Celebrating our youth partnerships in a time of uncertainty.

Amidst the decision to close the Museum to the public beginning on Saturday, March 14th and this unprecedented time that the globe is facing, came the question: how do we still showcase the work of students and teachers involved in the Extended School Partnership (ESP)? Thanks to the quick thinking, experience, and dedication of Gallery Educators Akiko Mims, Luisa Martínez, Max Lofano, and Olimpia Vazquez Ojeda, showcase installation quickly turned into an impromptu photo session. With slideshows of these photographs, the Museum is able to share a virtual showcase  with our partner schools and the public at large.

These ESP collaborations between teachers, students, and the Museum’s Gallery Educators began in fall 2019. Educators integrated contemporary art into their curriculum, drawing from exhibitions Marnie Weber: Songs that Never Die and Other Stories, More Like a Forest: Paintings and Sculptures by Richard Allen Morris, Nancy Lupo: Scripts for the Pageant, Bound to the Earth: Art, Materiality and the Natural World, and México quiero conocerte: Photographs by Graciela Iturbide and Manuel Álvarez Bravo.

Cultural Identity

Environmental Concerns

Gender Expectations

Literary Dystopia

Mental Health

Personal Identity

Personal Landscapes

Phobias

Urban Landscapes

 

 

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Spring ESP Showcase: A Celebration of Student Artwork

MCASD Extended School Partnership (ESP) program presents a digital showcase of student artwork from two local high schools: Chula Vista High School and Hoover High School. Students from these schools created artwork in response to their experiences during gallery tours, lessons and pertinent activities led by the museum’s Gallery Educators. The Gallery Educators facilitated broader experiences and lessons relating to topics discussed and learned in the classroom in classes at Hoover High School ranging from Language Arts, American Literature, AP Literature, Expository Reading and Writing; and at Chula Vista High School of Creative and Performing Arts in AP Studio Art, Design and Art Studio.

 

At the Museum, students from Hoover High School explored how contemporary artists work with natural materials and commonplace objects to question our relationship to our surroundings, and use natural and built landscapes to give meaning to the world around us. Students extended this investigation to the places they spend their own time in, by paying attention to the events that take place there, informed by Nancy Lupo’s installation, which  drew attention to the overlooked nuances of our everyday lives. Works by other students explore questions about how and why we inhabit everyday spaces. Inspired by the artists on view, students have connected their artworks to ideas about the meaning of life, existentialism, and the absurd.

 

Students from Chula Vista High School examined how artists Marnie Weber and Richard Allen Morris explore gruesome aspects of reality. The  AP Studio Art and Design Studio classes worked in groups of 3-4 to create thought-provoking pieces inspired by their fears, revealing how they confront the unsettling ideas. The Studio Art classes worked in groups in order to focus on using ordinary materials to address human interactions with the environment and create provocative, three-dimensional artworks.

 

All students developed their artworks through a project-based learning model, including hands-on production and a series of peer critiques. The result of the partnership is a showcase of individual and collaborative reflection and innovation. Each student brings forth a unique perspective of how to interpret, challenge, and bring change to the world around us, both immediately and towards an undiscovered future.

 

While screenshots were included in the slide shows, those students' who submitted a video can be found here:

 

Fuera de Lugar [Out of Place] Artist: Adilene Juarez Haro Group: Personal Identity	Imagine Artist: America Hernandez, Dayanira Islas, Julianna Mercado Group: Personal Identity
[Homage to Bryanna's Father] Artist: Bryanna Camacho Group: Personal Identity	Untitled Artist: Jazmin Cruz, Arianna Zavala Group: Personal Identity
The Bottle Artist: Daniel Rodriguez Group: Personal Identity	What Can I Do? Artist: Shadrack Kitambogo, Group: Personal Identity

 

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Digital ESP March 2020 Catalogue

 

Following the decision to close the Museum to the public on Saturday, March 14, 2020, we faced the question: how do we still host Extended School Partnership (ESP) Showcase. Thanks to the quick thinking, experience, and dedication of gallery educators and management, a physical installation quickly turned into an impromptu photo session, documenting student work that had already been delivered to the Museum. With these photographs, the team produced the Museum’s first digital showcase consisting of nine slideshows, video work, and an art catalogue to share with our partner schools and the public at large.

 

View the Catalogue on ISSUU
or Download your copy.

 

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The Extended School Partnership Program at MCASD is made possible by generous support from The Dr. Seuss Fund at the San Diego Foundation, California Arts Council, ResMed Foundation, Price Philanthropies, Wells Fargo Foundation, and the City of Chula Vista. Institutional support of MCASD is provided by the City of San Diego Commission for Arts and Culture, the County of San Diego Community Enhancement Fund, and annual contributors to the MCASD Museum Fund.