STOP PRESS on WORKSHOPS

ATTENTION - New Scheme Teachers

The VADEA Digital Media Workshop on Saturday 21st March has been accredited by the New South Wales Institute of Teachers.

This means that this exciting opportunity to improve your skills and meet other teachers, can count towards your 50 hours of accredited inservice. If you haven't read the details of these workshops about Photoshop, Illustrator and After Effects have a look at the workshop flyer.

See you there?

MORE COFA TALKS - THE CREATIVE WELL

Attend a forum discussion regarding the value of the arts community - something dear to all of us!

The Creative Well: Inspiration and Arts Funding
24th March 6:30pm COFA

FLYER HERE

The Creative Well: Inspiration and Arts Funding is a panel
discussion presented in conjunction with issue 23 of the
Grif fith Review, ‘Essentially Creative’. Award winning author
Frank Moorhouse, arts advocate Helen O’Neil, and Griffith
Review’s founding editor Julianne Schultz discuss issues
raised in the Federal Government ’s 2020 Summit, with
the aim of working towards a new Australia which truly
values the arts and creativity.

YAYOI KUSAMA @ MCA

Took my Year 12 class to ARTEXPRESS last week and after they were finished "being intimidated" by some of the beautiful and innovative work there we moved on to the MCA.

We went to see the Simryn Gill exhibition (and it was very good) but then we had about 25 mins to spare, so we visited the Mirrored Years by Yayoi Kusama and it was FANTASTIC!!

The perfect "upnote" to end the excursion on. Some of the exhibits have been shown here before, but the mirrored room (Fireflies on Water) and the room covered in fluoro dots have to be seen to be appreciated!

The students were very impressed and it doesn't hurt that she is part of our next case study! If you have a chance to visit, you won't be disappointed. At the MCA Sydney until 8th June 2009.

Working across different media and forms that include painting, collage, sculpture, installation and film, as well as performance and its documentation, Kusama creates works that reveal a fixation with repetition, pattern and accumulation. Describing herself as an “obsessive artist”, her work is intensely sensual, infused with autobiographical, psychological and sexual content.

From MCA website

Image from Time Out Sydney (review there too).

Enjoy
KP:)

JENNY HOLZER @ THE WHITNEY

Jenny Holzer is having a show @ The Whitney in NYC. The site resources look really fantastic, with images, video and even the exhibition brochure (they use Scribd too).

Have a look and let's see how we can develop this as a resource!

PROTECT PROTECT

Jenny Holzer's pioneering approach to language as a carrier of content and her use of nontraditional media and public settings as vehicles for that content make her one of the most interesting and significant artists working today. Alternating between fact and fiction, the public and the private, the universal and the particular, Holzer's work offers an incisive social and psychological portrait of our times. PROTECT PROTECT centers on Holzer's work since the 1990s and is the artist's most comprehensive exhibition in the United States in more than fifteen years.
Text from The Whitney website; Image from Art das Kunstmagazin

KP;)

WHO ARE WE? WHO? WHO?............

Thought it was about time we removed the cyber-space veil and revealed who we all are...............please note the empty spaces. Why not come and join us??

Diagram Association

EXPRESSIONS OF INTEREST

If you would like to be involved in VADEA in a more active role, expressions of interest are being sought for the following positions:

• Newsletter editor
• Web site manager
• Assistant Professional Development officer

If you can see yourself in any of these roles please comment on this post and we will contact you.

Remember this association is for YOU, so getting involved benefits us ALL and helps us to provide rich content = win/win!!
KP:)

BRETT WHITELEY TRAVELLING ART SCHOLARSHIP - OPEN!

Brett Whiteley Travelling Art Scholarship 2009

Applications now available online

Entry for the Brett Whiteley Travelling Art Scholarship is open to Australian artists aged between 20 and 30 (inclusive). The Scholarship comprises an amount of $25,000 and a three-month residency at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, which is administered by the Art Gallery of New South Wales. The residency is for a continuous period of three months from July to September 2010 (dates subject to change). The $25,000 must be used by the successful applicant to further their art education in Europe for a period of at least six months, three months of which must be used in conjunction with the residency.

Download an application form
For more information, please see our website

Closing date for applications is Friday 10 July 2009

Cross post from AGNSW

PUBLIC LECTURE by NEW BIENNALE DIRECTOR

Lecture at Sydney University, by the director of the 2010 Biennale David Elliott.

