Category: Social Justice

Art in Other Places by Kate Collins

“They Didn’t Know We Were Seeds” by Ana Maria Economou

Art in Other Places is a special topics course I designed and teach for the students in the M.A. program in Interdisciplinary Arts Infusion (MAIAI). In this class, students look across all of the various art forms to explore the many ways in which artists and arts organizations are engaging with vulnerable and marginalized communities. In the home video below, you’ll see the original spoken word poetry of TU graduate student, Jess Kless, who is an elementary school music educator in Anne Arundel County, now in her final year of the MAIAI program. And with the still photos, you’ll see the work of MAIAI graduate assistant, Ana Maria Economou, a fantastic teaching artist who specializes in ceramics, now in her final semester of the MAIAI program. Each student takes a deep dive into researching one particular population. Jess chose to focus on chronically ill children in the hospital setting and Ana Maria chose to focus on undocumented immigrants. Typically in this course, students take all of the research they’ve collected over the course of a semester and create a visual art installation designed to create greater awareness and understanding for the population itself and also the artists who strive to meaningfully engage and support them.

This year, students had the added challenge of using a large corrugated cardboard box as their main source of material for a 2D or 3D work. The photos of Ana Maria’s project show how she took up this task so skillfully. She crafted a unique box with imagery and text both inside and out, but especially noteworthy is the central element, a beautiful mask that she made using paper pulp in a clay mold. She titled her work They Didn’t Know We Were Seeds.

The video reflects yet another stellar project from Jess Kless. To account for the fact that we have graduate students with interests and skills in both visual AND performing arts, I decided to shake things up this Fall and bring in a performative option for the final projects. Given how it is often touted for its healing and transformative potential, the whole class had been introduced to spoken word poetry with a fantastic local guest artist, poet, and MICA faculty, Unique Robinson. The COFAC Diversity and Inclusion committee graciously funded Unique’s contribution to our class. For the final project, 5 of the 16 enrolled students volunteered to work with Unique to write and perform a poem with their research in lieu of an art installation. Each student had two coaching sessions with Unique and under her tutelage, they created some truly moving works. Synthesizing collected research and then being cautious to not speak on behalf of a population for which they are outsiders was no easy task, but these students rose to the task. Jess Kless really wowed us with her creative work titled This Room. Take a look…

"This Room" by Jess Kless
“This Room” by Jess Kless

MORE STUDENT WORK…

Artist: LaVerne Miers-Bond, MAIAI graduate and a high school art teacher, explored what she learned about art-making in and with Native American communities through the creation of a dynamic research poster that folds down into a book.
Artist: Gabrielle Amaro, current MAIAI student, and kindergarten teacher used a cardboard box and other repurposed materials to create a 100% touchable installation which captured what she learned about art-making in and with the visually or hearing-impaired community.
Artist: Sarah Zablotney, current MAIAI student and kindergarten teacher, explored what she learned about art-making with those who have intellectual or developmental disabilities through the use of text, image, and light.
Artist: Lauren Elfring, a current MAIAI student and K-12 art teacher, created a sculptural representation of her research combining her special skill with portraits along with cardboard, text, and image to explore what she learned about art-making with youth and adults on the autism spectrum.

 

About:

Kate Collins joined Towson University and became Program Director for the new Master of Arts in Interdisciplinary Arts Infusion (MAIAI program) in August 2014. Prior to this position, Kate was at Ohio State University completing her doctorate in Arts Administration, Education and Policy. Her action-research dissertation focused on socially engaged arts and cultivating the civic imagination of student and youth artists. Read more

Interdisciplinary Arts Infusion (M.A.) The Master of Arts in Interdisciplinary Arts Infusion (MAIAI) is a one-of-a-kind, graduate program designed for classroom teachers, arts specialists, teaching artists, administrators and arts entrepreneurs.

With all of the hardships and difficulties brought by the pandemic, I have to say that the work my grad students did on their final projects in the Fall semester was an absolute silver lining. These students are largely working teachers and teaching artists so they already had a lot on their plates, but even so, every one of them truly stepped up for a really challenging task and just shined!

