Call for Applications: WMG Seeks Teaching Artists for Community-based Project, Summer 2012

Woman Made Gallery is looking for teaching artists, art educators, and art therapists of all backgrounds to lead found-object assemblage workshops during Summer of 2012 for our 20 Neighborhoods project.

“20 Neighborhoods” is a community-based project celebrating Woman Made Gallery’s 20th Anniversary. The gallery is partnering with 20 Chicago neighborhood, community-based, and housing organizations to create an art exhibition based on Chicago women’s individual and collective experiences and aspirations for their homes, neighborhoods, communities, and city. Woman Made Gallery will host found-object sculpture workshops for 5 to 10 participating women at each organization’s location, culminating in an exhibition of all the participants’ art pieces, as well as an event series, at Woman Made Gallery in October of 2012.

The project will span a month of workshops meeting once a week for two hours each, plus a one hour orientation with participants, making for a total of nine contact hours.

Teaching artists’ commitment would be to attend a training session at Woman Made Gallery with other teaching artists, prepare, teach, and close up each class, as well as lead one orientation, and attend two events at Woman Made Gallery during the final exhibition. We foresee this commitment as between 20 and 25 hours total. Teaching artists will be paid a stipend of at least $350 for their participation.

Woman Made Gallery will be responsible for developing and providing curriculum, teaching artist training, and all workshop materials and tools.

Workshops will take place over the course of four consecutive weeks in June, July and August of 2012, and scheduling will be based on the needs of both the teaching artist and the organization where they are teaching.

A successful applicant should have:

• Some experience leading arts related projects, whether in a classroom setting, studio setting, or any nontraditional venue
• Excellent interpersonal skills
• Ability to lead discussions about personal and political issues that participants may face in their daily lives, and then facilitate participants’ art making and artistic content based on these discussions

 Applicants do not need to have a background in sculpture or found object assemblage. Women and Spanish-speaking applicants are strongly encouraged to apply.

Qualified applicants should submit to admin@womanmade.org with ATTN: Teaching Artist in the subject line. Please send:

• Resume or CV
• Cover letter detailing interest in the project and relevant experience with art education and/or social justice organizing
• 3 to 6 images of work samples preferably showing both personal artwork, and projects for which the applicant took part in as an educator or leader, jpegs only please

 The deadline for applications is March 11, 2012. Interviews for prospective teaching artists will take place in March and April of 2012, and hiring will be announced in April.

Please direct questions to admin@womanmade.org, or call 312-738-0944

Announcing WMG’s 20 Neighborhoods Project and Partners

“20 Neighborhoods” is a community-based project celebrating Woman Made Gallery’s 20th Anniversary. The gallery is partnering with 20 Chicago neighborhood, community-based, and housing organizations to create an art exhibition based on Chicago women’s individual and collective experiences and aspirations for their homes, neighborhoods, communities, and city. Woman Made Gallery will host found-object sculpture workshops for participating women at each organization’s location, culminating in an exhibition of all the participants’ art pieces, as well as an event series, at Woman Made Gallery in October of 2012.

We are proud and excited to announce our first fifteen partner organizations:

Art Forward in Logan Square

Our mission is to integrate and infuse the arts into all aspects of community development. Our vision is that social service agencies, community development corporations and other service organizations infuse the arts as a means of realizing their missions. Arts and cultural resources are considered essential community assets, integral to achieving community goals.

Arts of Life in West Town

Established in 2000, The Arts of Life is an arts studio for people with and without disabilities in the North Shore and Chicago. The program model that we developed together, after a year spent getting to know each other and working together as a community, consists primarily of each member taking ownership of the space and having an equal voice in the decision making process. At the studio, we focus on a variety of art forms, including: visual art, performance, installation and music. Please join us in celebrating twelve years of providing high quality, innovative service to over 50 adults with developmental disabilities.

