Art Education

Catalina received the Donald and Barbara Smalley Graduate Research Fellowship from the Department of Gender and Women's Studies for Spring 2022. Based on her dissertation proposal, “String Figuring: A Practice to Witness the Beautiful,” she was selected from the GWS graduate minors who applied. The Smalley fellowship provides $12,000 for the period from January 15 through June 30, 2022, along with a tuition and fee waiver. As the recipient of the Smalley Fellowship, Catalina will be asked to give a public lecture on campus based on her dissertation research.      

The Illinois Art Education Association selected Dr. Jorge Lucero as a 2021 Educator of Distinction. Jorge is a 2021 IAEA Educator of Distinction. Jorge is employed with University of Illinois. Annually, the IAEA recognizes art, design, and media educators for their excellence and service to the field. The IAEA awards and scholarship committee found Jorge ’s professional performance, service, and leadership to be exemplary in every regard and selected him for this recognition. Please join the Illinois Art Education Association in honoring and elevating Jorge for this recognition. The Illinois Art Education Association (IAEA) is the premier professional development provider for art, design, and media educators in Illinois. The organization serves thousands of teachers statewide through a wide range of programs and services. Learn more at ilaea.org. Congratulations again to Jorge for his excellence!

Dr. Jennifer Bergmark and Dr. Blair Smith together with their community partners,  Dr. Asia Fuller-Hamilton, Principal and Sunni Ayers, Art Teacher at Garden Hills Elementary, received a $25,000 community grant through the University of Illinois Call to Action to Address Racism & Social Injustice Research Program. This will fund a year-long community-based pilot project that is a collaboration between the art education program at the School of Art and Design and faculty and staff at Garden Hills Elementary School with a series of visiting artists and public art projects to investigate the role of the arts in revitalizing communities through civic engagement, collective care, and advocacy. A primary goal of this project is making space for historically marginalized people from this school/community to gather, create and address its most pressing concerns. This will be facilitated through three arts projects lead by visiting artists with a practice of advocacy embedded in their creative work. The artists and projects were chosen to provide a platform for addressing community concerns, rebuilding trust between families and the school, and expressing a sense of pride in the school and community. Additionally, this project will provide hands-on community arts experiences for both undergraduate and graduate art education students, challenging students to consider implications of race in both curriculum and pedagogical practices while expanding the notion of art education experiences. These projects are intended to generate conversation about other possibilities, raise awareness of community assets and provide a foundation for future collaborations between the Art Education program and Garden Hills Elementary school.

Associate Professor of Art Education Jorge Lucero hosted the Museum of Us on June 11 through the Art Institute of Chicago’s Learning and Public Engagement Department.

Associate Professor of Art Education Jorge Lucero was invited by the University of Michigan Press to talk about Irina Aristarkhova’s book Arrested Welcome: Hospitality and Contemporary Art, which uses a feminist lens to examine who is worthy of being welcomed. Listen to the podcast.