6. Example of a contour line drawing. 7. Book: Thanks for the Feedback by Julia Cook 8. Sketchbook, or paper and board to transport 9. Paper, scissors, pencil 10. Large sturdy paper 11. Acrylic or tempera paint 12. Board or table surface to paint. 13. Brush and water with cup 14. Palette for paint 15. Cleaning materials

(Stage 2) Assessment (Rubric at end of the plan) Students have achieved objectives when demonstrated: ● The ability to brainstorm collaboratively during small group discussion to discuss multiple design options for composition. ● The ability to develop and organize a plan to produce a painting. ● The ability to use NVC skills to listen and respond with language that includes art vocab words. ● The ability to depict the illusion of the depth of space, using overlapping shapes of varying size. Student creates a composition with smaller shapes toward the top of the picture plane, existing behind larger shapes on the lower portion of picture plane. ● The ability to actively participate in sketching during fieldwork where students show the ability to identify elements of art in objects in nature. ● The ability to create a finished work of art, that includes depth of space in acrylic paint. ● The ability to use art vocab words in group and class critique.

83 (Stage 3) Sequence ● 30 min: Present composition by viewing slideshow, review several works of art that depict depth of space, and define and discuss composition. ● 20 min: Present contour drawing technique. Discuss elements of art using poster ● 40 min: Walk around campus and view various locations and discuss elements of art, and the shapes that fill the space around them. Identify the elements of arts in objects and nature emphasizing line and color. Ask students to create a sketch by observing nature, using contour drawing technique draw outline of trees, building, etc. ● 10 min: In the classroom, cut shapes out of paper with shapes students have created from fieldwork drawing. ● 10 min: Present NVC. Read book, review and practice NVC methods, and incorporate into following practice in groups: ● 20 min: In group work of three to four, each student arranges shapes on large paper, and discuss overlapping shapes, relevant shapes, placement of shapes in space, in regards to depth of space. Brainstorm collaboratively in the design problem. Move shapes around and create at least three arrangements. Include in discussion: ○ Each student shares presentation of one arrangement to others in the group, while others members listen and then respond by sharing observations and feelings using art vocab words to recommend how to create depth of space. 20 min: After deciding compositional arrangement, each student individually draws the picture on the large paper. The shapes can be outlined to create the composition. ● 30 min: Create a painting. (Use workspace processes presented in Unit Plan for Pre K). ● 10 min: Give a presentation on critique. Give handout on words to use for critiquing art. Give examples of incorrect and correct statements for critiquing ● 15 min: In small groups, practice critique each other's work using listening and responding from NVC process. Use a list of critique words as a guideline to describe art work rather than share opinion. ● 15 min: Hang the artwork on the wall and practice a group critique.

Rubric Criteria Not Proficient Developing Proficient Exemplary

Class Partici- Rarely if ever Contributes to Comments en- Proficient + Vol- pation contributes to class discussion rich class discus- unteers regularly class dialogue. when called sion. Attention to to class discus- Not prepared upon. Comments class discussion sion without when called are helpful and is apparent. Is dominating. upon. related to topics prepared with Comments are being discussed. course readings. insightful, reflec- Completes BBL tive and enlight- posts. ening.

Criteria Not Proficient Developing Proficient Exemplary

The student The student The student tried The student ex- Work of Art: fulfilled the worked with a few ideas plored several Creativity/ assignment, but idea, but lacked before selecting choices before Originality gave no evi- originality; stu- one; or based selecting one; dence of trying dent accom- work off some- generating many anything plished minimal one else; made ideas; tried unu- unusual amount of re- decisions after sual combina- search and com- referring to one tions; connect to pleted with min- source; solve previous imal amount of problem in logi- knowledge; effort cal way. demonstrated understanding problem solving skills.

Group Isolated from Involved with Actively partici- Makes useful Participation group activities. group activities. pates in the contributions to Not construc- Listens actively group. Makes the group (not tive. Contrib- and participates relevant com- dominating), in- utes little to in group process. ments and sug- cluding sugges- group success. gestions. Helps tions and over- the group be looked questions. successful. Focused on task.

Encouraging Is often nega- Consistently fails Never discour- Makes construc- and tive or unsup- to offer encourages anyone with tive comments to Supporting portive of agement and word or action. others. Offers Others others. occasionally is Occasionally frequent words negative or un- offers encour- and gestures of supportive. agement and encouragement. support.

Work of Art: Attempted, but Attempted and Depth of space is Accomplishes Skill and project is in- completed a fin- evident, but sub- sense of depth technique complete, and ished work, but ject is not fully evident from size did not use did not use com- described and and location of composition positional ele- formed with subject matter. elements to ments to create paint. Paint is fully create depth of depth of space. applied to space Brush stroke describe subject. does not describe subject.

85 FOURTH AND FIFTH GRADES

Unit Plan: Art Nouveau posters media/skill: Gouache Grade level: 5th & 6th grades Time Frame: Ten hours Name and Date of Author: Bobbie Rae Jones

(Stage 1) Description/Overview Students will research a Northern California tribe, identify relevant issues, brainstorm imagery to create an advocacy poster in style of Art Nouveau. Students are encouraged to illustrate a socio-political issue that the tribe is affected by, or have historically dealt with. If available, a community member or representative from local tribe can assist in a lecture of history and current impact society of on tribe and place.

Goals 1. Enduring Understanding Art that is thematically based in advocacy and culture can help us to understand relationships between people, cultures, place and art.

2. Standards: 1. VAPA: 2.6 Use the interaction between positive and negative space expressively in a work of art. 3.2 Identify and discuss the content of works of art in the past and present, focus in on the different cultures that have contributed to California’s history and art heritage.

1. California Common Core State Standards: English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects – Reading (RL of RST) RL 9 Compare and contrast the treatment of similar themes and topics (e.g. opposition of good and evil) and patterns of events (e.g. the quest) in stories, myths, and traditional literature from different cultures. Expanded notion: Compare and contrast the treatment of similar themes and topics and patterns of events in works of art in Art Nouveau, traditional and contemporary Indigenous art. English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects—Writing (W or WHST)

86 W 7. Conduct short research projects that build knowledge through investigation of different aspects of a topic. Expanded notion: Conduct short research projects that build knowledge through investigation of different aspects of a topic.

1. National Core Arts Standards: Creating: VA:Cr2.3.5a Identify, describe and visually document places and/or objects of personal significance. Presenting: VA:Pr5.1.4a Analyze the various considerations for presenting and protecting art in various locations, indoor or outdoor settings, in temporary or permanent forms, and in physical or digital formats. Connecting: VA:CN10.1.4A Create works of art that reflect community cultural traditions.

3. Objectives Students will collect information from various research to explore the art and culture of the local tribe, create a image from various subjects related to topic, then make a poster in the style of Art Nouveau using gouache.

Understandings Students will understand the relationships of place, people and culture they inhabit, and current socio-political and environmental issues associated with them.

