So it has finally come to an end.
Friday will be my last day at the Amon Carter Museum of American Art. It was a great experience. I feel I learned so much. It hard to imagine that come next week I will no longer be a fellow there. Everyone was so supportive and gave me the room to share my ideas. The experience really helped me decide what I want to do in the future. I found a love for community programs and I hope in my future endeavors I can continue designing/assisting with programs in the future. The Amon Carter was a wonderful place to work and any UNT student would be lucky to get the chance to work there. It's kind of strange since many of the people I first met there have left and there is a new staff. This week I only have one more program to help with. It is an afterschool program at an elementary school. The kids were a blast. I am a little sad this is the last one I will be helping with because I had finally earned their trust. It is strange how much working with K-12 students is built on trust. I do not think you can effectively teach someone until they trust you and it took weeks for the kids to become comfortable with me. I finally got the student who refused to do anything we asked to listen to us. He is a nice kid, but he did not like us.
Besides helping with that final program, I do not have much to do this week. I do need to clean up my desk it is covered with supplies leftover from programs and art that participants have given me. Friday is not only my last day at the museum but also the day I graduate. I will be leaving two places this week. I am looking forward to the future.
Sunday, December 8, 2019
Saturday, December 7, 2019
Workshops
November felt like a culmination of a lot of hard work. In the two previous posts I talked about the Wandering Wardrobe, but that is only a small part of my job in Onstead. Most of my focus is professional developments and community workshops. On November 8th and 9th we had two sessions that we had been preparing for since the beginning of the semester.
On Friday, November 8th, Keller ISD brought 25 art teachers to UNT for two professional development sessions. They spent the morning in the fabrication lab learning about pixels and the afternoon in the fibers lab working on string as line. They were led by Abby Sherril who brought her knowledge of tech merged with physical making. They stitched, programed and played. It was pretty great.
The next day: Saturday, November 9th, Lauren Lake led a community workshop at Lewisville Community Center. It was a mixed bag of teachers, personal makers and the curious, and made for a very fun day. They made new sketchbooks their own through collage, sketch and alteration.
All three sessions had required weeks of planning, many meetings and lots of purchases, but were over in hours. They all received rave reviews from the participants, gaining the teachers involved valuable professional development hours and hopefully skills that will feed their classrooms. As for the individual makers, I hope they left with a sense of joy and a longing to continue their own art practice.
On Friday, November 8th, Keller ISD brought 25 art teachers to UNT for two professional development sessions. They spent the morning in the fabrication lab learning about pixels and the afternoon in the fibers lab working on string as line. They were led by Abby Sherril who brought her knowledge of tech merged with physical making. They stitched, programed and played. It was pretty great.
The next day: Saturday, November 9th, Lauren Lake led a community workshop at Lewisville Community Center. It was a mixed bag of teachers, personal makers and the curious, and made for a very fun day. They made new sketchbooks their own through collage, sketch and alteration.
All three sessions had required weeks of planning, many meetings and lots of purchases, but were over in hours. They all received rave reviews from the participants, gaining the teachers involved valuable professional development hours and hopefully skills that will feed their classrooms. As for the individual makers, I hope they left with a sense of joy and a longing to continue their own art practice.
Wandering Wardrobe
On November 7th I got to visit Denton High School for Onstead and Wandering Wardrobe.
This is a court coat from the 1780s. It, along with lesson plans and information about its historical relevance, craftsmanship and creations, will be available for check-out for classrooms starting in the spring.
On this day, however, it was escorted by myself and Annette Becker. Me, just to observe, answer individual questions & take pictures, and Annette to give her amazing talk.
Annette spoke to the class and then pulled out the garment for closer examination.
The students were able to interact with historic fashion, while learning about its placement within history. It bridged the skills used to create the piece to to skills they are learning in their class in current day.
The specific focus, of the court coat is its amazing embroidery. Since the students are also learning to stitch they shared their own work with us.
We were able to converse one-on-one with students about their aspirations in art and fashion and to help direct them on that path. This day was a really awesome experience.
Wandering Wardrobe Beginnings
I'm trying to get in all my information (and tell you more about Onstead). Its been a busy semester & I had no idea how much I was taking on when I signed up. But it has been great too.
As I previously mentioned, Onstead has partnered with the Texas Fashion Collection to create the Wandering Wardrobe (WW). WW is a collaboration designed to use historical garments as teaching tools that can be checked out by educators to use in their classroom. They not only include some amazing pieces that can be viewed and (carefully) handled by teachers and students, they also include possible lessons involving art history and making. They can be tied to historical situations of their time, or even math and science. They are a true STEAM package.
Part of my role this semester is to help get this program rolling. In addition to working on a system of tracking the packages in the WW library, we are also working on promotion and teacher training. In October, Annette & I met with a director to decide on information to include in a series of promotional videos & photos. That lead to a full day photo & video shoot with both her and Peter being interviewed for specifics on both TFC and Onstead.
The promo work is currently in edits & should be going up on our social & website early next semester. The spring is also when we will start allowing pieces to be released to educators.
