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Bring Back A Week (2005-2007)
Bring Back A Week (BBAW) is an in-class workshop implemented as an exercise
in contemporary art practice for advanced art students helping them sharpen
their awareness of metaphor and meaning making.
First, the BBAW team presents a slide show of work by real, working artists
that documents durational performances of everyday life. Then students
are asked to reflect on the repetition of objects, or feelings or thoughts
that occupy their daily life. Next, students return to the classroom with
the beginnings of a collection that represents their daily experience.
These materials are used to generate a two or three dimensional art work
developed through discussion. Finally the work is exhibited at Daughters
of the Frozen North, a Phoenix gallery and studio space located in the
heart of Roosevelt Row.
The results celebrate the individuality of each student and are as diverse
as the particpating student body: no two art works ever look the same.
The project takes a month, from start to finish, for classes that meet
daily.
BBAW is also offered as a two-part professional development workshop
for Junior High and High School art and partnering classroom teachers
coupled with in-class project support. Teachers in Glendale, Peoria and
Scottsdale benefitted from our collaborations.
This project was generously underwritten, in part, by the City of Glendale
Arts Commission.
The BBAW Team
Melinda Bergman works with the Artist in Schools program
for the City of Glendale Arts Commission bring teaching artists to the
classroom. This program serves a dual function of facilitating professional
development to the teachers and integrated projects to the students. Bergman
has her MFA from Konstfack: National University of Fine Arts, Design &
Handicrafts, Stockholm, Sweden. Her work has been exhibited in the U.S.
and in Europe.
Jo Novelli is a performance scholar who teaches and
lectures on contemporary artistic practices and performance art. She
is currently writing a dissertation for a PhD in Performance Studies
from New York University. She completed her undergraduate work, in Women's
Studies and Art History, at Arizona State University. Jo has the habit
of performing when no one is looking.
Deb Salac received a Master of Fine Arts from Concordia
University in Montreal, Canada where she also taught a number of art classes.
She is a member of the Artist's Rosters for the Arizona Commission on
the Arts and has been an Artist in Residence throughout the state of Arizona.
She has prepared tailored workshops for school districts in Tempe, Phoenix,
Yuma, Glendale and Scottsdale. As an artist, Deb has exhibited in various
solo and group shows in the U.S. and internationally. She works with cloth
and clothing-examining its use in both identity and memory. She is, however,
often distracted.
G.E. Washington, PhD -- is an assistant professor of
art education at Daemen College in Buffalo, New York. In 2005 Dr. Washington
earned his doctorate in art education from The Pennsylvania State University.
He has created artworks for galleries, nightclubs, churches, and other
public spaces throughout Washington, DC, Pennsylvania and New York.
He has designed and implemented community-based as well as arts-based
curriculum projects with organizations in West Virginia, Washington
DC, Chicago, Pittsburgh and several locations in Arizona. Dr. Washington
has extensive teaching experience at the elementary, secondary and university
level. His research hyphenates the line between life and
aesthetics to investigate everything that we do "as" performance.
In teaching, life becomes the starting point for student learning in
his courses.
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