Essential Questions 1. What is considered art and who makes the decision 2. How is a western art movement, Art Nouveau different and similar to traditional craft from local tribe. 3. What are current topics in indigenous culture of Northern California? 4. What are current topics in environment and wildlife of Northern California? 5. What is an artifact and who determines who is an artist or has the authority to make art? 6. Does Indigenous art belong in a museum? How was it procured and who owns artifacts in a museum? 7. Who are contemporary artists in Northern California and what do they produce? What is traditional art versus contemporary art?

Knowledge 1. Vocabulary a. Art Nouveau- a style of decorative art, architecture, and design prominent in western Europe and the US from about 1890 until World War I and characterized by intricate linear designs and flowing curves based on natural forms.

87 b. Modern Art- artistic work produced during the period extending roughly from the 1860s to the 1970s, and denotes the styles and philosophy of the art produced during that era. The term is usually associated with art in which the traditions of the past have been thrown aside in a spirit of experimentation. c. Traditional art- art that is a part of the culture of a group of people, skills and knowledge of which are passed down through generations from master craftsmen to apprentices. d. Museum- a building or place that exhibits art, where the collection of art are under ownership. e. Artifact- An object produced or shaped by human craft, especially a tool, weapon, or ornament of archaeological or historical interest. f. Positive and negative space- Positive space refers to the main focus of a picture, while negative space refers to the background. When used creatively and intelligently, positive and negative space together can tell a story using visual composition alone. g. Subject matter- the main idea that is represented in the artwork h. Form refers to the work's style, techniques and media used, and how the elements of design are implemented i. Content, on the other hand, refers to a work's essence, or what is being depicted. 2. Skills/Techniques a. Create google doc b. Research topic and collect information to store in document c. Compose work of art based off research d. Draft a poster e. Paint with gouache

Historical Context Art from Indigenous culture will be discussed. Impact of colonization in relationship to presentation of art. Contemporary art and issues in indigenous culture will be recognized. Skills Demonstrated/Outcomes ● Students will analyze and research local tribe. ● Students will make design a poster. ● Students will understand relationship to place.

Materials/Resources ● Poster board ● Paint brush and water with cup ● Board and towels ● Pencil, eraser, ruler, etc.

88 ● Computer access ● Information/resources for teacher ○ Sacramento River and Winneman Tribe ■ http://www.run4salmon.org/run4salmon-curriculum/additional- resources-for-teachers/ ■ Run4Salmon http://www.run4salmon.org/run4salmon- curriculum/ ■ “The Salmon will Run.” https://vimeo.com/230830363 ■ Curriculum guide: http://www.run4salmon.org/wp- content/docs/SOSG-TeachersGuide-Winnemem-V8.pdf ● Sense of place: https://www.lessonsofourland.org/wp- content/uploads/2017/08/Create-a-Neighborhood-Map.pdf ● Teacher review: “Gouache Art Nouveau Painting” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jy4xC6S-CXI

(Stage 2) Assessment (Rubric available at end of unit) Students achieve objectives when demonstrate the ability to: ● Conducts research to develop content for work of art. ● Divide composition in the poster into positive and negative space. ● Incorporate Art Nouveau style into a work of art that portrays California culture. ● Participate in group discussion related to topics, compare and contrast themes in various art, and identify culture from California. ● Identify, document culture, place, wildlife and indigenous people of California

(Stage 3) Sequence 1. 40 min: Present topic with member or representative of tribe, preferably an artisan. Display local tribal art and or show images. Discuss the cultural heritage of art of indigenous people. a. Analyze the various considerations for presenting and protecting art in various locations, indoor or outdoor settings, in temporary or permanent forms. Discuss indigenous art in museums, who collected the art, and who placed it in the museum. 2. 16 min: Watch “The Salmon Will Run.” 3. 20 min: Research terms related to California indigenous art, California tribes, etc. Create a google doc to hold information and found images. a. Place additional information in google doc related to: i. Animal in Northern California, and identify habitat ii. Artwork from Northern California tribe

89 iii. Student makes research relevant to personal interests iv. State and describe a social issue relevant to indigenous people

1. 10 min: Presentation on Modern Art and Art Nouveau. Discuss the movements style and commercial interest. The illustrative qualities of the style suitable for designing a poster to advocate for the socio-political issue. 2. 20 min: Use research to make decisions regarding subject matter and compose work of art. a. Choose image(s) b. With ruler create frame. c. Using observational technique, reproduce image onto paper. d. Make sketch of picture. Share image with a partner, discuss and critique, partner disagrees/agrees with concept and then ask teacher to confirm. Make sure to include using linework to create frame and imagery, positive and negative space, and space to lay down flat broad shapes of color e. 60 min: Paint image with gouache

MIDDLE SCHOOL

Title: Stories That Paint a picture medias/skills: Comic books (illustrative graphic painting) & Technology (stop-motion animation) Grade level: Middle School Time Frame: 5 hours (unit can be divided over several days to use each activity in smaller lessons)

(Stage 1) Description/Overview Students analyze and discuss components of storytelling, then create stories using technology painting and drawing media. Goals 1. Enduring Understanding Art tells the story of our collective human history, and artists contribute to the history of stories by creating works of art that link us to our ancestors.

90 2. Standards:

A. VAPA: Grade Seven 2.6 Create a work of art, using film, photography, computer graphics or video. 5.3 Examine art, photography, and other two- and three- dimensional images, comparing how different visual representations of the same object lead to different interpretations of its meaning, and describe or illustrate the results.

B. California Common Core State Standards: a. English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects – Reading (RL of RST) Traditional Notions of Text: Grade 6-8 RST6. Analyze the author’s purpose in providing an explanation, describing a procedure, or discussing an experiment in a text. Expanded Notions of Text in Visual Arts: Analyze the artists purpose in providing an explanation, describing a procedure, or discussing a process in a drawing. b. English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects—Writing (W or WHST) Traditional Notions of Text: Grade 8 W3a. Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, relevant descriptive details, and well-structured event sequences. Engage and orient the reader by establishing a context and point of view and introduce a narrator and/or characters/ organize an event sequence that unfolds naturally and logically. Expanded Notions of Text in Visual Arts: Draw a narrative to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, relevant descriptive details, and well-structured event sequences. Engage and orient the viewer by establishing a context and a point of view and introduce a character that organizes an event sequence that unfolds naturally and logically.

C. National Core Arts Standards: ● Creating: Grade 6 VA:CR1.1.6a Combine concepts collaboratively to generate innovative ideas for creating art.

91 ● Presenting: Grade 8 VA:Pr5.1.8a Collaboratively prepare and present selected theme-based artwork for display, and formulate exhibition narratives for the viewer

3. Objectives Students use the elements of a story to make a work of art. Students use technology to create animation. Students create symbols to describe a topic. Students draw and paint a comic strip with material from ideation session.

Essential Questions What themes are relevant to me? What is my story? How does the use of symbols, color, line make it easier to talk about difficult material?

