Art Education is...
I have worked on and off in art education since 1997. I am an avid proponent of creating more communally-run, inter-generational art-making “classes'' in which creators of all ages can share their interests, passions and joys with one another... and grow together.
Never too young or too old for GroupArt
In the summer of 2021, I created an ongoing workshop for grandparents, parents and their children. Pictured here is a large group painting, painted by four children between the ages of 2 and 4 and their parents, grandparents and friends.
A Garden of Gifts
As the Police Reform Organizing Project artist-in-residence (2019 - 2020) I organized a form of outreach to communities harmed by abusive policing techniques. Bringing together a group of college student and artist volunteers I facilitated a series of painting and poetry workshops for children at St. Mary's Episcopal Church in Harlem, New York. The series culminated in a collaborative painting of an imaginative garden as well as a collaborative poem about the gifts we appreciate.
The Day and Night Giraffe Gates Project,
Coffey Park, Red Hook, Brooklyn NY, 2018
As founder/director/tutor (2009-2018) of the Red Hook Art Project in Red Hook, New York, I organized and led multiple community art projects. In Red Hook's Coffey Park over the summer of 2018, a group of RHAP students (between the ages of 8 and 18) conceived of and completed the paintings on four blank giraffe gates on the parks department building. Pictured here are the "Red Hook by Day and Night" gates. On the other side is the "Planet Earth by Day and Night."
The Mandala Project
In 2014, as part of Dance, Theatre Etc's Red Hook Fest, I organized RHAP volunteers, parents and children in the creation of two large mandalas. Afterwards the mandalas were permanently displayed on the facade of the Red Hook Art Project's then home, a corner storefront (see below).
A Storefront with Meaning
RHAP's logo was created in 2009 by one of RHAP's first students. In 2014 volunteers and students replicated the logo at a large scale after moving to our new location. The Mandala Project proudly represented the multi-generational creativity within.
