2018 YAM Flag Design Winner

Congratulations to Ilysa Sirota on winning the 2018 NYSATA Youth Art Month Flag Design contest. Her design for the theme of Art Builds Community was chosen as the winner for New York State and will be displayed at the 2018 National Art Education Association's Annual Conference in Seattle later this month!

Chicago: Van Gogh's Bedrooms at The Art Institute of Chicago

I'm Back from the National Art Educators Association Conference in Chicago and I wanted to share one of the highlights which was the Van Gogh Bedrooms exhibit at The Art Institute of Chicago.  Vincent loved hie 'Yellow House' in the south of France and considered it his true home painting 3 versions of it over 2 years.  All 3 paintings were shown together along with additional paintings, drawings, and notes Vincent wrote at the time.  Take a look at the video below for a quick glimpse.



One of the most interesting aspects of the show was seeing some of the scientific analysis of the paintings and the comparison and contrast of the 3 works which seem so similar at quick glance but have interesting variations on closer inspection.

NAEA Outstanding Teaching Award

I was thrilled to learn this month that I will be awarded the National Art Education Association's AET Outstanding Teaching Award.  It was an honor to be nominated by Rebecca Mir of the Guggenheim Museum and it was great being featured in Newsday's WINNERS column this week.  I'm especially grateful that such esteemed colleges and former students had a hand in the nomination process.  I'm looking forward to traveling to Chicago next month for the NAEA National Conference to receive the award and share some of the great art we do here at Smithtown East as I present a hands-on session on how we incorporate Digital Drawing and Creative Coding in classes.

Nationa Art Education Association's 2016 AET Outstanding Teaching Award

I was extremely honored this week to learn that I will be the recipient of The National Art Education Association's 2016 AET Outstanding Teaching Award.  This is a tremendous honor made all the more special by my nomination which came from my innovative art education colleague Rebecca Mir of the Guggenheim Museum.  I'm looking forward to traveling to Chicago in March to the NAEA National Conference where I will recieve the award and showcase some of the work we have done here at Smithtown merging art and technology at our developing makerspace in Digital Media class.

The San Diego Museum of Art

Last week I was in San Diego, California for the National Art Educators Convention and I had a chance to visit The San Diego Museum of Art in Balboa Park so I wanted to share some of the highlights.

The museum had a terrific show on painter Robert Henri (1865-1929) who's work which I have not seen much before and an example of a portrait he created is pictured directly above.  The exhibit titled Spanish Sojourns included interactive elements such as a wardrobe and props to create the Robert Henri look like I did above!

 

I also had a chance to meet and talk with artist Deborah Butterfield at the NAEAwho is world famous for her sculptures of horses uses weathered wood.  She gave a great talk on her work which we'll reference during our upcoming organic sculpture unit.  Take a look at some of her work below, its terrific!

Back from San Diego's National Art Educators Association conference

Loving the #creative #spirit @naea #SanDiego! Great #participatory #workshops w/ @Sharpie & @MichaelsStores #naea14 https://t.co/m7Dma8hSCb
— Tim Needles (@timneedles) March 29, 2014

I'm back from the National Art Educators Association conference in San Diego today feeling refreshed and creative!  This is the last week of the quarter so make sure all projects are complete and in by tomorrow!