Knowledge Vocabulary 1. Narrative painting illustrates multiple scenes within a single picture plane, the type of visual art that tells a story. 2. Content is the meaning, aesthetic value, or psychological aspect of work of art; what it says. 3. Theme is the underlying message in the story. Skills/techniques Students design a storyboard to ideate for animation. Students use technology in an interactive group discourse to make an animated story production. Students use the ideation and reflections from group animation project, to individually create a story in a comic strip. Historical Context Storytelling is an aspect of our visual art history that expresses themes and concerns in human life.

Materials/Resources ● Blick studio brush markers ● Large sturdy paper ● Brush, paint, water and cup ● Technology for stop-motion ○ Tripod stand needed for a tablet or smartphone, and ■ iPads in the classroom have stop motion applications. ■ Stop Motion Studio application for personal devices ■ Stop Motion animators can be downloaded to Chrome account ○ Images can be transported onto a computer and assembled into an animation using iMovie for Apple Computer or Windows Movie Maker for a PC (Bellmont & Brink, 2017, p. 16).

92 ● Teacher reference book: Animation Lab for Kids: Fun Projects for Visual Storytelling and Making Art Move by Laura Bellmont + Emily Brink ● Storytelling forms for teacher resource: Use all or part of pdf to teach students about elements of a story https://www.rcboe.org/cms/lib010/GA01903614/Centricity/Domain/4395/Element s%20of%20a%20Story.pdf ● Theme video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8muSkXjPHE ● Tate museum definition of narrative art: Gives teacher an overview of art history. http://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/n/narrative ● Storytelling teacher resources- ○ Oral history, first storytellers examples such as the creation of myth and astrology through the observation of stars in the night sky. ■ Visual Art: ● Narrative paintings- historical and contemporary ● Comic books ● Graphic novels ● Comic books, graphic novels, comic strips for students to read and review. Persepolis, American Splendor, Love and Rockets, American born Chinese, Tough love, Ghost world. ● “Wally Wood 22 Panels that always work” video describing building a comic strip https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_KwzCarm_0 ● Comic strip materials: ○ Paper ○ Vellum ○ “Wally Wood 22 Panels That Always Work” form

(Stage 2) Assessment (Rubric found at end of plan) Students have achieved goal when demonstrated ability: ● To create an original work of art, using film, photography, computer graphics or video. ● To examine 2-D works of art, discuss different visual representations of the same object that lead to different interpretations of its meaning, and describe or illustrate the results. ● To draw a sequence of panels to tell a story, using a character in an event sequence that unfolds naturally and logically to engage viewer. ● In a Partner Permission session between two students, each student analyze the other students purpose in providing an explanation of the process in a creating composition for the drawing of the comic strip. ● To participate in a class discussion, and collaborate to combine concepts by using the elements of a story to generate innovative ideas for creating art.

93 ● To collaboratively prepare and present selected theme-based artwork for display, and formulate exhibition narratives for the viewer ● Work in a group to collaboratively prepare and present animation and culminate in editing and presenting the narrative story for the class to view.

(Stage 3) Sequence 1. 10 min: Teacher introduces Storytelling. Students view presentation of contemporary and historical narratives in art. Storytelling presentation will give students definition and examples of themes. Define content, and story design which is made up of the elements of a story: plot, theme, etc. 2. 15 min: As a class, ideate and brainstorm story lines, using a theme from literature/arts to create content. Give students storytelling ideation form to write notes. 3. 20 min: In small groups of 3-4, collaborate, design, plan and execute a production for a stop motion animation. 4. Students create a Storyboard to break down each scene and plan for camera shots, select camera angles, and create shot lists. On a piece of 8.5 X 11 paper, draw a series of rectangles, each with a few lines to the side. Have students tell a simple story in the most interesting way they can using only the boxes (one for each unique shot). Draw as if viewing through the eye of the camera and write a short description of the action on the lines beside the boxes. Keep it short. Make a shot list that need to happen to make the story complete, and discuss with students the post production editing work that will happen (Bellmont & Brink, 2017, pp. 24-25). 5. 60 min: In small groups of 3-4, paint a backdrop using supplies in the classroom, and create figures of characters for story, using found objects, clay, wire, legos, puppets, etc. 6. 60 min: Set up each scene and take various shots to create a digital story. 7. Make a voice over, and edit using Stop Motion application. 8. 10 min: Conclude the session, writing a reflection of ideas, stories and themes in google doc or in writing. Students write what they saw, experienced, and felt. 9. 10 min: Students view examples of comic books. Students prepare to create a comic strip by viewing other artists works. 10. 10 min: Show students examples of many ways to draw. Show students examples of artists they can draw: South Park, Baseman, Graffitti, Xul Solar, Aubrey Beardsley. 11. 30 min: Student collects and reviews ideation document, Storyboard and any other notes accumulated from stop motion animation project. Student will individually design a story for a comic strip. Students can also consider stories from their life, and will draw most compelling story.

94 12. Break the story into five important moments, the five stages found in a plot. 13. Students view the Wally Woods 22 panels form and video. Discuss the various elements in each composition, to help shift the point of focus in each panel. Students cut each panel and pick out the five compositions they would like to use in their comic strip. Students take some time to move each panel around to create an ideal storyboard. 14. Students find a partner and collaborate, experiment and suggest new ideas for each others story. Each student gives “partner permission” to draw story, and then is approved by teacher. Planning of composition is complete. 15. 45 min: Arrange the five panels and glue in a strip across the top portion of the paper. Below each panel, student writes the five moments in the story. 16. Place vellum over the Wally Wood panels, and students draw composition in their own style in pencil. 17. Students create a new row of boxes for panels below the written portion. Students redraw story in new boxes. 18. After draw, use brush pen to create graphic comic book imagery. The image can be photocopied. 19. Student have option to scan images into the stop motion program to create an animation. 20. 60 min: At the end of unit, have a popcorn party with the class to watch the videos and present comic strips

References:

Bellmont, L., and Brink, E. (2016). Animation Lab for Kids: Fun projects for visual storytelling and making art move by Laura Bellmont + Emily Brink. Beverly, MA: Quarry Books.

Gude, Olivia. (2017, November 10). Presentation of Punished: Comic & Zines from Spiral Workshops. at CAEA conference. San Francisco.

95 Rubric Criteria Not Proficient Developing Proficient Exemplary

Class Rarely if ever Contributes to Comments enrich Proficient + Participation contributes to class discussion class discussion. Volunteers class dialogue. when called upon. Attention to class regularly to class Not prepared Comments are discussion is discussion without when called helpful and related apparent. Is dominating. upon. to topics being prepared with Comments are discussed. course readings. insightful, Completes BBL reflective and posts. enlightening.

The student Work of Art: The student The student The student tried explored several Creativity/ fulfilled the worked with idea, a few ideas before choices before Originality assignment, but lacked selecting one; or selecting one; but gave no originality; based work off generating many evidence of student someone else; ideas; tried trying accomplished made decisions unusual anything minimal amount after referring to combinations; unusual of research and one source; solve connect to completed with problem in logical previous minimal amount way. knowledge; of effort demonstrated understanding problem solving skills.

