Critical Intervention / Personal Voice Action Plan
Research Paper
Megan Fallin
March, 2020
In the world of art education, it has become a necessary goal of mine to help others consider the impacts made on the environment when designing and collaborating on art projects with students, and to become more conscientious about consuming. From personal experience, I've become increasingly more aware and equally terrified of the amount of waste we dispose of on a daily basis, especially when it comes to disposing of reusable materials. I'm on a mission here to research ways art educators can help positively impact our communities and encourage others to reconsider what objects they define as trash.
Walking past any public trash bin in front of a local grocer offers one a view of plastic coffee cups, plastic bags, aluminum cans, bottles, utensils, and paper; the list is endless, unfortunately. Sometimes when I walk past a public trash bin, it seems like it's more full of reusable plastic, paper, and metal materials than actual degradable waste. It can be temporarily convenient for us to dispose of these products quickly, but it makes me wonder how often we think of the long-term consequences of these actions. Sarah Reichard acknowledges this, reminding readers that, "We have developed an out-of-sight-out-of-mind approach to our garbage that is pretty shocking, especially when you consider...the average person in the United States or Canada generates four to five pounds of garbage per day. This is the equivalent of eighty-two thousand football fields covered in six feet of compacted garbage every year... (not including) all of the materials that went into making the goods we ultimately throw away" (Reichard, 2011. p. 168). Thinking about these statistics, I wonder if we should be asking ourselves if disposing of most of what we consider waste is really ever convenient for us in the first place?
On this subject, art educator Pamela Taylor wrote about this in the late 90's, mentioning her own fears about how easy it is to toss unwanted objects into waste bins, which later travel to a landfill, "That landfill is part of our earth and is actually in our home! Can we live with that? I know what I have thrown away, but what about my neighbor, the gas station, the cafeteria, machine shop, or chemistry lab? How can life as we know it be sustained with such ever increasing piles of the unknown?" (Taylor, 1997. p. 16). Taylor worked with this issue in her own community by asking her students to look at art pieces that question our temporary solutions to problems with waste as well as how the actions of one person alone can contribute to change (p. 17). She wrote about how even a few conversations about the severity of this particular situation with her art students helped them become more conscious about who they are as consumers and disposers, stating, "Throughout these experiences the students seemed much more conscious of the materials they used, and, I believe, at times, they actually pocketed their disposables before throwing them into the art room trash bin. Most notes and plans were taken in their own journals or created on the backs of materials found in trash bins all over the school" (Taylor, 1997. p. 18). I found it inspiring how one teacher's dedication to informing her students about being mindful with what they were considering trash lead to the creation of a small community of environmentally aware individuals. By asking her students to gather found materials to create pieces of art, she also inspired her students to reconsider their thoughts about finding meaning in art. This acts as a perfect example of how the actions of one person truly do impact the actions of those around them.
D. Klein and K. Phillips consider the importance of teaching sustainability alongside teaching students about design, proclaiming, "When design students are made aware of the context in which products are manufactured, they are more likely to consider barriers to sustainability outside of their usual parameters; increasingly resource-hungry technology, a culture that focuses on the short term, and pervasive advertising and marketing efforts aimed at increasing consumption" (Klein, Phillips, 2011. p. 69). While sustainability goes far beyond the world of design, education is a powerful tool and can be incredibly helpful while we pave a path towards a more sustainable future (Klein, Phillips, p. 69-70). They go on to talk about looking at nature to design sustainable solutions to the problems we have put upon ourselves. They remind their readers that we are not just participating or existing in nature, but we are a part of nature, and should be respecting it, as "Designers can benefit in many ways by being students of the natural world" (Klein, Phillips, 2011. p. 71). They recognize designers who have looked to the natural world to redesign environmental-conscious shipping plans, chairs, radiators, cutlery, hangers, and many other simple daily objects (p. 71-73)
B. Clark and C. Button have come to the conclusion that STEM can be an important tool to help teach students about sustainability in their chosen fields of interest. They inform their readers about how we can use art galleries to help teach others about this essential topic, using nature sounds, visual art, music, video, sculpture, poetry, and many other forms of art to encourage others to gain an understanding of land ethics (Clark and Button, p. 44). Art Galleries such as CCSU have been used to teach communities and students about global warming and ecological awareness through various forms of art, and scholars Clark and Button found that "CCSU elementary pre-service teacher education students and second-grade urban students with diverse cultural backgrounds, experiences, and academic levels, engaged with the AVIARY (museum installation) environment with ease" (Clark and Button, 2011. p. 44) which helps prove that this is an effective way to reach groups of individuals with ideas to promote change in communities, as environments like this can act as areas for people to share ideas and collaborate together, and Clark and Button follow up with this idea by sharing, that through these interactions, "There was an increased awareness of the need for children and teachers to experience artists and creative environments to illicit critical and creative thinking for sustainability" (Clark and Button, 2011. p. 46). Their research lead to a short but powerful quote they found from Greenleaf, who has stated, “depth of meaning about process emerges only out of experience” (Greenleaf, 1998. p. 61). Local communities can definitely benefit from programs like these that offer valuable learning experiences for the people within them to engage with (Clark and Button, p. 50).