6pm 26th March 2009 Mills Lecture Theatre University of Sydney

How does cultural influence spread? Using genetic theory and a consideration of pre- and ancient history, David Elliott, Artistic
Director of the 17th Biennale of Sydney (12 May – 1 August 2010), examines how influence works through art and related
forms of cultural interchange.

David Elliott Flyer 26 Mar 09

MORE SAMPLE RESPONSES

Here are some more student responses to the sample essay questions.
Essay 1

Essay 2
These essays all scored a High A.
If taking please comment:)

Enjoy:)
KP

SAMPLE ESSAY RESPONSE

Here is an example of a student response to this essay question, I posted in the blog yesterday. This student was awarded a High A.

“When reality isn’t real – are artist’s commentaries still legitimate and/or valuable?” Discuss.

Your thoughts? Anything to share?
KP:)

SAMPLE YR 12 ESSAY QUESTIONS

Some essay questions that you may like to try with your students.

Using the Metropolitan Museum of Art (NYC) and MoMA's recent Photographic exhibitions and referencing the Conceptual Framework.

Please comment if taking:)

KP

TEEN SPIRIT RESPONSES

If you read the Teen Spirit article in Review last Saturday (28/3/09), you may also have read the VAEDA President's response here on the blog, now we see the responses The Australian saw fit to print (Review March 7-8 2009 p2).

Interesting that both the responses, which are still very negative regarding art teaching and contemporary art in general, came from Western Australia - never recognised as a bastion of forward educational thought.

So Allen ridicules ARTEXPRESS, denigrates the NSW syllabus and the teachers who deliver it and the only responses that are printed are from WA!

I know for a fact that there were responses from NSW (from a variety of sources including academics and teachers) and it appears they were wholeheartedly ignored.

Yet another case of the media presenting a biased view and using this as a thinly veiled vehicle for more teacher bashing and in an "arts" magazine! Tsk Tsk!

KP

PRESIDENT'S RESPONSE TO ALLEN ARTICLE

This has been sent to The Australian - lets see if they have the "conscience" to publish it?
Teen Spirit Response

MORE REALISTIC SYLLABUS VIEW

Here is an article by Joanna Mendelssohn, giving a background to the current Visual Arts syllabus and noting how the synergy between a number of people and events has given us the rich and versatile document we work with today.

Over the past three decades, the teaching of visual arts in New South Wales has diverged from the rest of the country to become an international leader in linking cognitive development to visual understanding.

Joanna Mendelssohn
PhD BA(Hons) Syd., DipEd SCAE

Associate Professor; MArtAdmin Coordinator
COFA University of NSW

Joanna Mendelssohn is actively involved in researching content for the Dictionary of Australian Artists Online while also completing the writing of a book on Australian artists, Richard and Pat Larter and the Larter exhibition catalogue for the Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre Sydney Australia.
Bio from COFA website

This is how I like to think of the VA syllabus - your thoughts??

INSULTING ARTICLE FROM CHRISTOPHER ALLEN

If you read The Australian on Saturday specifically Review (Feb 28-March1 2009 pgs 18-19) I am sure you will have "noticed" the article by Christopher Allen where he slams Artexpress, art teaching in NSW and the BOS curriculum.

If you haven't seen it, here is the link.

The real question that Artexpress raises is how art should be taught in schools, why it should be taught, and what should be taught.

....a lot of the work in the show, as always, reveals the lack of any general vision of the place of art in a school education. The system seems to be trapped between a fetishisation of creativity and self-expression -- in the sense that they are encouraged in kindergarten or in asylums -- and an aping of the look of contemporary art. What is missing is the teaching of what can be taught.

Think maybe it is time we "spoke out" against this kind of media bias and obviously uninformed opinion!

Letters to the editor anyone???
KP

TEACHER ACCREDITATION WORKSHOP

Are you a new teacher?
Do you need to obtain accreditation with the NSW Institute of Teachers?
Is it all a blur or seems to be too much to do?

Then come to a workshop with others just like you and find out some tips form people who have "been there, done that"!!
New teachers and Head teachers will discuss their experiences and strategies.

17th March 2009 5-7pm
International Grammar School
4-8 Kelley Street
Ultimo

Information flyer here and below:
Accred Flyer - 2009

Hurry - special rates for VADEA members - FREE!!!