Group Isolated from Involved with Actively Makes useful Participation group group activities. participates in the contributions to the activities. Not Listens actively group. Makes group (not constructive. and participates in relevant comments dominating), Contributes group process. and suggestions. including little to group Helps the group be suggestions and success. successful. over-looked questions. Focused on task.

Criteria Not Proficient Developing Proficient Exemplary

Encouraging Is often Consistently fails Never discourages Makes and Supporting negative or to offer anyone with word constructive Others unsupportive encouragement or action. comments to of others. and occasionally is Occasionally offers others. Offers negative or encouragement frequent words and unsupportive. and support. gestures of encouragement.

Comic Strip: Attempted Line and color is Line and color is Technical skill of technique project, but blotchy and complete in comic line work and does not read sketchy and story strip but story is uniform color is as a story and is difficult to not easy to complete and fully drawing and decipher. comprehend. rendered. Story is painting is engaging and reads incomplete. well.

Animation Handling is Technology Technology Create an animated Technology dangerous to handled well, but handled work of art and object, and animation is lacks respectfully and handles technology incomplete the elements of a with care, and with care and animation is story animation respect. Story is created encompasses the understandable elements of a and interesting. story.

PROFICIENT HIGH SCHOOL

Unit Plan: Artivism Media/skill: Digital Media Grade level: Beginning High School Time Frame: Four hours (Unit can be broken into smaller segments over a period of weeks)

(Stage 1) Description/Overview Students use Design process to solve a problem. Students will research social issue, and decide on a problem for content. Students create a work of art in digital media using shapes and textual imagery. Students will write a letter to their State Representative in opposition to a current proposal or bill related to the issue

97 Goals 1. Enduring Understanding Artists use the Design Process to solve problems and create works of art.

2. Standards:

A. VAPA: Proficient 2.1 Develop and refine skill in the manipulation of digital imagery (either still or video). Proficient 4.1 Articulate how personal beliefs, cultural traditions, and current social economic, and political contexts influence the interpretation of the meaning or message in a work of art.

B. California Common Core State Standards: a. English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects – Reading (RL of RST) Traditional Notions of Text: RST5 Analyze the structure of the relationships among concepts in a text, including relationships among key terms. Expanded Notions of Text in Visual Arts: Analyze the composition of subject matter in work of art, including the relationship between subject matter. b. English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects—Writing (W or WHST) Traditional Notions of Text: W5 Develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising, editing, rewriting, or trying a new approach, focusing on addressing what is most significant for a specific purpose and audience. Expanded Notions of Text in Visual Arts: Develop and strengthen a work of art as needed by using design process: planning, revising, editing, reworking, or trying a new approach, focusing on addressing what is most significant for a specific purpose and audience.

C. National Core Arts Standards: ● Creating: HS Proficient VA:Cr1.1.la Use multiple approaches to begin creative endeavors. ● Presenting: HS Proficient VA:Pr6.1.la Analyze and describe the impact that an exhibition or collection has on personal awareness of social, cultural, or political beliefs and understandings.

98 ● Responding: HS proficient VA:Re.7.1.la Hypothesize ways in which art influences perception and understanding of human experience. ● Connecting: HS Proficient VA:Cn10.1.la Document the process of developing ideas from early stages to fully elaborated ides.

3. Objectives Students will create a work of art using digital media. Students discuss cultural, historical and political significance around current social issues. Students write a letter to senator, representative or congressman.

Materials/Resources ● “5 Steps To Make Your Own Political Art.” Video informs students of how artists use imagery to convey political imagery. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMVd5k2a2IM ● “Cases for Political Art: The Art Assignment, PBS Digital Studios.” History of artists in 20th century making political art. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfXad3HVox4 ● Feldman’s Model of Art Criticism http://www2.gvsu.edu/hipshean/resources/Feldman's%20Model%20Crit.pdf ● How to Critique/ The Art Assignment/ PBS https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9neybpOvjaQ ● Political Art of Ai Wei Wei/ The Art Assignment/ PBS https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMtsodcAsVU ● Tips for Writing Letters to your Members of Congress, Senate or Representatives. https://www.aota.org/-/media/Corporate/Files/Advocacy/Tips-Writing-Letter- Member-Congress.pdf ● Internet access, paper, pencil, eraser. ● Computer or Chromebook, photoshop or similar application and printer. ● Notebook or file for organizing and compiling information

(Stage 2) Assessment: (Rubric found at end of plan) Students have achieved goals when demonstrated: ● The ability to articulate how personal beliefs, cultural traditions and current social economic and political contexts influence the interpretation of the meaning or message in a work of art. ● The ability to develop and refine the skill of creating a work of art in Photoshop. ● The ability to use the steps in the design process to focus on addressing what is most significant for a specific purpose and audience.

99 ● The ability to analyze the composition of subject matter in works of art, including the relationship between subject matter, in their work and a partners work, and offer suggestions to improve the work of art. ● The ability to use multiple approaches in research to begin the creative endeavor. ● The ability to analyze and describe the impact that a political art has on personal awareness of social, cultural, or political beliefs and understandings. ● The ability to hypothesize ways in which art influences perception and understanding of human experience. ● To document the design process, and depict the problem solving process of the project from early stages of research to fully elaborated ideas.

(Stage 3) Sequence Day 1: 1. 30 min: Teacher Introduce design process as a problem solving journey as stated in Universal Traveler. Help students to think openly and systematically about the process of generating ideas for this project. Teacher prepares students to consider thinking about a topic they would like to use as the content for work of art while the class creates ideas through various research. a. The 7 Stages of the Universal Travel Model of the Creative Process: i. Accept Situation (or understand the problem.) ii. Analyze (the problem/situation.) iii. Define (restate the problem clearly by defining the goal. iv. Ideate (to think of the possibilities, come up with option.) v. Select (to decide upon the best option by comparing the options on important parameters such as feasibility, risks etd.) vi. Implement (by taking the plunge.) vii. Evaluate (to assess whether or not the solution works and how it could be improved.) 2. Students use a notebook to organize and catalogue the design process. Students take notes throughout the project, in notebook and can also save online images or sources in a file or document on computer, as part of the process to generate ideas. Images can be glued into notebook. 3. Describe to student how to use multiple approaches of research to collect information to create ideas for a project, e.g., read written material, discuss with others, contact an expert, brainstorm, write, ideate. 4. Teacher introduces social issue problems: hunger, poverty, homelessness, minority and women equity, asks students to offer suggestions, and discuss as a class.

