Caren Willms
Watching the growth of an idea evolve through consideration as well as uncertainty and mystery is the excitement that fuels my teaching as it fuels my art making. For me there isn’t a separation between the making of art and the teaching through, and in, and with it. Studio and classroom are one in the same.
Art making locates our critical thinking, our social contexts, our spiritual interactions, and our physical bodies in a place where meaning is transformed and shaped. Here, our consciousness transforms through learning. Image making like cartography locates the maker in a place and encourages the viewer to respond how they will traverse the terrain. The ability of the reader to interpret the map depends on their knowledge of place and direction. Herein lays the great unconventional challenge of the teacher. If art educators are to be relevant and authentic teachers we must honor our individual artistic landscapes and find relevant landmarks for students to identify with.
Teaching for me is a methodology evolved from experiences that honor attentiveness as a primary lens with which to experience learning and art making. In slowing down the pace of our hurried world we are in a better position to teach and make art from a place of reflection and depth, we are more able to engage our world in a thoughtful, conscientious manner that allows for paying special attention. This is the posture of an attentive learner. The teaching of art must not be relegated to the classroom, but should be a natural response to living and being in relationship to creation in all its places.
For it is not that I must expound information, but that I join in on the process of the awakening, illumination and acknowledgment of the imagination and the creative process that draws me to teaching.
These experiences are for pure delight of a reckoning with oneself, the world, creation and God.
Watching the growth of an idea evolve through consideration as well as uncertainty and mystery is the excitement that fuels my teaching as it fuels my art making. For me there isn’t a separation between the making of art and the teaching through, and in, and with it. Studio and classroom are one in the same.
Art making locates our critical thinking, our social contexts, our spiritual interactions, and our physical bodies in a place where meaning is transformed and shaped. Here, our consciousness transforms through learning. Image making like cartography locates the maker in a place and encourages the viewer to respond how they will traverse the terrain. The ability of the reader to interpret the map depends on their knowledge of place and direction. Herein lays the great unconventional challenge of the teacher. If art educators are to be relevant and authentic teachers we must honor our individual artistic landscapes and find relevant landmarks for students to identify with.
Teaching for me is a methodology evolved from experiences that honor attentiveness as a primary lens with which to experience learning and art making. In slowing down the pace of our hurried world we are in a better position to teach and make art from a place of reflection and depth, we are more able to engage our world in a thoughtful, conscientious manner that allows for paying special attention. This is the posture of an attentive learner. The teaching of art must not be relegated to the classroom, but should be a natural response to living and being in relationship to creation in all its places.
For it is not that I must expound information, but that I join in on the process of the awakening, illumination and acknowledgment of the imagination and the creative process that draws me to teaching.
These experiences are for pure delight of a reckoning with oneself, the world, creation and God.