Tune in to my next post to see one of those pieces & see a classroom visit with Annette.
Ciao!
As I previously mentioned, Onstead has partnered with the Texas Fashion Collection to create the Wandering Wardrobe (WW). WW is a collaboration designed to use historical garments as teaching tools that can be checked out by educators to use in their classroom. They not only include some amazing pieces that can be viewed and (carefully) handled by teachers and students, they also include possible lessons involving art history and making. They can be tied to historical situations of their time, or even math and science. They are a true STEAM package.
Part of my role this semester is to help get this program rolling. In addition to working on a system of tracking the packages in the WW library, we are also working on promotion and teacher training. In October, Annette & I met with a director to decide on information to include in a series of promotional videos & photos. That lead to a full day photo & video shoot with both her and Peter being interviewed for specifics on both TFC and Onstead.
The promo work is currently in edits & should be going up on our social & website early next semester. The spring is also when we will start allowing pieces to be released to educators.
Tune in to my next post to see one of those pieces & see a classroom visit with Annette.
Ciao!
Sunday, December 1, 2019
Getting ready: plan, write, communicate.
Most of my time in Onstead is about planning, writing and communicating.
Peter gets communications from school districts, cities, museums and other groups inquiring about workshops. Sometimes we do a visit or meeting with the people who reach out. Other times it's all phones calls and emails.
From there we help them figure out specifics; whether it is something we have done before or completely new, and whether it will be held at UNT or offsite. We reach out to potential and returning session leaders, or we plan to run the sessions completely with in-house staff.
Session leaders cover a wide range of topics: from pedagogy to art making. It all depends on their specialty. Regardless of whether the sessions leaders are guests or staff, a lot of thought goes into their planning. It's a lot like preparing assignments for classes when you are a Teaching Fellow, except you have to consider your audience much more. Is it a professional development for teachers? If so, what grade do they teach? Elementary teachers require a completely different type of workshop than secondary educators. Is the session actually for students in K-12? If the workshop is being requested by someone other than a school district representative, is it a community event?
Once workshops are planned and leaders are in place, we order supplies and verify spaces, all the while keeping in close communication with the people requesting the development. It may not be glamorous, but it's kind of fun making sure that everything is in place for the day.
Peter gets communications from school districts, cities, museums and other groups inquiring about workshops. Sometimes we do a visit or meeting with the people who reach out. Other times it's all phones calls and emails.
From there we help them figure out specifics; whether it is something we have done before or completely new, and whether it will be held at UNT or offsite. We reach out to potential and returning session leaders, or we plan to run the sessions completely with in-house staff.
Session leaders cover a wide range of topics: from pedagogy to art making. It all depends on their specialty. Regardless of whether the sessions leaders are guests or staff, a lot of thought goes into their planning. It's a lot like preparing assignments for classes when you are a Teaching Fellow, except you have to consider your audience much more. Is it a professional development for teachers? If so, what grade do they teach? Elementary teachers require a completely different type of workshop than secondary educators. Is the session actually for students in K-12? If the workshop is being requested by someone other than a school district representative, is it a community event?
Once workshops are planned and leaders are in place, we order supplies and verify spaces, all the while keeping in close communication with the people requesting the development. It may not be glamorous, but it's kind of fun making sure that everything is in place for the day.
Some specifics
WOW! This semester has been CRAZY! I thought I had shared this post but it sat there as a draft. Now I'm going to be posting, posting and posting some more.
SO without further ado:
At the beginning of the semester I got to go on my first Onstead visit. We got a call from a new project space: Latino Arts Project, in the Dallas design district. We met with the educator, director and overseer of the space. They were looking to make connections with educational organizations in the area and, of course, Onstead fits that description. Peter & I were told by the director that they do not see themselves as either a museum or gallery, therefore "project" better fits their mission.
In addition to the meeting, we got to experience their inaugural show featuring sculptural works from private collections and museums across Mexico, mostly moquettes of major monuments. The space is small and never should have been able to contain so many works well, but it was curated beautifully. The mix of conventional cool white, ala every gallery ever, warm laminated wood and traditional costume as reference to statuary(curtesy of guidance from Annette from the TFC) was very successful.
We left with new contacts, some awesome opportunities for bridges to art education and with having had an amazing experience.
SO without further ado:
At the beginning of the semester I got to go on my first Onstead visit. We got a call from a new project space: Latino Arts Project, in the Dallas design district. We met with the educator, director and overseer of the space. They were looking to make connections with educational organizations in the area and, of course, Onstead fits that description. Peter & I were told by the director that they do not see themselves as either a museum or gallery, therefore "project" better fits their mission.
In addition to the meeting, we got to experience their inaugural show featuring sculptural works from private collections and museums across Mexico, mostly moquettes of major monuments. The space is small and never should have been able to contain so many works well, but it was curated beautifully. The mix of conventional cool white, ala every gallery ever, warm laminated wood and traditional costume as reference to statuary(curtesy of guidance from Annette from the TFC) was very successful.
We left with new contacts, some awesome opportunities for bridges to art education and with having had an amazing experience.
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