100 5. 20 min: Students prepare for assignment by bringing in a current and relevant topic from a local, statewide, national or global issue. Make a list of the topics from students on board, and discuss as a class. 6. 20 min: Students view video, “Cases for Political Art,” view images of political art, take notes and discuss as class. Analyze and describe the impact that political art has on personal awareness of social, cultural, or political beliefs and understandings. Students will be creating a work of art in a digital file that can be displayed on internet. Discuss how artists impact and influence the public's beliefs with imagery on internet. What kind of image is needed to read clearly? 7. 30 min: Students will research different forms of activism. Students break up into small groups of three, and discuss different forms and methods of activism including, but not limited to, boycott, civil disobedience, community building, Craftivism, cultural jamming, demonstration, franchising, guerilla communication Hacktivism, Internet activism, lobbying, nonviolent and violent confrontation, propaganda, and protest. Each group picks a topic, defines and presents to class. 8. 20 min: Each student choose a topic of interest from local, statewide, national or global issue, for content of the project. Students respond to following questions; Why chose the topic? Is it personal? What change would they like to see occur? 9. Compile notes in notebook and google doc. Create google doc and file on computer and name appropriately, to store notes and images found from internet. 10. Students watch and take notes: “5 Steps to make your own Political Art.” 11. Teacher presents images of contemporary political art. (Watch film) After film class discussion where teacher encourages students to discuss how personal beliefs, cultural traditions, and current social economic, and political contexts influence the artist interpretation of the meaning or message in a work of art. 12. 20 min: Students use internet to research topic. 13. 60 min: Students use Photoshop on computer to create a work of art. (Application on chromebook or other device can be used). 14. In Photoshop open a new file and name appropriately. 15. Prepare by taking notes as to who the audience is that you want the work of art to reach. Where would you post this information? Social media, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, email, flyer? 16. Make sketches of an object that is relevant to content. Photograph or scan object onto computer and create a jpeg file. 17. Upload or paste image into application. Use brush tools to add color, and consider color dynamics, principles of art, and composition. Collage pieces of information related to content into work. Select and move objects across picture plane. Add text and use font relevant to the meaning the student wishes to portray.

101 18. Analyze the composition, and the relationships of subject matter in work of art, including the relationship between subject matter. Student uses principles of art to create an image. Move subject matter around on picture plane, and make various compositions. After student analyzes the components and relationships in the work of art and decides upon a final composition, ask a partner to review image and offer suggestions. After any adjustments are made, and composition is agreed upon by partner, (Partner Permission), contact teacher to review and approve. Make any other final corrections. 19. Save file appropriately. Save for web by reducing file size. 20. Students print the image and present for a class critique. 21. 30 min: Teachers presentation on critique and art vocab to use during critique. Teacher provides a form with Feldman's guide to critique, students discuss and watch video to view. 22. Class critique. As a class, use discussion to hypothesize ways in which art influences perception and understanding of human experience. How could their image influence understanding of social issues? 23. 30 min: From the current political topic, students write a formal letter to one of their State Representatives. Outline of the letter will include: a. Paragraph 1 i. Who they are and the reason for their writing. ii. Evidence supporting their knowledge of the event/proposal. b. Paragraph 2 i. Why they are concerned with the event/proposal. ii. Their position on the event/proposal and possible interventions. c. Paragraph 3 i. Synthesize their concerns and conclude with a salutation. 24. Students discuss the letter as a class, the rights and privilege of U.S. citizen ability to write letters to Senator in a democracy.

Reference: Koberg, D., and Bagnall, J. (1974). The universal traveler: A soft-systems guide to creativity, problem-solving, and the process of reaching goals (rev. ed.). City unknown: W. Kaufmann.

102 Rubric Criteria Not Proficient Developing Proficient Exemplary

Class Rarely if ever Contributes to Comments enrich Proficient + Participation contributes to class discussion class discussion. Volunteers class dialogue. when called upon. Attention to class regularly to Not prepared Comments are discussion is class discussion when called helpful and apparent. Is without upon. related to topics prepared with dominating. being discussed. course readings. Comments are Completes BBL insightful, posts. reflective and enlightening.

The student Work of Art: The student The student The student tried a explored Creativity/ fulfilled the worked with idea, few ideas before several choices Originality assignment, but but lacked selecting one; or before gave no originality; based work off selecting one; evidence of student someone else; made generating trying anything accomplished decisions after many ideas; unusual minimal amount referring to one tried unusual of research and source; solve combinations; completed with problem in logical connect to minimal amount way. previous of effort knowledge; demonstrated understanding problem solving skills.

Group Isolated from Involved with Actively participates Makes useful Participation group activities. group activities. in the group. Makes contributions to Not Listens actively relevant comments the group (not constructive. and participates in and suggestions. dominating), Contributes little group process. Helps the group be including to group successful. suggestions success. and over- looked questions. Focused on task.

103 ADVANCED HIGH SCHOOL

Unit Plan: Community Building: Public Mural Media/skill: Exterior latex house paint Grade level: Advanced High School Time Frame: Six months (unit is divided into segments over period of months)

(Stage 1) Description/Overview Students meaningfully engage with community to ideate, create and produce public mural to celebrate the community. Goals 1. Enduring Understanding Art is a bridge in a diverse population unites and celebrates community.

2. Standards:

A. VAPA: 2.3 Assemble and display objects or works of art as part of a public exhibition 4.2 Identify the intentions of artists creating contemporary works of art and explore the implications of those intentions

B. California Common Core State Standards: a. English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects—Writing (W or WHST) Traditional Notions of Text: W 4. Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience. Expanded Notions of Text in Visual Arts: Produce clear and coherent drawings to develop composition, style for work of art, purpose and public.

C. National Core Arts Standards: ● Creating: HS Advanced VA:Cr2.3.llla Demonstrate in works of art or design how visual and material culture defines, shapes, enhances, inhibits, and/or empowers people’s lives. ● Responding: HS Accomplished VA:Pr6.1lla Make, explain and justify connections between artists or artwork and social, cultural, and political history.

104 ● Connecting: HS Advanced VA:Cn10.1.llla Synthesize knowledge of social, cultural, historical and personal life with art-making approaches to create meaningful works of art or design.

3. Objectives Students will ideate to create imagery for a public mural by visiting site and interviewing community members to gather information. Students will compose several sketches in color of proposed mural. Students will create a PowerPoint as if presenting to community. Under leadership, students will paint mural. Essential Questions Why do artists make public art? What role does public art play in building relationships in community? What context have muralists created public arts in reaction to cultural, political, and personal history?

Knowledge Historical Context Murals depict imagery in various movements in history; the Renaissance, New Deal following WWII, Murals in Mexico during 19th century and the active role murals played in the 60s and 70s in civil rights movement.

