K-12 Residencies

TAPAS (Teaching Artists Present in Asheville City Schools) Residency
Funded by the Asheville City Schools Foundation, Asheville, NC
5^th grade Science Class at Vance Elementary School, April 7-10, 2015

I proposed a TAPAS project that would result in a large wall piece that illustrated the seasonal changes of the NC Dogwood and which would remain on display at a school. Ginger Hubner, director of Roots and Wings School of Art & Design in Asheville and in a position appointed by the Asheville City Schools Foundation to assist in connecting TAPAS artists with schoolteachers, connected me with Brian Ballenger, the 5^th grade Science teacher at Vance Elementary School. Each student would have a hands-on experience working with a partner to felt a sheet of wool fiber to a certain percentage of possible shrinkage allowing for engagement with the biology of the fiber, directional shrinkage and math for measuring and assessing the percentage of shrinkage. Each student was responsible for cutting designated shapes from their felt and contributing them in a communal layout to create a composition incorporating the felted shapes of all 70 5^th graders participating. The piece was then backed with silk fabric in various colors celebrating the changes in the height of the sun dependent on the season and then, finally with many layers of wool fiber. This background created a network of fibers that would travel through the layers of fabric and the previously felted shapes when rolled, unifying the components into a singular felt. The piece was then fulled, stretched on a frame and presented to the students during a school open house celebrating the concept of STEAM, the integration of science, technology, engineering, art and math.

The first step is always planning! Sampling colors for the students to use to represent the stems, green leaves and the white leaves of the Dogwood and the density of partial felt from which the kids will cut shapes.

Bringing the felt studio into the classroom..including all the wool weighed out for the surface area the students will layout and lots of towels!

Getting students to layout two colors in the same felt so that the fibers in the middle are at a consistent thickness was a challenge and so was moderating their soap application!

Making time for clean up and storing of their work between days has got to be part of the plan

On the second day, students finished rolling until the layers of fibers integrated enough to remove the felt from the bubble wrap to begin 3-D fulling, shrinking the area to 40% remaining of the original area

The stock of partial felts from which the kids will cut shapes on the third day

A shift to working dry and much more meticulously..such focus to cut out the bulbous tip of the bud!

Students working in small groups to arrange their branch pieces in a gradation from widest to the most delicate tips

The second group in charge of the white leaves (what most think of us as the flowers, are actually a type of leaf with the yellow flowers in the center!) had the special task of laying a plastic resist over all but the center to keep the white leaves from attaching to the background

The third group arranged their leaves from the smallest and brightest yellow/green to the largest dark green responding to the design layout of the prior classes...fingers spread like branches and high 5's for the 5th grade!!

The fourth and final day, students covered the design with grey and blue silks considering the height of the sun during different seasons of growth and a background of wool fibers that would navigate through the layers connecting all the components into a singular felt

The final class of the fourth day began the rolling, which necessitated some coordination of pressure and speed to keep the roll parallel!

Miss Lisa doing some final fulling in the STRONGFELT STUDIO to curl up the white leaves into the third dimension...wish we had had one more day in the school so the kids could do this as the concept of resists was new for the kids!

Of course, I had to add a few punches of free-motion embroidery to the center to detail the little yellow flowers

The addition of a label to document those involved in the effort!

The presentation of the finished piece at Vance's Open House offered a chance for the proud students to describe the process to parents!

The stretched felt on a three inch deep frame created a wonderful effect of the blossoms curling over the edge and several sitting on the top edge. The piece will be displayed permanently in the hall of the school! photo credit: Steve Mann

Founders Memorial Elementary School, Essex Junction, VT, 3/29-4/8/2010

While offering a felting workshop at the Northeast Fiber Arts Center, the owner, Jennifer Hoag, knowing that I worked with kids, introduced me to Founder’s Memorial Elementary School’s art teacher, Kerin Rose. Kerin and I worked together to propose a teaching residency at the school and the PTO funded my two-week residency. Working with 3^rd, 4^th and 5^th graders, each student felted a symbolic egg that incorporated a piece of silk fabric on which I had free-motion embroidered their full name to represent their person. Students brought foods such as grains, beans and seeds from home, which they used to fill their hollow egg forms as a representation of the nurturing they receive from their immediate family. Students implemented basic stitching to close the form and secure the contents of their egg. The students then assisted me in covering a 2-D resist with wool fiber, which was rolled flat and then fulled into a 3-D nest representing the larger school community that further supported the development of each child. Students wove locally harvested branches as well as random materials they gathered from their locality into the holes created in the nest to represent the even larger community and environment outside their school. Each grade had their own nest to place all their eggs, which were then temporarily installed in trees on the school property and more permanently exhibited in the school.