Perpich residency, 3 hours
Though it's not part of my residency per se, advising and registration day was this past Monday at MCAD, and I had the opportunity to work at the Teaching Artist Minor table, alongside the professors that run the other minor programs. I was with Nancy Hicks, another teaching artist minor who went through Practicum last year. While there was plenty of stuff going on and people around for advising, not too many people ended up coming up to ask about the minor program. A few people came up with questions though, and it was great to talk to them about what they were interested in or curious about regarding the minor. It was also nice to be able to talk to Nancy a bit again, both as another teaching artist and artist engaged in community (through the Peoples Library) and as someone I hadn't been able to talk to in a little bit.
On Wednesday, I was back at Perpich and the senior students there were (and are) in the midst of setting up their senior shows. This program happens every year, and while it was initially set up as a retrospective show for students to exhibit their work and growth during their time at Perpich, around the time I was there it began to shift more towards being a self directed project or exhibition. Students can now choose whether they create a retrospective or a more singular or concept oriented installation. Each student gets a space on a wall or out in the gallery area and writes a proposal for what they plan to create. Jeremy was out Wednesday, so I helped the gallery coordinator there with a couple of different tasks. I assisted some students with setup of their spaces and gave advice on how to tackle certain challenges, from making a sculpture look more weathered to how to hang lights in a spaces. I also reorganized the (very densely packed) gallery tool cart, which sounds small but was pretty visibly helpful for the students. I'm excited to continue observing and working with them on this process this coming week, and to see what they end up with when all is said and done.