Eric Sihao Lin

L.E.S. Walking Tour with Leora Fuller and Dakota Devereux Scott

September 13, 2019 by Eric Sihao Lin Leave a Comment

Tour stop in front of a LES community garden.

During one of the first sessions of the semester, students from Critical Pedagogy, Artists, and the Public Sphere went on a walking tour of the LES with Art + Ed alum Leora Fuller and Dakota Devereux Scott from FAB (Fourth Arts Block) NYC and People’s LES.

The tour began with a land acknowledgment, in which Leora stated that New York University, and Manhattan in general, sits on the occupied territory of the Lenni Lenape peoples. Throughout the tour, Leora shared the invisible histories of resistance in the neighborhood, and the group discussed the ramifications of gentrification in the changing Lower East Side. Between tour stops, the group participated in activities like creating found-word poems from words that were seen during the walk, and a trust walk, depending on other senses to experience the L.E.S.

Tour group walking in the LES

Supporting contextual images shared during the tour:

Manahatta, Lenape land.

Map of Lenape Villages.

L.E.S. Map

Cooper Square Mutual Housing Association.

Image from the 1988 Tompkins Square Riots

We the People Won't Go

Mirror/Echo/Tilt Workshop

June 24, 2019 by Eric Sihao Lin Leave a Comment

Mirror/Echo/Tilt is a performance and pedagogical project created by artists Melanie Crean, Shaun Leonardo, and Sable Elyse Smith to examine the language and gestures used to describe experiences of arrest and incarceration. This collaborative project between artists, educators and individuals affected by the justice system uses magical realism as a framework. Performative vignettes are translated through the body and recorded in vacant former institutions such as empty prisons and courthouses to consider how individuals might assert agency in the reclamation of physical and psychic space. Taking the form of video, performance, text, archive and curriculum, the work envisions new language around the way we engage with mass incarceration and inserts counter narratives into the dominant media landscape, which commonly alienates and criminalizes black and brown bodies.

In this workshop, artist Shaun Leonardo with members of the Brooklyn Justice Initiative at Recess Art introduced elements of the project to Art+Ed students as a way to imagine new interactions and ways of engaging the body as a site of historical memory, trauma and possibility.

Mirror/Echo/Tilt website

New Museum: Mirror/Echo/Tilt

Workshop hosted by Shaun Leonardo and peer leaders from The Brooklyn Justice Initiative.

Stop! Don’t Shoot! What role can art play in changing policies about gun control?

May 31, 2019 by Eric Sihao Lin 43 Comments

Student artwork of a gun.

The United States has a complicated relationship with guns that has become a focus of heated debate. The U.S has the highest rate of homicide in the “developed world,” due in part to easy access to a wide range of firearms. Gun ownership is considered a constitutional right protected by the Second Amendment but mass shootings in elementary and high schools, concert venues, bars, and houses of worship are happening with increasing frequency. In 2017 the U.S. experienced a total of 346 mass shootings and 2018 numbers will likely remain as high. Artists throughout history have depicted the gun as both a fetishized object and a deadly weapon. Today, many artists are using their creative practices to participate in the debate around access to guns and the increase in gun violence. Students in this class will examine these debates connecting the work of artists with student movements and public dialogue about how and why gun violence is part of our society. The class will use art as a social justice “weapon” to change public perception and mobilize change in public policy.

In spring 2019, NYU Art+Education students Sarah Mallory and Tayllor Johnson and high school students from across the city embarked on a journey to better understand the issue of gun violence and gun control in the United States today. The class explored sub-questions such as: What is a gun? What are current gun control policies in the United States and what does the 2nd amendment say about the rights of citizens? and how will you, as an artist create artwork that promotes the change you want to see in gun control policy? Students researched and discussed topics such as mass shootings (schools, religious spaces, music venues), police brutality and connections to racism, gang violence, and gun protection and ownership by exploring the work of artists including Amanda Williams’s Chicago is Iraq series, Shaun Leonardo’s Primitive Games performance, JR’s photo mural installed in NYC The Gun Chronicles: A Story of America, and Shepard Fairey’s print: Guns and Roses.

Students brainstorming the topic of gun violence. Students sit around a large table discussing an image shown on a screen. A teacher and student discuss a work of art.

Student painting during a Stop! Don't Shoot Visionary Studio session. Students and their artwork during a Stop! Don't Shoot Visionary Studio session.

Students studied policy documents and created black out poetry images, designed a graphic posters to represent their research, visited a public memorial created by artists, and developed their own proposal for an artwork that would speak to the issue of Gun Violence in their own words and images.