Materials/Resources ● Internet access and photoshop ● Graphite pencil, color pencils, paper, eraser ● How to Learn About Contemporary Art/ The Art Assignment/ PBS https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=An3L7hQdkOg ● Paints – heavy body in a range of colors to include but not limited to cadmium red medium, ultramarine blue, Hansa yellow, titanium white, Burnt sienna. ● Brushes – range of sizes that include rounds and flats. Color pencils – Cloths Apron or painting clothes 18”x24” drawing pad spray mount painters tape heavy duty xacto knife + extra blades aerosol cans – range of colors respirator mask for use with any aerosol (specific) products. (eg; 3M 7500 Series Half Facepiece Respirator + 3M Filters and Cartridges) ● Politics and Painting: Murals and Conflict in Northern Ireland Hardcover – July, 1991 Marling, Karal Ann. Wall-to-Wall America. USA: University of Minnesota, 1982. Norwood, Susan. Diego Rivera and his murals. Yale-New Heaven Teachers Institute. 2005 Exit Through the Gift Shop – Banksy http://www.woostercollective.com/2011/01/el_mac_shows_us_how_its_done_in_ sin gapo r.html http://www.vimeo.com/11175747 Diego Rivera: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyLHcwBH6PI Baca, Judith. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSAPCysoQEU&t=149s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9heVR5VQw1k https://www.sftourismtips.com/mission-district-murals.html http://www.sftravel.com/article/guide-san-francisco%E2%80%99s-mission-

105 districtmurals http://www.7x7.com/take-a-walking-tour-of-the-missions-vibrant- street-art1787152350.html https://www.juxtapoz.com/news/street-art/wall- sessions-jonny-alexander-in-detroit/

(Stage 2) Assessment (Rubric found at end of plan) Students demonstrate ability to: ● To paint works of art for a public art piece. ● To discuss intentions of artists creating contemporary works of art in public. ● Produce clear and coherent drawings to develop composition for mural, to express purpose and celebrate community. ● To produce clear and coherent drawings to develop composition of style of work of art, purpose and audience. ● To synthesize knowledge of social, cultural, historical and personal life with art- making approaches to make meaningful design. ● The ability to explain and justify connection between muralist and social, cultural and political history. ● To demonstrate in design how visual and material culture defines, shapes, enhances, inhibits or empowers people's lives.

(Stage 3) Sequence 1. Teacher shows film of muralists celebrating community, discusses historical context of cultural, political history of murals and mural artists. 2. Students discuss population of site where mural is to be placed, and relevance of the audience to content of mural. In class, discuss intention of artists making contemporary art in public. 3. Students interview population for interests and themes relevant in community. 4. Design process includes synthesizing knowledge of social, cultural, historical and personal life with art-making approaches to make a meaningful design. Use ideas from public interview to create a design to demonstrate how visual and material culture defines, shaped, inhibits or empowers people’s lives. 5. Students create sketches in color with pencil or pen, to scale in relation with the dimension of the site. 6. In small groups, students create a PowerPoint, much like a presentation to a community meeting, which includes: a. Relevant information, and background research, that celebrates the community depicted. b. Images c. Site pictures d. Image in situ using Photoshop.

106 7. Students prepare wall at site based off need, i.e., power washing, base coat, etc. 8. Students draw image onto wall, use spray paint or brush/paint jar with one of following methods: a. Use overhead projector indoors b. Grid i. Chalk line ii. Tape string to wall 1. White or light spray paint, in a tone that offset wall color. c. Freehand like a street artists d. Use stencil or guides 9. Paint mural 10. Plan a date to reveal mural to community with celebration and food.

Photoshop example:

107 Rubric Criteria Not Proficient Developing Proficient Exemplary

Class Rarely if ever Contributes to Comments enrich Proficient + Participation contributes to class discussion class discussion. Volunteers class dialogue. when called Attention to class regularly to class Not prepared upon. Comments discussion is discussion when called are helpful and apparent. Is without upon. related to topics prepared with dominating. being discussed. course readings. Comments are Completes BBL insightful, posts. reflective and enlightening.

The student The student The student tried The student Work of Art: fulfilled the worked with a few ideas explored several Design assignment, idea, but lacked before selecting choices before but gave no originality; one; or based selecting one; evidence of student work off generating many trying accomplished someone else; ideas; tried anything minimal amount made decisions unusual unusual of research and after referring to combinations; completed with one source; solve connect to minimal amount problem in previous of effort logical way. knowledge; demonstrated understanding problem solving skills.

Group Isolated from Involved with Actively Makes useful Participation group group activities. participates in the contributions to activities. Not Listens actively group. Makes the group (not constructive. and participates relevant dominating), Contributes in group process. comments and including little to group suggestions. suggestions and success. Helps the group over-looked be successful. questions. Focused on task.

108

Criteria Not Proficient Developing Proficient Exemplary

Encouraging Is often Consistently fails Never Makes and negative or to offer discourages constructive Supporting unsupportive encouragement anyone with comments to Others of others. and occasionally word or action. others. Offers is negative or Occasionally frequent words unsupportive. offers and gestures of encouragement encouragement. and support.

BEGINNING COLLEGE

Unit Plan: The Figure in Focus: Painting a Self Portrait Media/skill: Oil paint Grade level: Beginning College Time Frame: Two months

(Stage 1) Description/Overview Painting a self-portrait through observation, student uses design process to develop conceptual value of the painting. Tonal painting, and analysis of master artists works are scaffolding unto learning.

Goals 1. Enduring Understanding Portrait painting is a genre in history of fine art.

2. Objectives Student paint value scales of tones, tints and shades. Students will research master artists paintings of self-portrait and the use of technique, color and style of artists. Analysis of painting of a self portrait as a conceptual work of art is addressed in design process. Students document design process from beginning to the development of larger ideas.

Essential Questions What do painters through history consider when creating their self-portrait? What are techniques and styles of other artists? What sort of meaning do I derived from painting my self-portrait? Is the painting a design process solving a problem?

109 Knowledge Vocab 1. Hue is the name of the color 2. Intensity or saturation or chroma is how one color differs from another. 3. Value is the different degrees of darks and lights of a color. 4. Tone is the pure hue plus grey. A hue is toned to reduce colors saturation. 5. Shade is pure hue plus black. 6. Tint is pure hue plus white. Tinting a hue reduces saturation

Materials/Resources ● Identity Bruce Nauman Art 21 https://art21.org/watch/art-in-the-twenty-first- century/s1/bruce-nauman-in-identity-segment/ ● Frida kahlo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NICodKeadp0 ● Oil paints: cadmium yellow medium, cadmium yellow medium, hansa yellow light, alizarin crimson, cadmium red medium, ultramarine blue, phthalocyanine blue phthalocyanine blue, titanium white, ivory black, mars black, transparent mixing white zinc white, dioxazine violet, magenta, yellow ochre, burnt sienna. ● Optional oil solvents/mediums: Turpenoid Natural or Eco House Natural Thinner (to thin gloss medium and varnish paint/ clean brushes--nontoxic method), Gamblin Galkyd (fast drying glazing medium, gloss finish) Gamblin Lite Galkyd (slower drying/viscous glazing medium/gloss finish) ● Brushes: for oils: bristle, gold nylon or sable (for detail). Flats: sizes #2, #8, #12 Rounds: sizes: #1, #4 Optional: filbert brush ● Paint Tank Mixing palette knife, Disposable palette, size 9" x 12" ● Mirror, easel, chair ● Blotting paper- roll of paper towels ● books

(Stage 2) Assessment (Rubric found at end of plan) Students demonstrate goals when show the ability to: ● Paint a value scale black and white ● Paint a color value scale in tint, tone and shade ● Use design process to create context for painting a self-portrait. ● Create a monochromatic underpainting of self-portrait. ● Use tonal painting technique to create self-portrait.