Categories: Art, Community, Silver Linings 2020-21, Social Justice

Making Lemonade

“Hands of Power,” photos by Lauren Castellana

By Vincent E. Thomas

As I sit to write this blog entry, I wanted to consider the meaning of the silver lining? Traced back to the writings of John Milton about a cloud’s silver lining, I admit I had no real knowledge of him nor his writing. But I did have a memory of my grandmother teaching me the power of making the best out of the ‘not so best’. In other words, ‘making a way out of no way’, as they would often say in the Southern Baptist church. Big Ma (the late Mariah Brown) was a spiritual soul from the south, who always saw good in others. I am reminded of Big Ma and me making lemonade and sweet tea in the cozy kitchen. This memory of (as a child) taking sour lemons and making something sweet and delicious out of it, is what has stayed with me during these times.

This pandemic has been, truthfully, troubling, and challenging on so many levels. Since March 13th, the pivot dance has been my Electric Slide, my Cupid Shuffle, and my Wobble. And this dance continued into the fall semester, as we pivoted into all online/virtual classes (teaching and learning). So in true Big Ma fashion, I decided to make some lemonade.

A huge pitcher of lemonade has been the Modern Repertory class. In early August, I decided to create a piece inspired by the 100th Anniversary of the 19th Amendment, Women’s Suffrage Movement, March on Washington 1963/2020, and Voting. It has been a thirst-quenching journey. The virtual platform challenges, the diminished individual moving spaces, the lack of in-person physical community and tactile connections were the lemons, and the research, creative processes, personal investigations of subject matter, new ways to connect with a larger university community, and the students were the cups of sugar. The result is the dance piece “Hands of Power”. The work has five sections: My first vote…, I am…, In my hands…, In my feet…, and In our Rights. For the section In my feet…, I reached across and within the university community to engage collaborative partnerships with others in an organized “artful” march. I work in the pageantry marching arts so I am very familiar with aspects of marching, but I wanted to bridge and fold social justice and social movement marches into this creative process for art. It was really important to share with the dancers, in practice, how life and art reflects each other. One of my favorite quotes is “Life imitates art far more than art imitates life” by Oscar Wilde. 

What initially was going to be nine dancers ended up being over thirty participants, two videographers, and one photographer. The participants were asked to create signage for the march and to consider what would be a platform they would march about. What would/do they stand up for? What cause do they value and want to add their voice? What issues would/do they vote for? It was an amazing gathering of folks across a spectrum, coming together for a common goal of common good. In my feet… is performed by Modern Repertory, TU Dance Company, Assistant Professor Alison Seidenstricker (Dept. of Dance), Assistant Professor Michelle Humphreys (Dept. of Music), Bria Bennett (Athletic Dept.- Community Partners Coordinator), Luis Sierra (Office of Civic Engagement), three members of the Women’s Track & Field, members of Towson AIDE, and several other Towson University students. Videographers: Rebecca Wolf (Dept. of Dance- Production Coordinator) and Ben Rosenbaum (Athletic Dept.- Director of Digital Media), and Alex Wright (TU Photographer).

At the beginning of the semester, I had no idea it would turn out this way. Throughout the creative process, I continued to listen to the art and allow it to blossom, stir, and evolve into a tall pitcher of lemonade.

About

Vincent E. Thomas, professor in the Department of Dance, is a dancer, choreographer and educator. Thomas received his MFA in Dance from Florida State University and a BME in Music from the University of South Carolina. His multi-dimensional company VTDance builds on the use of contemporary dance, improvisation, text/ movement, a variety of sound sources, and collaborations with other artists, including dancers, musicians, poets, visual artists, and others [to be discovered]. These ideas coupled with witty, poignant, athletic and gestural movement are the rich palette for VTDance. Vincent was awarded the 2019 Board of Regents Faculty Award for Excellence in Scholarship, Research, Creative Activity. More recently he received the MDEA’s 2020 Living Legacy award by the Maryland Dance Education Association.

Categories: Awards, DANCE, Social Justice