General Links, Mouthpainters

Workshops

Watercooler Design 112
Photoshop Markups

Philosophy

My purpose as a teacher is to help people realize their fullest potential, regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, ability. I do this by sharing with them my experience, knowledge, and passion for what I do. I have high expectations for myself and for my students.

In my introductory courses, fundamentals such as design elements and principles are stressed. I begin with an overview of the assignment, motivational examples, and immersion into media and process. Technique and concept are given equal time and importance. I work individually with students, directing them to other sources when appropriate, sharing and discussing ideas with the class. When the project is complete, the results are often evaluated in a critique.

In advanced levels there is more independence, freedom to explore interests, personal concerns, and ideas, along with an emphasis on thematic development and working in series. Students are expected to understand, evaluate, and discuss the work in terms of its meaning, personal and historical context, and formal structure during critiques.

My teaching philosophy is the result of having taught in various locations, in Europe, Central and South America, in American Samoa and the United States. My students have been men and women of different ages, aptitudes, skill levels, and cultures. Locations have included a prison (teaching design), and a hospice (teaching quadriplegics to mouth-paint and use the computer). I have been a visiting artist in American Samoa and at The Dalton School in New York, and a high school, adult education, and university art instructor.

I enjoy teaching and helping students develop more eloquent modes of communication and expression - it is especially rewarding today as traditional and new media are used by artists and designers to develop new forms that transcend borders

John Cage

Some Rules and Hints for Students and Teachers

1. Find a place you trust and then, try trusting it for a while.
2. (General duties as a student) Pull everything out of your teacher. Pull everything put of your fellow students.
3. (General duties as a teacher) Pull everything out of your students.
4. Consider everything an experiment.
5. Be self-disciplined. This means finding someone wise or smart and choosing to follow them. To be disciplined is to follow in a good way. To be self-disciplined is to follow in a better way.
6. Follow the leader. Nothing is a mistake. There is no win and no fail. There is only make.
7. The only rule is work. If you work it will lead to something. It is the people who do all of the work all of the time who eventually catch on to things. You can fool the fans - but not the players.
8. Do not try to create and analyze at the same time. They are different processes.
9. Be happy whenever you can manage it. Enjoy yourself. It is lighter than you think.
10. We are breaking all of the rules, even our own rules and how do we do that? By leaving plenty of room for "x" qualities.

Helpful Hints.

• Always be around.
• Come and go to everything.
• Always go to classes.
• Read everything you can get your hands on.
• Look at movies carefully and often.
• Save everything. It may come in handy later.

 

Tips

Problems in an individual piece tend to fall within these five categories:

1. inconsistency of style, idea, or feeling
2. failure to determine basic structure
3. tendency to ignore negative space
4. inability to develop value range and transitions
5. failure to observe accurately

From Critical Assessment from Drawing, 4th Edition Betti/Sale

A Good Professor

should have solid knowledge of the subject, communication ability, compassion, concern, high expectations, maintain high standards, treat students equally, enjoy what he/she does, have a good personality, sense of humor, scholarly ability and contagious enthusiasm for the subject matter, as well as build the campus and department, make the majors better, and build a future... from the Daily Aztec SDSU 3/23/055.

Mouthpainters

(See also Former student Robert Florio)

Mouthpainters in Samoa

In American Samoa I worked as a National Endowment for the Arts artist in residence, high school art teacher, and community college photography, clay, studio art instructor. I taught art in the prison, and to teachers on isolated islands.A nun from the hospice approached us one day at the college and asked if we were interested in working with two men, helping them learn to mouth paint. They were two quadriplegic men, one Samoan, the other Tongan: Rudy Steffany, and Tony Hema. I built lazy susan palettes, worked with them using watercolor and ink, and helped them develop their work in landscape and traditional designs.They had an apple computer and using a brush wrapped with tape on the end held in their mouth were able to scan their work in and manipulate the designs, creating cards and invitations to their openings.They created designs for t shirts, and we silk screened them using a photoemulsion technique. We threw pots and they decorated them.They had an opening at the governor's office just months after they began painting. They painted every day, all day, and immersed themselves in their artwork.

Tony has a wife and two children. he had been thrown in a ditch from a bus stop during a fight.

Rudy was in the passenger side of a car driven by someone who had been drinking when it when off the road. Rudy is currently a mouth-painter and teacher for special education career development  He is also involved with computer graphics and video production.  Rudy’s joy is seeing his students transformed by their involvement in the arts. from artslinkhawaii.org.


pacific arts symposium

I ended up writing about Tony and Rudy, the experience, the possibilities of using different media for mouth painters, and presented the paper at the Pacific Arts Symposium in Adelaide, Australia. To read the paper, and see the easel plans click the following link: PDF 1.5 mg.

LAULIMA

Their experience is documented as well in a documentary:

Title: Laulima: Working Together (video, 29:10 min,)
Producer: Merrie Carol Grain
Distributor: CPAC, ATTN: Eleanor Coffin 1580 Makaloa St., Suite 930 Honolulu, HI 96814 (808) 946-7381, cpac@pixi.com
Content: This is a documentary on four Pacific Islanders whose disabilities may have been critical in the emergence of their artistic expressions. Aithea Serrao, a Hawaiian, became a quilt maker. Makia Malao, another Hawaiian, became a storyteller. Ruby Steffany, a Samoan, and Tony Hema, a Tongan, both became mouth painters. (Closed captioned)
Superfest Award(s): Award of Merit (Artistic and Cultural Representation)
Purchase Price: $25.00
Rental Price: N/A