In conclusion, for the time being, I believe we can start to make impacts by following the teaching methods of Pamela Taylor, and looking to artists like Tara Donovan, who creates sculptural work out of mass-produced objects. Her work questions the ways we have changed the world with our man-made products, and how we can use these objects and inspires viewers to look at daily objects in different ways than before. Her works often mimic nature and natural forms that play with light, color, and texture. As art educators we have particular voices that have the power to reach out into our communities and execute change, and I think this can start by questioning how we consider and use the materials we already use in our classrooms, and how we talk about them with our students to encourage them to be mindful consumers in a consumption-crazy time.
sources
Clark, B. and Button, C. (2011), "Sustainability transdisciplinary education model: interface of arts, science, and community (STEM)", International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, Vol. 12 No. 1, pp. 41-54. from https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/14676371111098294/full/html
Greenleaf, R. (1998), The Power of Servant Leadership, Berrett‐Koehler, San Francisco, CA.
Klein, D., & Phillips, K. (2011). Sustainable Design: An Educational Imperative. The Journal of Technology Studies,37(1/2), 69-77. Retrieved March 26, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/43604665
REICHARD, S., & Raven, P. (2011). Recycle, Reduce, Reuse, Repurpose. In The Conscientious Gardener: Cultivating a Garden Ethic (pp. 167-180). BERKELEY; LOS ANGELES; LONDON: University of California Press. Retrieved March 28, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/j.ctt7zw58t.12
Tara Donovan. (n.d.). Retrieved March 28, 2020, from
https://www.pacegallery.com/artists/tara-donovan/
Taylor, P. (1997). It All Started with the Trash: Taking Steps toward Sustainable Art Education. Art Education, 50(2), 13-18. doi:10.2307/3193638
Action Plan
When everything surrounding COVID19 calms down and the public is less afraid to touch shared surfaces again, I plan to reach out to the Fort Worth Museum of Modern Art, located in Fort Worth, Texas, when they reopen to the public in regards of setting up a community canvas somewhere on the property with a short prompt, open to the public, for any and all people, of all ages, to contribute to an evolving piece of art with found objects from their person, their car, or the natural environment around them.
The purpose of this action plan is to encourage members of my community to reconsider the everyday objects and to think about how they could create art with things we either dispose of, or already have access to, such as naturally found objects from the outdoors. By designing and promoting the unused hashtag "changing mosaic", I hope for this to become viral within the art community (at least) so they can see the different art works made from common items and inspire them to use what they have before they buy new products. It will begin as soon as possible and will be up for three months from the start date (pandemic pending).
The prompt next to this canvas will state a narrative along the lines of:
"Changing Mosaic"
interactive art piece: found objects, canvas
initiated by artist and educator Megan Fallin
Spring, 2020
#ChangingMosaic
"Please find an object near you or on your person to add to the Changing Mosaic.
Add, take, and/or rearrange items to create a piece of art made from things we might normally dispose of, such as coffee cup lids, gum wrappers, bottle caps, or simply natural objects from the natural world around you, to create an evolving, changing mosaic with others from the community. Help the artist, Megan Fallin, spread awareness and encourage members of our community to reconsider objects we see in our everyday, and to be more conscious of what we dispose of.
Every sustainable action we make as individuals has the power to create a more creative, cleaner tomorrow for all.
Share your work with your friends on social media using the hashtag #ChangingMosaic and see what others have created, too!"