By Elizabeth Gerbush
Silkscreens and still lifes and sculptures,
oh my! All one had to was follow the gray cement road to
Upton
Hall to experience the recent “The Art of Learning”
exhibition, a collection of 50 pieces from some of Buffalo
State College’s most talented undergraduate and graduate
art
education students.
The show, which celebrated its 26th year,
featured a wide range of artwork, including:
• watercolor paintings
• acrylic paintings
• oil paintings
• charcoal drawings
• ink drawings
• colored pencil drawings
• mixed media pieces
• collages
• silkscreens
• stone sculpture
• clay sculpture
• bronze casting
And the fact that the exhibition was juried
meant that the works displayed were among the best of what
Buffalo State art education students had to offer.
A juried exhibition is one in which a judge
or group of judges select the artworks to be displayed from
a number of pieces submitted by exhibit hopefuls. This year,
Mary Wyrick,
the committee chair of the art
education graduate department, chose Gerald
Mead, curator of education and outreach at the Burchfield-Penney
Art Center, to serve as juror.
The student chapter of The
National Art Education Association (NAEA) handled the
intake of artwork submitted into the competition. According
to Tullis Johnson,
the president of NAEA, there were “only about 10 pieces
that didn’t get into the show.”
Juried exhibitions give students a taste
of what being an artist in the real world is like, as artwork
on display in most galleries and museums is usually selected
to be there by discriminating art experts.
“Every exhibition in a museum is in
a way juried—a curator chooses which works to include
and omit,” explained Diane
Koeppel, assistant professor in the art education graduate
department. “For students, juried exhibitions are
more prestigious than exhibitions that showcase class work.
These students can now claim that, in this case, a staff
member at the Burchfield-Penney Art Center chose their work
for inclusion. In my opinion, they are closer to the kind
of real world scrutiny that every artist must work with
when they enter the world of galleries and museums.”
The students in Koeppel’s Educational
Programming in Museums class, AED 604, had just as much
a real world experience as the artists: The 16-student class
was responsible for the installation of the entire show,
and had just one week to complete it, a small time frame
for such an undertaking. Under the direction of Koeppel,
the students were graded on their creation of a successful
gallery exhibit, from painting the walls of the gallery
to composing the write-ups about the artists and their works.
“In the classroom they learned about
exhibition mathematics (i.e. correct height and spacing),
how visitors learn in unstructured learning environments
like museums, what visitors expect when they visit museums,
and how to develop interactive spaces,” described
Koeppel.
"They wrote individual object labels
(the text next to the artwork) and chose the wall color.
In the gallery, they prepared the walls and painted, designed
the space divisions, created the interactive space, chose
the placement of each artwork, hung the work, and adjusted
the lights. They are also responsible for taking down the
exhibition and preparing the artwork for its return to each
artist.”
Like Koeppel’s students, gallery-goers
were also given the opportunity to take part in “The
Art of Learning.” The exhibit featured an interactive
corner stocked with art supplies where visitors could create
and display their own work of art about the teacher who
had the greatest influence on their learning experience.
In addition, the corner contained an informational display
about the history and design of Upton Hall, also important
to the exhibit’s theme because of its onetime status
as a revolutionary structure for teaching art.
“When Upton Hall was built, it was
state of the art and very innovative in its conceptual design,”
explained Koeppel. “Other college and university art
departments came to Buffalo State in the ‘60s to examine
the building. So, examining the art of architecture—a
well thought-out building for the time—seemed like
a natural thing.”
The exhibit’s theme also tied into
the unique, multi-faceted learning experience necessary
to art education students.
“I think it is a great metaphor for
the process these students go through to become teachers,”
remarked Koeppel. “Unlike students majoring in studio
area, these students must become proficient in studio and
in art education.”
Koeppel stressed the hard work and careful
attention to detail that went into making the exhibit a
success.
“I'm very proud of these students,”
said Koeppel. “They had a week to put this show up
and they did a thoughtful and professional job. I think
the positive reaction to this show is because every artist,
regardless of age, deserves to have their work displayed
in the best light and that's just what we did.”
Elizabeth Gerbush can be reached at gerbet47@buffalostate.edu
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