This year marks the 10th Anniversary
of the Pierro Gallery of South Orange. In celebration of this
momentous occasion
some of the schools in our communities are participating in
many projects organized by the Pierro Gallery’s Outreach
Program.
In an effort to bring
arts exposure to the kids as well as expose the community to
art created by the kids in our schools, the following projects
have been created. The schools participating in these programs
are Columbia High school, Millburn High School, South Orange
Middle School, Marshall School in South Orange and Millburn Middle
School.
 |
Vicki
Fredricks is on the Gallery executive board for the
Outreach Program. Participants in the program
and on the committee include: art teachers Ellen Hark
of South Orange Middle School, Kate Dodd of Millburn
High
School, Ellen Weisbord of Marshall School, Claudia
Sohr of Millburn High School and student, Jordan Filko
of
the Art Club at Columbia High School. |
| Art Pals |
| This projects allows students from
2 different schools to communicate and learn about one
another through a piece of art that they create. |
Columbia High school and Millburn
High students worked on a collaborative piece of art.
A student of Columbia High would work on the piece, then
send it to Millburn High Art Club and a student would
add their creative effort and then it would go back to
the Columbia high student to add a little more. Twenty
students participated from each school. Each student
had a chance to work on the piece 4 times. |
 |
South Orange Middle school and
Millburn Middle school participated in the Art Pals program
using a different approach. The students created 5”x
7”“postcards” to send back and forth
to each other. The postcards were a combination of word
and images to reveal a little about themselves to each
other. They even created the “stamp” for the
postcards.
The schools had about 5 weeks for the creation and
exchange of the pieces. Each student will create 4 or
5 postcards
by the deadline which is a party planned at the Gallery
in April 17 allowing the kids to meet their Art Pals
in person and view their works. |
Random Acts Of Art
The Columbia High School Art Club created
pieces of art to be placed in South Orange and Maplewood for
the specific purpose to be found, enjoyed and kept by anyone
who happens to run across them. The kids have created 200 Random
Acts of Art to place in the train stations, cafes, public places
where people can discover them and take them home if they like.
In addition to distributing the pieces all around the communities
the club members will also be handing them out personally to
commuters and people watching the Performance Art event at
the South Orange train station to be held on April 10 starting
at 1:00 pm. Some of the pieces will be exhibited on the Party
Day where other students will be able to see them
Pierro
Gallery Of South Orange Tours
Gallery tours of current exhibits have been given to kids
from South Orange Middle school, Marshall School, Columbia
High School. Future tours include Millburn High School and
Millburn Middle School.
Recently Marshall School viewed the Synopsis @ 10: The Anniversary
Exhibition.
Judy Wukitsch, Director of the gallery, led the tour and gave
the kids materials to create their own “10” works
to be completed back in the classroom. A quote form Ellen Weisbord
of Marshall School follows:
“ Dear Vicki,
We had a great visit to the Gallery on Thursday. The kids absolutely
loved it! They really got a lot out of it. During their recess
time at lunchtime, I had one class come in to try their own
#10's. On Friday, the other class had a turn. They had fun
making their own pieces. I had tables set up with different
materials. Some worked with markers, others with craypas, collage,
watercolor.”
The Marshall kids will attend
the Party in April along with the other kids and will display
their “10” Art
project.
Work Shops at Gallery
Franc Palaia, an exhibiting artist
in the Gallery at the time, gave a workshop on Photo manipulation
to the Columbia High
School art club. Franc combined the workshop with the Artist’s
talk during is exhibition of his work in March. The workshop
was free for the kids and funded by the gallery.
Jordan Filko of Columbia Art Club writes;
“ We loved the workshop!! Sam and I discussed sort of replicating
the workshop at a meeting so that anyone who wasn't there could
do it, and for those that were, they seemed interested in continuing.
We also stayed for the artist talk, which we found very interesting,
especially the sculptor.”
Party in April
A party is planned April 17 for
all participating schools in Outreach Program to display
and view all the projects that
have been worked on so far this year. The kids will meet their “Art
Pals” and discuss their works of art. The “Random
Acts of Art” and “10” works will be displayed
for all the kids to see. Tours of the current gallery exhibition “synopsis@10” will
be given.
Columbia High School
Art Club Volunteers
The kids from the art club at Columbia
have also volunteered their time to work with the gallery on
projects and activities
related to the Synopsis @10, The Anniversary Exhibition. They
will help out with the set up the Gala Auction of the Synopsis
@10 art works planned for May 16th. They will be present to
help out with different duties during the auction. |
