Oh, I come from Alabama.....

The Visual Arts Staff on Friday, minus Sally

What a great week with the Alabama Institute for Education in the Visual Arts, June 15 - 19, held at the Montgomery Museum of Art. We had 36 participants from all over the state. This was truly a group "who played together well." My deepest thanks go to my facilitators aka "The A(Art) Team": Sabrina Hubbarb, Donald Myer, James "Doc" Bender, Sally Chambliss, and Margaret Snider. The week could not have gone on without them. Our special guests were Margaret Lynne Ausfeld, curator of paintings and sculpture at MMFA, and Charlie Lucas, sculptor. We were very fortunate to have Pat Wanglie, a seasoned docent from MMFA, joining us for the week. Pat did a great job describing the museum's sculpture collection. She also contributed a lot with our classroom activities

Some of the units we covered during the week were da Vinci's painting and inventions; Van Gogh's expressive painting; Georgia O'Keeffe's nature subjects; Picasso's Cubist sculptures and Charlie Lucas' Outsider art. On Friday, we had a rotation day with the other art institutes and a lesson with Jacob Lawrence. I am hoping that the teachers who attended will be able to share new ideas about using art in their classrooms. I look forward to teaching again at the Arts Integration Workshop in Montgomery and a Professional Development week for Dothan schools in July. I created a new blog for posting art related lessons and photos from the week: http://www.alaarts.blogspot.com/.

Just a plug: the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts has a wonderful collection of American art. It is a beautiful setting in the Alabama Shakespeare Festival park.

Wishing you lots of creative thoughts!

Durinda