Student artwork: poster with symbols and statistics about gun violence affecting Black women

Dreamyard Artist Educator Mixer

April 10, 2019 by Eric Sihao Lin Leave a Comment

Dreamyard Mixer group

Dreamyard, an organization that collaborates with Bronx youth, families and schools to build pathways to equity and opportunity through the arts, hosted a gathering for Social Justice Artist Educators. This event was part of a 3 part series of events hosted in the Bronx by different cultural organizations to connect the NYU community with arts-based initiatives and organizers that was funded as part of NYU/Steinhardt’s Diversity Innovation Grants. Dreamyard teaching artists hosted brainstorming and discussion sessions talking about teacher super powers and how we engage our students. Participants had a chance to partner across different organizations to learn about different approaches to social justice art education, and then had a chance to make original bags and wearable pins inspired by social justice warriors from the past and present.

Dreamyard Mixer buttons Ironing tote bags at the Dreamyard Mixer Button making at Dreamyard Mixer Dreamyard Mixer group

Whitney Museum Tour, 2018

November 20, 2018 by Eric Sihao Lin Leave a Comment

Field trip to Whitney Museum, November 2018

Programmed: Rules, Codes and Choreographies in Art, 1965-2018 establishes connections between works of art based on instructions, spanning over fifty years of conceptual, video, and computational art. The pieces in the exhibition are all “programmed” using instructions, sets of rules, and code, but they also address the use of programming in their creation. The exhibition links two strands of artistic exploration: the first examines the program as instructions, rules, and algorithms with a focus on conceptual art practices and their emphasis on ideas as the driving force behind the art; the second strand engages with the use of instructions and algorithms to manipulate the TV program, its apparatus, and signals or image sequences. Featuring works drawn from the Whitney’s collection, Programmed looks back at predecessors of computational art and shows how the ideas addressed in those earlier works have evolved in contemporary artistic practices. At a time when our world is increasingly driven by automated systems, Programmed traces how rules and instructions in art have both responded to and been shaped by technologies, resulting in profound changes to our image culture.

Photo from the Whitney Museum exhibition: Programmed: Rules, Codes and Choreographies in Art, 1965-2018

Media Literacy Spoof Ads, 2020

October 16, 2018 by Eric Sihao Lin Leave a Comment

Each year in the Media Literacy class, students engage in art making to explore and critically respond to different forms of digital and mass media. In the Spoof Ad project, students apply their knowledge of photoshop skills to express conceptual strategies and critical theories in media literacy. Students use photography, digital collage and text to respond to the manipulation of print media. Using Olivia Gude’s Postmodern Principles as inspiration, students use juxtaposition, appropriation, layering, and interaction of text and image to communicate a desired visual message in response to and resistance of the identified ad campaign / issue.  

Image of fake advertisement for Converse sneakers

Image of fake advertisement showing Kanye West selling water Image of fake Ancestry.com advertisement with Elizabeth Warren Image of fake movie poster for Fast and Furious that shows Social Media figures Fake image of Dolly Parton on a New York Public Library Card application Image of fake advertisement for International Women's Day with Emma Watson

Images created by: Laina Weiss, Zoe Stern, Jocelyn Lewis, Andrew Beers, Molly Rutledge, Sarah Sanders

NYU Art+Education at NAEA

October 10, 2018 by Eric Sihao Lin Leave a Comment

NAEA 2017 – Boston

Close up of signs from NAEA 2016 presentation

NYU Art+Education alumni and faculty presented several formal and informal sessions at the 2017 NAEA conference. Jungwon Park, Ariana Mygatt and Jessica Hamlin presented the panel: Art as Research: Investigating Education as Artist Educators. This session highlighted the work of pre-service teachers in the NYU Art+Education program, and shared examples of research-driven inquiry and artwork produced while working in urban public schools and community-based contexts.

Program alumni John Kaiser staged a protest sign making and borrowing station at the convention.

Professors Joe Fusaro and Jessica Hamlin presented a session: Contemporary Strategies for Creative and Critical Teaching in the 21st Century based on an article published by Art Education magazine of the same name. This session paired classroom case studies and the work of contemporary artists who model critical and creative capacities and process-driven strategies across diverse subject areas and grade levels.

