Saturday, October 27, 2012

SC Art Educator Association Annual Staff Professional Development Conference



     The annual SC Art Educator Association Staff Development Conference in Myrtle Beach was great this week.  The featured artist presenters included South Carolina's own and highly esteemed, Dr. Leo Twiggs, British born Shaun Cassidy, Mac Arthur Goodwin, R. Scot Hockman, and Tom Stanley.  The resounding theme: teaching artists MUST create.  Although I enjoyed hearing from the speakers, I thought it interesting that there were no featured women artists represented throughout the three day event.  This will surely be pointed out by yours truly.

     There were  many sessions to choose from.  It was a hard choice; but I decided on the Frida & Diego, Occupying Anonymous, a video project with "underprivileged girls", "nesting" with wool, paper making, melted crayon pictures, and Media Literacy for starters.  The latter is the latest addition to the SC Art Standards.  The nesting project utilized the wet felting technique.  It included embellishment of the wool with feathers, raffia and other nest building supplies.  The melted crayon session got a bit detained.  While using hairdryers, the electricity circuit went out, so we were left the option of only using votive candles for melting.

     Next year's conference will be October 18-20, 2013 in the beautiful Beaufort, SC.  It is definitely on my calendar.  Please mark yours as well.

Thanks to all the organizers, presenters, session leaders and attendees for an awesome time!