Benton House in Bridgeport

Benton House is an independent non-profit 501(c)3 organization providing social services for the Bridgeport community in the city of Chicago for over 100 years.

Center on Halsted in Lakeview

In a safe and nurturing environment, Center on Halsted serves as a catalyst for the LGBT community that links and provides community resources, and enriches life experiences.

Enlace Chicago in Little Village

Enlace Chicago is dedicated to making a positive difference in the lives of the residents of the Little Village Community by fostering a physically safe and healthy environment in which to live and by championing opportunities for educational advancement and economic development.

Enlace Chicago se dedica a hacer una diferencia positiva en la vida de los residentes de la comunidad de La Villita, promoviendo un ambiente seguro y saludable en dónde vivir, y proporcionando oportunidades para el avance educacional y el desarrollo económico.

ETA Creative Arts Foundation in Pullman

eta CREATIVE ARTS FOUNDATION seeks to be a major cultural resource institution for the preservation, perpetuation and promulgation of the African American aesthetic in the City of Chicago, the State of Illinois and the Nation. Toward this end, eta CREATIVE ARTS FOUNDATION, shall provide professional opportunities by way of training and performance for the development of both youth and adults as artists and technicians; sales for visual artists through the gallery and exposure for the general public to authentic, valid projections of African American lifestyles, experiences and aspirations.

Hamdard Center in East Rogers Park

Hamdard’s mission is to promote physical and emotional health and well-being of individuals and families by offering hope, help and healing.

House of the Good Shepherd in Wrigleyville

House of the Good Shepherd provides an opportunity for battered women and their children to embark upon a new life of self-worth and dignity. Families come to us from abusive situations and—over the course of four months—complete a comprehensive program of education, counseling, budgeting and money management, and work skills training. While at the House, families live in individual apartments, which fosters independence and self-sufficiency. Women are mentored in positive parenting and receive individual, family and group counseling.

Our overall goals are:
• to promote healing and recovery for the mothers and children we serve, and
• to enable the women to develop independence and self-sufficiency and remain free from domestic violence

Howard Area Community Center in Rogers Park

The mission of Howard Area is to assist low-income individuals and families in and near Rogers Park to stabilize their lives and develop the skills necessary to become productive community members.

 

Imagine Englewood If in Englewood

Imagine Englewood if… ‘s mission is to strengthen and empower the greater Englewood community through teaching local youth healthy living, environmental awareness and positive communication skills.  IEi… motivates youth and their families to seek a positive quality of life and encourages them to pursue positive change.

 

Living Arts Center in Andersonville 

With an emphasis on visual art and writing, Andersonville Living Arts Center offers courses for women, teenagers and children. Art therapist and founder, Suellen Semekoski explains the mission of the “arts center, which promotes wellness through creativity and mindfulness.”

Mercy Housing in several Chicago neighborhoods

Mercy Housing’s vision is working to create a more humane world where poverty is alleviated, communities are healthy and all people can develop their full potential. We believe that affordable housing and supportive programs improve the economic status of residents, transform neighborhoods and stabilize lives. Mercy Housing’s mission is to create stable, vibrant and healthy communities by developing, financing and operating affordable, program-enriched housing for families, seniors and people with special needs who lack the economic resources to access quality, safe housing opportunities.

Mexico Solidarity Network Centro Autonomo in Albany Park

En el Centro Autónomo unimos nuestra fuerza con mujeres, hombres, jóvenes, ninas y vecinas con los cuales compartimos esperanzas, sueños, ideas, donde en forma de Caracol dialogamos, desaprendemos y nos reconocemos con gente que viene desde abajo. Caminando de forma circular seguimos buscando espacios donde nuestras voces sean escuchadas. Queda entonces este espacio como un referente para dialogar, comunicarnos, respetarnos, solidarízanos y enlazar resistencias.