And finally, NYU Art+Ed alumni and faculty helped to organize a participatory art performance by Oliver Herring along with students from several high schools in New York City. Areas for Action (AFA) is an open ended participatory performance, improvisatory sculpture, and real-time collaborative artwork. Conference participants were invited to interact with one another and the environment in the spirit of creative invention, interpretation, and play. A follow-up discussion with Oliver Herring, educators and students from a variety of contexts explored the possibilities for connecting AFA to classroom teaching and learning.

NAEA 2019 – Boston

Tiffany Jones at NAEA presentation, 2019

In 2018, Program Director Dipti Desai received the Studies in Art Education Lecture Award for scholarly contribution to art education and gave a talk.

NYU Art+Education alumna, Tiffany Lenoi Jones and faculty, Jessica Hamlin presented the session, ‘Connecting the practices of socially engaged artists to student led social transformation‘ which shared examples of educator practice at high school and graduate levels that facilitate student-led artistic inquiry and social activism that were inspired by contemporary socially engaged artists.

In addition, NYU Art+Ed faculty participated in a two-part presentation. Part 1 of the presentation discussed how contemporary art and artists offer rich connections to students’ lives and explored different approaches to contemporary teaching practices. Part 2 of the session included a wide range of teachers who offered “flash” descriptions of classroom and individual teaching strategies using contemporary art and artists to engage students.

Hurricanes, Fires, Floods

October 9, 2018 by Eric Sihao Lin Leave a Comment

Student artwork from Hurricanes, Fires, and Floods.

Student artwork from Hurricanes, Fires, Floods.

Hurricanes, Fires and Floods, Oh My!: What is the role of art in the face of global climate change.

Climate change is one of the defining issues of the 21st century. Many scientists agree that rising global temperatures and sea levels are the reasons why we are experiencing more destructive weather than ever before. Deforestation, mass extinctions of species, water scarcity, dramatic changes in food production and agriculture reflect our changing global ecosystems and the impact of human activity on our planet. Many contemporary artists are becoming climate activists: using art as a way to create awareness of the realities and impact of climate change, as well as using visionary strategies to rethink what we take for granted about the environment and imagining alternatives. In this class, students will build their own knowledge about climate change and create work in a variety of media connecting ideas about planetary health with local and global efforts to raise awareness and make change.

Student artwork from Hurricanes, Fires, and Floods.

Artwork of a fist grasping a plastic water bottle coming out of the earth

Manufacturing Addiction

October 9, 2018 by Eric Sihao Lin Leave a Comment

Students posing in front of artwork at the opening exhibition.

Manufacturing Addiction: How can art move the conversation about drug addiction from personal problem to the systems that support it?

Many people take medication daily — to stay healthy (vitamins) or prescribed medications to relieve physical pain due to illness or operations. Across the United States, pain-killers, also known as opiods are increasingly being prescribed by doctors contributing to widespread addiction and deaths. Led by the pharmaceutical industry, the infrastructure that supports this system of legalized addiction has a long history and a complex set of current powerbrokers. We have long considered drug addiction the fault or problem of the victim alone. How have artists helped to raise awareness of the larger structures and systems that influence drug dependency and also imagine alternative forms of support and healing? In this class students will explore the connections between addiction and the pharmaceutical industry, create artwork in different media in response to this crisis, and imagine the possibilities for sharing their knowledge with others.

Student artwork.

100 Ways to Mobilize exhibition.

Student painting during Visionary Studio 2018.

White Out!

October 9, 2018 by Eric Sihao Lin Leave a Comment

White Out!: What do our public monuments tell us about our past and our present?

Public statues and monuments serve as reminders of our past, paying tribute to people and events that have shaped our history. But what if these histories do not represent all voices and perspectives, or contradict the values and beliefs of citizens today? We are often told that history is told by the victors, and monuments reinforce these stories in public, providing a constant reminder of who is considered important in our society as they stand in our public parks, in public buildings and government offices. Many monuments are now understood as controversial because they represent racist, sexist “patriarchal” histories and the dominance of White power over other narratives and points of view. The history of slavery, the genocide of Indigenous people, and colonization are not visible, nor are the many contributions of African-Americans, Native Americans, Asian Americans, Latinx visible. Contemporary artists have challenged how we understand monuments and the stories they tell, opening up conversations about who and what should be recognized in our public spaces.In this class students will explore how monuments tell stories about racial and patriarchal hierarchy in our society, investigate the function of monuments as public art today, and design alternative monuments and forums of public storytelling about our past, our present, and possibly our future.

Student working on a sculpture during a Visionary Studio session, 2018 Student working during a Visionary Studio session, 2018

Student painting during Visionary Studio 2018

Eric Sihao Lin

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