http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2016/02/ceramic-coral-reefs-by-courtney-mattison/
http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2014/04/our-changing-seas-a-ceramic-coral-reef-by-courtney-mattison/ Courtney Mattison is an eco artist that uses ceramic installations to draw attention to the destruction of coral reefs, and the effect of warming ocean waters on the ecosystems. She says about Our Changing Seas III, "At its heart, this piece celebrates my favorite aesthetic aspects of a healthy coral reef surrounded by the sterile white skeletons of bleached corals swirling like the rotating winds of a cyclone. There is still time for corals to recover even from the point of bleaching if we act quickly to decrease the threats we impose. Perhaps if my work can influence viewers to appreciate the fragile beauty of our endangered coral reef ecosystems, we will act more wholeheartedly to help them recover and even thrive."
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How do you now use art history? How might you add more and be critically and culturally responsive? What technology or web resources might you use?
Incorporating art history is one of my biggest weaknesses in my curriculum. As I began to question the traditional ways of doing things in my curriculum when it came to art-making and art history, I knew in my gut that the way I was teaching was wrong. I knew what I was asking students to do needed to be less "project-y". I knew that students needed to see artwork that wasn't from the "Old Dead White Guy" version of art history. I knew my students needed to think creatively and create artwork with voice instead of following directions and being dependent on Google Images. I has been so rewarding to realize that my instincts were in line with what the scholars in the field were writing about and that the questions I was asking were similar to the ones people like Olivia Gude were asking. I began transforming my curriculum by revising the way I did projects and asked students to make art. As old projects fell away, I struggled more with the art history. My only way to teach art history in my pedagogical toolbox was to introduce an artist and then have students create a step-by-step project recreating their style. I knew that what I was doing wasn't right, but I didn't know what to replace it with that was that got my students away from their dependence on copying others' images. That meant I didn't replace it with anything and students ended up making projects without looking at any art. I also didn't have a toolbox of contemporary artists that would connect to my diverse population of students. The classics just weren't going to cut it. The resources and pedagogical techniques that we have read about this semester have given me a great starting place to bring back art history into my curriculum in a way that matches the values I have for my art-making curriculum. The idea of guiding students through their own inquiry about artists and historical movements seems to fit very well with the way I want students to inquire when they are making. A big break through for me was that I didn't need to have a deep knowledge of social activist movements to have a culturally aware curriculum. I didn't need to find artists of color making art about race, I just needed to show lots of diverse perspectives and art from artists of all kinds. I one final "project-y" project was my first project that my Foundations students complete. In the past, we watch the Art21 video for Elizabeth Murray, create thumbnails, rough draft sketches, final sketches, and finally create a shape in Elizabeth Murray's style cut out of cardboard. As a group the students put all of their shapes together into one painting. I realized that I was nearly impossible for me to grade them, and that all of the students had the same picture of their cardboard shape in their portfolio. This year, I tried to make the unit more open to student voice, and more connected to art history. We did the Elizabeth Murray shape activity, but only as an introduction and skill builder to composition and abstraction. Then I showed a video on how to appreciate and view abstract art. We talked about the difference between modernism, and postmodernism, and how what is happening in a society in a place and time influences artists. Student's then had to choose a modern abstract artist to investigate so they could answer the following questions. How would you describe their style? What elements and principles did the artist use? What did this artist value? What were their goals? Do you think their artwork is relevant to today? Why? What historical events or trends happened in society at that time that may have affected or influenced the artist? Do you like their artwork? Why or why not? How would you explain the value of their work to someone who said "I could do that."? Students then found a post-modern abstract artist whose work they liked to share with the class and then designed their own piece of abstract artwork. I am so happy with the results so far and the way students are showing off their voice and creativity. I also really want to use the strategies from the Teaching in the Art Museum text to discuss works with students and look at them for long periods of time. Tech resources that I love include Pinterest, Art21, and the blogs The Jealous Curator, and This Is Colossal. I want to have more breadth of knowledge about artists so that I can direct students to artists I think they would like. |
AuthorMorgan Singleton is a secondary art educator with a Master's degree in art education. Archives
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