(Stage 3) Sequence 1. View Identity on Art 21 Discuss as a class.

110 2. Charcoal reductive drawing, look in mirror and draw an abstracted face of self. Pull out highlights with an eraser. 3. In various environments and lighting photograph a series of selfies, print them out and draw several gesture sketches with graphite. Add another media to image, color them, turn them to side. Look at drawing from several angles, and try to look at yourself from outside in. 4. Ask student to take note of interests, thoughts, ideas, recurring themes and cataclysmic moments in students life. 5. Create a seven-step value scale in white. Premix colors on palette. Brush white and black on first. 6. Create a seven-step tone value scale with a hue 7. Create a seven-step tint value scale with a hue 8. Oil painting. Begin with a monochromatic underpainting using burnt sienna and medium. Leave light places with very little color. Let the white of the canvas or board shine through. 9. Create flesh color with white, yellow ochre, alizarin crimson and burnt sienna. Mix plies of flesh hue with tone to create. Mix piles of flesh hue with tint. Mix piles of flesh hue with shade. 10. Paint the head with adding tones, tints and shades to create form. 11. Create a color mixture for hair, add black, grey and white to make shade, tone and tint.

Rubric Criteria Not Developing Proficient Exemplary Proficient

The student Work of Art: The student The student The student explored several Creativity/ fulfilled the worked with tried a few choices before Originality assignment, idea, but lacked ideas before selecting one; but gave no originality; selecting one; generating evidence of student or based work many ideas; trying accomplished off someone tried unusual anything minimal else; made combinations; unusual amount of decisions after connect to research and referring to one previous completed with source; solve knowledge; minimal problem in demonstrated amount of logical way. understanding effort problem solving skills.

111 ADVANCED COLLEGE

Unit Plan: Temperature: Am I Hot or Cold? Media/skill: Acrylic painting Grade level: Advanced College Time Frame: Three months (Unit is broken up into smaller lessons over a period of time)

(Stage 1) Description/Overview Painting figure with temperatures of warm and cool colors to define form and shapes of figure. Student will paint several preparatory exercises in color temperature.

Goals 1. Enduring Understanding Artists study works of master artist to grow and develop within themselves.

3. Objectives Student will paint figure with temperatures of color. Students paint Impressionistic style through research of technique, use of color, brushstroke, study of various Masters. Students read academic writing from contemporary art circles.

Essential Questions How does history of art movement influence my painting style? What are the artists of Impressionism and Modern Art thinking when breaking away from traditional methods of formalism? What is avante garde? What is a colourist method and tonalist method and can both be used in one painting?

Knowledge Vocab 1. Hue is the name of the color 2. Saturation (or intensity or chroma) is how one color differs from another. 3. Value is the different degrees of darks and lights of a color. 4. Tone is the pure hue plus grey. A hue is toned to reduce colors saturation. 5. Shade is pure hue plus black. 6. Tint is pure hue plus white. Tinting a hue reduces saturation 7. Secondary hue or color is created when two primary hues are mixed together. (Mixing a warm blue with a warm red creates a different color than mixing a warm blue with a cool red). 8. Warm is the aesthetic quality of color. 9. Cool is the aesthetic quality of color 10. Bias is the temperature a color leans toward, ex. Red can have a yellow bias or a blue bias

112 11. Relative temperature is when comparing two colors, one color can have a warmer temperature than the other. 12. Spatial qualities of color is when warm colors tend to advance and expand and cooler colors tend to recede and contract. 13. Complementary colors opposite each other on color wheel create a grey and neutral color 14. Limited palette can include six hues: three warm reds and three cool reds

Materials/Resources ● Golden paint intro to temperature in color:http://www.justpaint.org/defining- warm-and-cool-colors-its-all-relative/ ● Acrylic paint: cadmium yellow medium, cadmium yellow medium, hansa yellow light, alizarin crimson, cadmium red medium, ultramarine blue, phthalocyanine blue phthalocyanine blue, titanium white, ivory black, mars black, transparent mixing white zinc white, dioxazine violet, Indian yellow, trans oxide yellow, quinacridone magenta, yellow ochre, burnt sienna. ● Blotting towel, paper towel. ● Medium ● Brushes of varying size. 1” brush will be primary brush ● Canvas ● Palette ● Easel, table, etc.

(Stage 2) Assessment (Rubric found at end of plan) Student demonstrates ability to 1. Discuss color theory in relation to painting using visual language 2. Mix hues to create neutral hue 3. Create a series of examples of color combinations to create form 4. Create a painting of a figure using colourist and tonalist painting method.

(Stage 3) Sequence 5. Create a color wheel using the six colors. Mix two reds with two blues, resulting in four colors. Mix two reds with two yellow, two blues with two yellow, etc. 6. Create seven paintings of a sphere on small heavy duty paper using different combinations of color. Can use graphite to lightly sketch sphere, shadow and horizon line. Start with painting warm red in sphere, then add: a. Warm red + tint. b. Warm red + tone. c. Warm red + water (with surface influences depiction of sphere).

113 d. Warm red + cool red added to background, and to create volume on sphere. e. Warm red + tone to background, +tint to sphere + cool red in background and to form sphere and shadow. f. Warm red + water + cool blue to background. g. Warm red + tint + tone + cool blue (in background) + cool red (in background). 7. Paint Van Goghs Sunflowers. Begin with yellow, cool yellow for background and warm yellow for foreground. Add tints to help image pop. Add tones (warm red + cool blue) to flowers to create volume. Outline flowers in contrasting color, ( warm red + cool blue + warm blue). 8. Student researches and bring a reading about impressionism for class discussion. 9. Pre-mix colors for figure painting. 10. Use a warm yellow to create underpainting to depict the figure with simple outlines. 11. Add tints, then create form by using warms to pull forward and cools to help areas recede. 12. Create depth in painting and illusion of space with cool colors in back and warm colors in front. Example is to use a cool red for background in a landscape and a warm red in the foreground. Students create form with contrasting colors and use loose brushstrokes. 13. Group critique on in- progress paintings 14. Group critique on completed paintings

Reference: Markowsky Art

114 Rubric Not Criteria Proficient Developing Proficient Exemplary

Class Rarely if ever Contributes to Comments Proficient + Participation contributes class discussion enrich class Volunteers to class when called discussion. regularly to class dialogue. upon. Attention to discussion Not prepared Comments are class discussion without when called helpful and is apparent. Is dominating. upon. related to topics prepared with Comments are being discussed. course readings. insightful, Completes BBL reflective and posts. enlightening.

The student The student The student The student Work of Art: fulfilled the worked with tried a few explored several Creativity/ assignment, idea, but lacked ideas before choices before Originality but gave no originality; selecting one; selecting one; of figure evidence of student or based work generating trying accomplished off someone many ideas; anything minimal else; made tried unusual unusual amount of decisions after combinations; research and referring to one connect to completed with source; solve previous minimal problem in knowledge; amount of logical way. demonstrated effort understanding problem solving skills.

