Pneumosparklyosis, or Glitter Lung

The Onion... it never stops. Here is a link to the Education Page of the Onion, and another link to an article about Glitter Lung. All art teachers! Beware! Actually....
After 33 years in the classroom, and 23 in a high school art room, I learned to be wary of the materials we used. Five years of silk screening and intaglio printmaking and a touch of asthma brought about a major revelation: Yes, the safety was important for the chillens, but even more so, I was the one who was in that room all day, every day, using the same chemicals for every repetition of that lesson plan! I'm OK. Be OK.

Creativity in Physics

How the heck
did this guy
get a DONUT?!

Grow a Tree for Fun

Simple stuff, simply click.

A Brief Interlude to Be Modest Me

I cannot begin to list all I have to be grateful for. My family is the bestest, and is the center of my life, that including our doggies. I have around me the most fantastic people- from friends, students, colleagues and neighbors. I have the luxury of security of all types today, and I am eternally and consciously pleased to have been genetically provided with a sense of creativity and curiosity.
This is a year end thanks to all cosmic and karmic! And to you who check up on this goofy little blog in the massive universe of internet-sphere!

My Journey Starts- Diving into Arts Education....

I JUST finished The Arts and the Creation of Mind by Elliot Eisner. Ohmigod I wish every teacher and every student who wants to live life fully would read this. Every politician who thinks test scores, norms, and percentages are needed to create successful schools should be mandated to understand the premise of good teaching and artistic education.
Art education is about life, seeing life, living fully and appreciatively, maintaining joy and imagination and inventiveness in our daily adventures. And it is about art students and art teachers- who we are, what we know, what we look for, and the possibilities of every little single thing we do, hear, see, feel. I SO recommend this book to be on the bookshelf of every inquiring mind!

I like this: "Why does a nation as diverse as ours need a common curriculum? Is there only one defensible conception of a good curriculum, a good school, or a good teacher? In a nation that boasts that one of its strengths is its diversity, are differences in the way the subjects are conceptualized exempted from that diversity?"
All subjects, the very culture of our schools, should be taught with passion and imagination!
THANK YOU Elliot Eisner!! (p163 The Arts and the Creation of Mind)

Our "New" Cabin

Check out these rafters... and the kiddo!!




Located 10 miles north of Chester, on the backside of Mt. Lassen, a diamond in the true rough. We have no electricity, no phone, and water, from the pipe that goes up the hillside. Wanna know what it's like to get away?? We have room for YOU!

My Show is Postponed till mid February....

But it's still comin'! Looks to be about February 15, but I'll update all the info here when I get the skinny. I get to stay up for six weeks if I wait, and THAT'S a deal!! Plus I'll get a few more pieces done. That's a really really good deal! Hang in... oh- and Merry Christmas!

Hey Barrera!!

You rock, girl! Go get 'em. Show those kiddos the power of the arts! Keep on sharing your all your passions for what you do so well!! Happy Credential! Congratulations! WOW! Who woulda thunk?

A Painting a Day? Making Money Making Art?

What do you think? Is there money to be made?
Can you paint a painting every day?
Michael Naples is outstanding!
So is Molly Brose!
A collage every day?

Arts Advocacy- I Need Help

In the interest of sharing the coolest of the cool, please forward to me, in whatever manner you want, any websites or You-Tubes that have really awesome content in the arts and/or art education. Let's compile these. (Isn't there that compilation SOMEWHERE already?) I've begun in the column at the left. Perhaps this could be one more great resource for those of us in arts ed, particularly in grades 7-college.

Kiddos from OHS!

Let's keep in touch! Add yourself to "Followers" on the top left side of this blog thing, I'll know you're there, and we can keep in touch! (I SO like this better than Facebook!)
Love ya!

for the Butte County Watercolor Society show at the Chico Art Center.

Chico Art Center, the old Chico Train Station, is such a cool space. If you can't make the show (Dec 18-January 8, reception Dec. 18, 5-9 pm, free, with food too~!), at least go hang out on the wood deck and have a cuppa joe!

Blackboard Art

Ya gotta love the Dow Jones these days. Yeah... I'm a dead duck. Or bird anyway.

Back to the classroom. These are dedicated to ALL my kids!
MORE MORE more to come....
LOVE YOU GUYS!!
Come to the show at All Fired Up in January and erase these chalkboards, as you do so well, and write something new. (Keep it clean!) Better start thinking about how to customize these OHS style! Chalk is available.
(minor added detail: this work is all for sale.)



An ode to the classical. And I WILL get Veni spelled correctly, real soon, promise.

We've got this critter camping on our front lawn every night. Oh and yeah- I was born the year of the rabbit. Incredibly significant.

I found a paper wasp nest on our "shack" property, north of Chester. It had to go into a painting. Yeah- that is the real stuff.


A bicyclette in France. That's bee-jee-clet-tae

A basket of lemons from the Cinque Terra, Italy.

Want to read the statement I wrote for these?

A Math Problem
Add:
A teacher of 33 years with a winning ability to multi-task in a high school art room.
A personality with ADD (DDD squared.)
A conflicted artist who doesn't know if she should draw, design, or paint with acrylics, watercolor or pastel- or collage?!
A bibliophile and a writer.
Sum:
All that I am incapable of focusing on.
Evidence of all I am is contained in this body of work. Finally I have discovered the solution to this complicated math problem. Finally I can draw, paint, sculpt, scribble, rip, tear and burn, and play with words and complete two, or three paintings, all on one canvas- and all at the same time. An ADD dream. While working through this series, I have discovered how to compile all I am into a visual, mixed bag feast. Here is a taste of the blur, the chaos and the frenetic as produced in my studio.
Note about the Blackboards:
Please, scribble your own graffiti on a piece of your choosing. Prove that no piece is ever done. Prove that our interpretations can change dramatically with a simple stroke, letter, or word. Blackboards are for those of us who need to make our marks. To say: "I am." Join me in the joy of this simple task.
This is the work that will be at All Fired Up- mid February.

Visual Aid Auction

I was so happy this little 12" guy sold at the Visual Aid auction in San Francisco this last November!

OBAMA! Can you Believe??!!

The Old Stuff First

I was so incredibly fortunate to be accepted twice to paint a COBA (Chico Open Board Art) for the Chico Art Center and the City of Chico. The first two paintings here are just those.

Art After Retirement

Boy oh boy. I'm thinking I need to go back to work....

Last June, 2008. Done with teaching at OHS. 33 years. I am SO missing the kids, the projects, the energy, the laughing. And I am so NOT missing the other 80% of what comes with any job. So what in the heck do I do? I sign up for the October Open Studios Tour, and paint and paint and paint. Pretty rough stuff, like not good. It'd been a long time I focused on painting for painting and not for lesson planning, for better or worse. I didn't sell anything as I shouldn't have; what hodge podge I can create! But I did finally narrow down and got focused- as focused as I can be anyway. Yeah, Ted, that ADD? Came from me.
THEN I presented at the California Art Educators' Conference in Burlingame. That was a rusH!- totally satisfying and exhilarating. Thanks to all my Studio Art kids for the lesson on Abstract Expressionism that I got to share! You are all so awesome! And thanks again to Ms Pat Macias for her help~
And NOW... it's my blackboard art. I have a show going up in All Fired Up, Broadway, Chico, at the beginning of January, 2009, and I am actually dang excited about it! So I'm sharing some of the stuff here. Hope my friends can come! Yep... you!

Retired and Just Beginning.

Too much to do, but starting with making art.