When I think about it, art has always been important to my family. My grandfather, James McPherson, made his living and supported a wife and seven children as a commercial artist and oil painter in Chicago. He worked on many well known projects including Mr. Peanut, Hamm’s beer, Old Crow Whiskey and posters for Ringling Brothers Circus. His father was also an artist who worked in wood. Some of his work is part of an exhibit in the basement of the Art Institute of Chicago. My grandmother also worked as a medical illustrator before she married. Both of my grandparents attended school at AIC.
I don’t remember much about my early history of art education. I know that I started my journey in preschool. The earliest item that I have was a Christmas ornament. It was nothing special. It was a gingerbread type man that was rolled out in some sort of dough, impressed with detail, and baked to make permanent. The ornament itself was pretty run of the mill stuff, but the fact that my mother saved it and made sure that she gave it to me to put on my own tree as an adult, made it extraordinary. When I think about it, it illustrates what my mother thought about me, and the things I created. I have always felt valued by her, and she has always encouraged me to make art.
After pre-school I went to a Catholic elementary school. I don’t recall having a specialized art class. We did, however, do a lot of the things that elementary school students did in the seventies and eighties. We made holiday art, drew pictures, painted and used play-doh. I used scissors often, and I became skilled with them. I think of this whenever I see how much many of my students struggle in using them in my classroom. While I didn’t have “art class”, in many ways I think that I had some advantages over the students of today in the area of art because so much more time in general was spent making. I was always motivated to draw and often did so with my free time at home. I also liked to build things when at play. I spent endless hours creating with Legos, Tinker Toys, Lincoln logs and Erector sets. I was always building, revising and creating new building, cars, motorcycles and spaceships. I truly think type of play largely influenced my ability to think spatially. Many years later, while creating a figurative sculpture from a sketch I had made in a college ceramics class, my professor, Randy Johnston commented, “You know, most people can’t do that.” “Do what?” I asked. “Draw something two dimensionally, and the make it in three dimensions.” He replied. It had never occurred to me that not everyone did that. I really think that the “education” I got from playing with Legos played a strong role in developing those skills.
Junior high played a pivotal point in my love of art. After elementary school I moved to a public school where I experienced my first real art class. I was not a great student. I had good test scores, but as I later discovered in college course called “Exceptional Child”, I probably have some form of attention deficit disorder. They didn’t know about it back then. I had a hard time sitting in class, did a lot of daydreaming and often made comments that I really should not have been making. Needless to say, I struggled. I was shocked when my mother came home from conferences and said that my art teacher, Mr. Nackerud, had raved about a drawing I had done of a Led Zeppelin album cover in oil pastel. That class was also where I was first exposed to clay. I made a skull that was pretty realistic. I was hooked on art, and especially clay.
After middle school, I took every art class my high school offered. I really looked up to one of my art teachers, Mr. Zulusky. He got my sarcastic sense of humor, and was very patient. He allowed me to take an independent study and come in and throw on the wheel during my study hall. Mr. Z was a huge positive influence on me. He was one of the bright spots in a dingy high school career, and a very big part of why I chose to be an art teacher.
I struggled at the beginning of my college career. I still didn’t understand quite how much or why. I ended up going part-time and working multiple jobs to put myself through school. Because of this, I always had a little extra time in my schedule to squeeze an art class in. I really enjoyed my studio and art history classes, even if my grades didn’t always show it. Eventually I took the exceptional child class, which opened my eyes and led me down a more successful path. By the time I graduated, I had taken forty extra credits of studio art classes. I took painting, hot and cold glass, sculpture, metals, ceramics, fibers, printmaking, and drawing. I soaked up everything I could in the studio. The last semester of school was student teaching. I had two placements. The first was at a high school. Without going into detail, I will say that was one of the worst experiences of my entire life due to the cooperating teacher I was placed with. I almost quit. My student teaching advisor from the university convinced me to complete the first placement. The second placement was with Sheryl St. John at Lincoln Center Elementary. It was so different in the best way. I learned so much from her. Without that experience, there is no way I would be a teacher today. I am eternally grateful for Ms. St. John. We still talk and share ideas, and when she retired last year she shared a great many of her resources with me. She is an amazing person.
When I graduated, I was working for UPS. It paid well and was stable. I hated it. I also worked in a bicycle shop where I often had the opportunity to teach young people how to work on bikes. That I loved. I was still unsure of myself as an art educator after my first student teaching experience, and I just took the safe route. That could have been the end of my personal art education history, but I did one very smart thing. I built a soda kiln in my yard. Every day I had to look at it when I left the house. Eventually, I bought the burners, the gas tanks and all the other equipment I needed to start creating. I also did some stained glass panels that are featured in a couple of local homes. There came a day, seven years after I graduated, I was full-time at UPS and was no longer at the bike shop. I was miserable. I realized UPS was killing me. I loved art and working with young people. So, I took the plunge and quit. I applied for a teaching license and went back to working at the bike shop and started substitute teaching.
It was a rough couple of years financially. I began to get my name known and started picking up long-term jobs. I taught a lot of special education. Whenever I could I watched teachers in the art room. I asked questions. After several long-term art jobs, I was working the summer in a bike shop. A principal I knew came in and asked if I would interview for a special education job that I eventually was hired for. I loved working with my students, but the job was an hour and twenty minutes from my house, and I really wanted to teach art. So I left. The next year I had two long-term art jobs, and learned so much. By the end of my second job, I was hired by my current district. It has been amazing. There are sixteen elementary schools, and the art teachers meet several times a year and work together. I have learned so much from them. My job is a crossover and I have taught both high school and middle school in conjunction with my elementary classes. This is my fourth year at South Washington County Schools, and I have been in five schools. Each experience has given me more knowledge, and I am grateful for my path.
I still squeeze in some personal studio time and learn new things every time I work. I am still learning about soda firing and have invited some local artists to join me. I have taken a couple classes including one on pop art. I had the opportunity to do a phone interview with an artist from Milwaukee , WI named Reginald Baylor. He is amazing. I love his work and he was so generous with his time. He was truly inspiring. I have earned tenure now, and I decided this was the time to further my education. I wanted a Master of Education program that was going to really be something I would use daily. I did a lot of research, and that is what brought me to the University of Florida.
Comments