Art Journal #3

2/13/22

#evolution

There are quite a few moments that stand out to me when I think of how I got to where I am right now. Just how did I end up as a 22-year old who studies art education theories and is consistently covered in paint? Well, for one, I grew up in an elementary art room. I remember going into my mom’s classroom after school and trying to complete all of the different projects that her students were working on at that moment. So while most kids would encounter projects for the first time, I had already completed that project a few times over and figured out new ways to reinvent it. Then, I went through middle school and high school, and while I still took art classes, I really resented my teachers and slowly stopped enrolling in them as I approached senior year.

I went into college studying the things I loved most; that being Spanish and English, but I still felt like something wasn’t quite right. It didn’t feel like I was growing in those subjects or really learning anything. So, that’s when I decided to study abroad in Todos Santos, Mexico. There, I took an Art in the Environment class.

For this class, we backpacked into the Sierra de la Laguna and documented the flora, fauna, and landscapes of this magnificent mountain range. Then, as a group, we developed a blueprint for a mural that depicts both the biodiversity and rich resources that the Sierra holds. With the help of the CSU Todos Santos Center, we invited the community to help us paint the mural and to spread awareness about the sanctity of the biosphere reserve. This course reminded me of the incredible impact that art can have when it comes to advocating for policy, uniting a community, and educating others. I realized that artists are incredibly powerful when they serve to empower other humans and the environments that they exist within. And that when I knew that I had both the capability as an educator and an artist to make positive impacts in the community with art. But I also don’t know how to explain this sort of epiphany that redeveloped my identity as an artist, without speaking about a woman named Dona.

Dona specialized in mosaic murals that she constructed alongside Todosanteños. I felt like I had found a piece of my soul as I walked through the gates of her studio. I was surrounded by animals, figures, and walls that were covered in colorful, broken segments of glass and tile. She explained to us that she had bought the house and the studio and had left her prestigious position at UC Davis to come here to Todos Santos, Mexico. She emphasized, “I want to get something straight. I did not come here for Mexicans to serve me. I came here to put clay in their hands. That’s why I’m here.” It felt as though she had put the words right into my mouth. And that’s when it hit me that I too wanted to put clay in the hands of people and show them the importance of creativity and art-making in our everyday lives. Then, she touched on an idea that has interested me. She spoke on the vital relationship between the scientist and the artist and how this relationship is critical to the future. She reinforced my own ideas about helping people understand the importance of harmonizing the sciences with art within our educational platforms, our morals, and our identities. The art class that I took in Todos Santos solidified my love for art and my dreams that anyone can create works that devastate social norms, add beautiful purpose to everyday life, dismantle oppressive structures, and voice their ideas to the world.

My time working on murals, engaging with local Todosanteños, hiking the Sierra de la Laguna, interviewing community members, documenting culture, and experiencing Baja life, all contributed to my goal of being an educator. And that’s when I knew exactly what I wanted to teach. A few weeks after my return, I contacted my advisor and changed my major to Art with an emphasis in Education, and declared minors in Spanish and Ethnic Studies.

Currently, the biggest change to my philosophy is that previously, I believed that you needed to know the rules of the arts to break them. I thought that if we wanted to conjoin the art world to the science one, we needed to have sound rules to counter the ones that they use in science. But, as I have learned from Teaching for Artistic Behavior, the process of an artist and the freedom to choose your means of creation are more important than understanding theories and practices. Students should be aware of the rules that govern other artists work and even try some things for themselves. But this is not the priority. It’s taken me three years to develop my own ideation and creation process. I can’t even imagine how my process might look if I had practiced it since elementary. Or if it would have influenced me to identify as an artist a little earlier in life. I’m going to take this philosophy into my classroom. My students will choose their practice as I open studios and deliver prompts that they are interested in working with. My goal is that they learn about their processes as artists. This includes understanding their styles, their tendencies, and their curiosities. If they continue to work often and with purpose, I believe that their skills will follow. I learned color theory by painting consistently, not by taking quizzes or filling in color wheels. And I wonder if a lot of students learn by doing.

My art for this journal is a digital painting of Grovyle, which is a Pokémon that is shown as halfway evolved. Just as I am evolving as an artist and as a teacher, I feel like I'm halfway there to my fullest potential. So, that just means that I have lots to do in the next few years! Just like Pokémon keep evolving and changing I want my philosophies to continue to evolve as I grow.