VISITING
ILLUSTRATOR PROGRAMS: Part 2
SPECIAL
PRESENTATIONS AND RESIDENCIES:
Created for specific topics or events, designed by myself,
or in collaboration with teachers, librarians, organizations. These might
give educators ideas on creating units of study in their own classrooms.
If you'd like a detailed account of any program, feel free to email me.
POET
IN OUR SCHOOLS:
(grades
4-5)
To give students a better understanding and appreciation
of poetry, students were given a series of workshops with a visiting
poet, where they learned to write their own poems. Then I spent two
days working with students to help them illustrate the poems they wrote.
Each class would select poems and art to be printed in a bound, black
and white booklet. There was a special “poetry night” for
students and their families, where art and poems were displayed, and
a number of students read aloud from their work, and the booklets were
given to the students and their families.
Poem
samples: 4-5 grades Poetry/Art Booklet
Life
my ancestor is life
Life as a god
Life as an animal
a fish, a hawk.
My heart is a god
it never dies
my ancestor is me
life ... as
me
"Nightmares are venus
flowers
eating my hopes alive"
PROGRAMS
FOR THE INSTITUTE FOR ARTS IN EDUCATION
I.A.E.'s
mission is to create a series of yearly programs that can be brought
in to the schools to teach Aesthetic education, which considers basic
questions about the nature of art, and the perceiver's experience when
viewing the work. I designed and taught a workshop for teachers and
educators for both institutes, based on the art of books, and later
brought these programs and displays into schools that requested these
units of study from the institute.
BOOKS AS ART:
(The Southern Tier Institute for Aesthetic Education
1998)
commercially produced books as well as “fine” art using books
or in the shape of books. Why did the artist choose books as a medium?
What is the difference in the two? How are design elements used?
THE
ART OF LITERATURE:
(Central
New York Institute for Arts in Education,1999-2000)
What does
a metaphor look like, how is the mood expressed through illustrations,
how are design elements used?
REFLECTIONS
OF ME:
“Personality Portraits” Empire
State Partnership Project,
Created
in conjunction with the Everson Museum of Art and Franklin Magnet Schools
to promote 'visual thinking strategies'.
As part of the project, I created a program called “Personality
Portraits,” where I spent three weeks each—with grade levels
3 to 5 in creating a “portrait” that reflected aspects of
their lives—cultural heritage and family traditions, pass-times
and hobbies, what animals, colors, and textures represented something
about them, mannerisms, their loves and fears, their dreams and heroes,
and possible future careers, favorite poems and songs, etc.
I also focused on teaching the elements of design in simple, fun ways.
The students' art was displayed in a special exhibit at the Everson
Museum of Art.
SCHOOL
OF THE FUTURE:
A two day
artist in residency program to help celebrate the 75th anniversary of
an elementary school, I helped students create illustrations of what
their school, classes, and teachers might look like in the distant future.
They learned to use reference and objects to help them create the art,
then they wrote stories to accompany the illustrations.
MAKING
A BOOK—After
School Program
A four day program for a small group. Children worked together to create
an illustrated book based on a topic they were studying during their
school semester: Alaskan animals, native peoples, economy, symbols,
and history.
Each child was responsible for creating a page for the book, text and
art, which they studied and researched. Afterwards, they dedicated and
binded the book. It was displayed with sculptures they created of Alaskan
animals.
MAKING
A BOOK—School Residency Program
A three day Program. Kids learned how to write their own picture-book
story, as well as illustrate and bind their own picture-books. Teachers
and librarians worked on the writing of the story in the class while
I focused on steps to illustrate and bind the book.
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A
sampling of Picture Books created during the Residency Program
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MAKING
A BOOK—Library Summer Program
Read
about a similar program for a public library.