Color wheel, Assignments Student Student Student sphere are not completed completed demonstrated exercise and complete. assignments. assignments. mastery of color Van Gogh Application of Application theory. Colors painting paint was paint was are clean and minimal and minimal brush strokes are forms were not full and intend fully completed. for a clarity of mark.

115 OLDER ADULT

Unit Plan: Paint and Sip media/skill: Painting Grade level: Older Adult Time Frame: Six week course for two hours, one day a week

(Stage 1) Description/Overview Participants will complete a painting in one hour period. Each week students will create a new painting with different color combinations, technique and imagery.

Goals Enduring Understanding Building community through making art together unites members of a community to drink and be merry.

Objectives Participants will learn a new painting technique each week.

Essential Questions How do we give ourselves permission to create an atmosphere to access creativity and connect with essential nature, as we did as children? Where have we lost connection with our inner-child and how do we access this playful part of being human.

Materials/Resources ● Paint ● 16 X 20 Canvas ● Three Brushes- small, medium and large. ● Water container, two containers: one for wash and wet brush ● Paper towel ● Paper plates for palette ● Chalk ● Wine, non-alcoholic beverage and snacks

(Stage 2) Assessment ● Access if participants are able to relax in the painting and enjoy the process. ● Access if they have learned the new technique ● Access if people are communicating and interacting with one another ● (if participants are not relaxing into a joyful love of painting, offer more wine)

116 (Stage 3) Sequence An example of procedures of one lesson session:

Oak Tree at Sunset Skill learning: Blending technique, negative space

On palette, place large dollop of white in middle. Around edge add purple, red purple, hot pink, yellow and black. 30 minutes: Wet on wet, begin with a wet canvas by wiping with large wet brush: With large brush, wet upper portion of canvas. Dip tip of brush in white and add to all of purple. Load brush and use long wet strokes on top 2” of surface. Wash brush and wet next 3” Dip brush tip in white and add to red purple, Apply to next 2” below. Blending technique: With wet brush, make squiggly line at border of purple and red purple. Then with tip of brush drag all way across canvas in layers from top of Z-line to bottom. Blending: Do blending technique with pink Add 1/2 white to pink and mix. Paint over lower half of previous color. Add yellow clouds: add brush tip to yellow and mix in rest of white. With layers of arching brush stroke, create cloud formation over the light pink area in lower half of canvas. Let canvas dry, class takes a bread to drink, eat and be merry 15 minutes Using chalk, draw in tree: “Craggly” is the theme word. Then paint in trunk and lowest branch, then limbs to left, then middle limbs. Remember to keep a diamond shape in branches to place moon. 30 minutes: Using black paint and large brush paint the trunk of tree and large limbs, graduate to smaller brushes as limbs thin to branches. Using white and black, make the moon. Use gray to create the face of the moon. Highlight edge of branch around moon Participants have a finished work of art. Take a photo and post it on favorite social media.

APPENDIX B

MFA STUDIO

These paintings are the result of a long period of contemplation to discover a solution for how to live in an environment that is seemingly vindictive, competitive, and polarized. The solution gleaned is to notice similarities instead of differences. The dominant theme that is expressed in each painting (a different woman’s story is depicted in each piece), is one that can be experienced by anyone, regardless of race, class or gender. I have discovered that exploring the similarities of our humanity (rather than focusing on our differences) through my paintings, can create a bridge that unites diverse, and often divisive, populations.

Each painting in this series of acrylic paintings depicts narrative and symbolic imagery extracted from the core, or soul, of a woman who lives in my community. The intent is to illustrate the inner strength of a woman-- the golden thread of divine and nurturing force that is needed to endure difficult moments, including childbirth, isolation, transformation, loss, change of roles and enlightenment. The subject matter of each painting was created from keywords taken from many deep and profound discussions between the artist and the woman in the painting. The interactive component of creating the subject matter of each piece is social engagement. As one of the women said, “we created the painting together.” Over a period of six months, I consulted with these women individually to inform the creation of her painting.

The paintings are painterly, Impressionistic and figural with some realism in fantastical environments. I created the paintings as an act of community building -- especially among this women’s circle. Artworld influences in the use of color, portraiture, and symbolism include the folk and surrealistic style of Frida Kahlo, as well as the mystical imagery of Alex Grey. The spiritual and indigenous inspiration is influenced by visionary artist, Susan Seddon Boulet. Some compositional and figural decisions grew from the work of Cecily Brown. The painterly style and processes of Susan Rothenberg influenced my process. And the metaphysical processes of Traditional Tibetan master artists and societal trauma healing artist Krystof Wodicko have been a core part of my research in creating these works of art.

118 119 Interdisciplinary Master of Arts May 2018 Exhibition

Figure 1. Childbirth, 2017-18, 48” x 72” acrylic.

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Figure 3. Isolation, 2018, 48” x 48”, acrylic.

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Figure 3. Transformation, 2018, 48”x48”, acrylic.

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Figure 4. Loss, sketch, 2018, 18” x 24”, graphite.

Figure 5. MFA open studio.

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Figure 6. MFA open studio.

APPENDIX C

SOCIALLY ENGAGED ART

Figure 1. Inga Hamilton, 2015, La Pachamama Santa Maria Head, textile, ceramic, bone, resin, and polystyrene.

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Figure 2. Inga Hamilton, Project 24, Queen’s Island, Bangor, County Down, Ireland.

Figure 3. Wheel of Change, Bobbie Rae Jones, 2017.

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Figure 4. Wheel of Change.

Figure 5. Art tent: Weaving Women’s Wisdom Art Tent.

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Figure 6. Art tent.

Figure 7. Art tent.

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Figure 8. Collaborative weaving.

APPENDIX D

RURAL PARTNERSHIP: CSU CHICO PUBLIC MURALS

Figure 1. Corning library mural.

Figure 2. Corning City Council meeting. CSU Chico student Ryan Ramos presents his mural design for the Corning library. 131 132

Figure 3. Ryan Ramos with Todd Deck, head librarian, Tehama County, after Corning City Council accepts mural design.

APPENDIX E

ART EDUCATION

Figure 1. Examples of K-6 students’ sculpture projects at Four Winds afterschool program.

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Figure 2. Intern art teacher CSU Chico Bobbie Rae Jones teaching value scales for skeleton drawing to visiting elementary school students.

Figure 3. Basket weaving workshop at CAEA conference.

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Figure 4. Fairview high School art teacher Alexa Ledwith at Butte County fair student art booth.

Figure 5. Volunteer teacher assistant to fine arts teacher Andrea Nieopoth at Chico Unified School District. The Magic Flute opera by Mozart Wolfgang lesson involved theatre performance, singing, drawing, and painting.

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Figure 6. Group critique for beginning life drawing at CSU Chico Art Department.