My Introduction to Art

As a creative person, art has been one of my favorites forms of knowledge production. Early in my career I knew this to be my truth, however, I did not have the words to describe this consciousness the way that I am able to now. The educational process did not appeal to me post third grade because I felt it was a system for conformist. I had learn to regurgitate information from history class, I could summarize stories from Language Arts and I had even learned basic math formulas by this point. Alice Bag does an excellent job of explaining my experience in her song Programmed. You can check out the video here.

I have a distinct memory from a favorite Art teacher of mine named Ms.Denai. She was employed by Charles County Public Schools and taught artists like me to think outside of the box. We were tasked with creating a paper mache scare crow, however, mine did not look like the rest of the students. My scare crow looked more like a scare cow, and I feared that I would not receive a good grade because my design was slightly outside of the norm. I had already gotten into some trouble that week for bad lip syncing in music class as I didn’t find singing songs from Grease to be culturally relevant to me at age 7. Desperate for approval, I asked Ms.Denai what she thought of my artwork as this is something I would frequently do after creating art around age 7. Her response is something that stuck with me for years, instead of providing critique or praise she asked me what I thought. I don't think it occurred to me that my opinion or perspective even mattered in the classroom. "I really like it, and I want to get a good grade" I said. "If you like it, I love it" Ms.Denai responded. This moment transformed the way I saw art and perceived the artistic process. Her words stayed with me much longer than the shame I had experienced from my music teacher. I had to write a letter to my parents on why I refused to sing in my music class, but I did not let that moment define me.

I decided to let Ms.Denai be my second grade hero and I took mental inventory of everything she did. She collected milk cartons and made them into art and I decided that I would re-purpose things and be frugal as an adult. She used funny jingles and songs so we can commit things to memory and this is still a study method I use to date. The letter I had to write home for my music class is in my moms attic, along with my lunch card I had misplaced that week. Some days I am curious about where Ms.Danai is now, how she would receive my story or if any of her other students have expressed thanks for her time in the classroom.

My recent art project

Acrylic paint on wooden canvas. Unfinished, untitled. I am waiting to see where my spirit and the paint brush lands at the end of the semester.

Right now I am still pushing my creative limits and I am less afraid of putting out the messy version of my projects to see where I land. Sometimes I have had marvelous results, other times they have been learning experiences. What I find to be fascinating is when I get the chance to collaborate with others and trust the creative process. I discovered the Alice Isn’t Dead Podcast years ago and during Joseph Fink’s book tour I learned that the actress Jasika Nicole was given no direction on how to read the lines. This provided a certain authenticity to the story and I had decided that when the opportunity presents itself that I too would allow creative control with people I work with in the future. I recently interviewed an artist from Brazil that I commissioned this year as I was interested in learning more about his creative process and projects. To read the interview you can click here.

My current learning process includes learning what art can teach us about individuals, societies and their values.