At the Autonomous Center we unite our strength with women, men, young people, children and neighbors, with whom we share hopes, dreams, and ideas.  Using the conch as a model we dialogue, learn and relearn as we identify ourselves with people who come ‘from below’. Proceeding in circular form we continue to explore spaces where our voices can be heard.  Using this space as a springboard for dialogue, communication, and to respect amongst one another we support and link popular resistance.

Sarah’s Circle in Uptown

Sarah’s Circle is a refuge for women who are homeless or in need of a safe space. By providing housing assistance, case management, referral services, and life necessities, we encourage women to empower themselves by rebuilding both emotionally and physically; realizing their unique potential.

Yollocalli Arts Reach in Pilsen

Yollocalli Arts Reach, a youth initiative of the National Museum of Mexican Art, is an arts education and career-training program for teens and young adults. The Yollocalli model is based on creating a space for youth to partner with practicing artists; access the tools necessary to realize their own vision; and build skills as emerging artists. Located in the heart of Pilsen, Yollocalli is an open forum for experimentation in art-making based on issues in art, history, and youth culture.

Thank You!
We are grateful to the Efroymson Family Fund and CityArts for their generous support of this project. We still have a ways to go before we meet our funding goal. You can add your support by donating online here.

A Message from Janet Bloch: Create an Action Plan

A month has passed already in this new year, and hopefully you have started working on your goals that you set for 2012. In case it is going slow… we are here to lend you a helping hand, and with her permission we have copied Janet Bloch’s letter that she sent us in December. Janet Bloch is an artist, educator and an author. She was WMG’s Gallery Director from 1993 to 2000, and still serves as the Gallery’s Senior Advisor. She has more than 15 years of experience helping artists achieve their goals. In her new workbook, Strategic Marketing Tools for Visual Artists, she offers the same sound advice that was available only in her workshops and private consultations.

Create an Action Plan for 2012:

“When the New Year rolls around again, my heart fills with hope and excitement. I may be annoyingly optimistic to some, but that is because I have experienced the joy of fulfilling the goals I have set for myself at the year’s start.

Over the last decade, one of the tools I have used to accomplish my goals is a strategic plan. Another term for a strategic plan is an action plan, and action is the key to success. Here I will share how to create and use this plan in order to support your own vision. My expertise is in helping artists stay focused and achieve their goals, so when my book was published this year, it gratified me to hear from people who are not artists that found the chapter on Strategic Planning helpful in achieving their goals as well. Please feel free to pass along this information to anyone you think would benefit from it.

The first step to the plan is to set aside some time to daydream. Imagine yourself six months from now. What would you like to achieve by then? In my work with clients, I’ve found that breaking down a strategic plan into six-month increments produces optimal results. It is a long enough time to make real headway and a short enough time to stay focused on the goal.

Now transfer your daydreams into writing. Make a list of everything you can think of that you’d like to achieve in six months. Both processes are important—letting your mind fantasize and then putting pen to paper will allow a picture of your sincerest desires to emerge. Once the goals are down on paper, the harder work begins as you prioritize your top three goals. Suspend your imagination and scrutinize each goal, asking yourself honestly if this goal can realistically be achieved in six months.

If you have to stop doing things to achieve your goals that are important to you or your family, such as going to the gym or helping your kids with their homework, you are setting yourself up for failure. I would bet that the biggest reason people abandon their objectives and create a cycle of self-sabotage is by setting unrealistic goals. I once heard a wise speaker who said everyone asks her how to get their too busy lives into balance. Her answer was that if you are too busy, your life will never be in balance. Please do not use a strategic plan to beat yourself up by creating impossible goals.

Download my Six-Month Form. Once you have settled on three goals that are attainable, prioritize three actions that you can take each month that directly relates to one of your goals. Determine actions that need to be done continually and consistently and write those actions down in every month in the six-month period. As an example, if an artist wants to send a CD to three galleries that they think are good matches for their art, I would suggest one action be to visit those galleries every month.

Now turn your attention to the actions that are one-time activities. Where in your six-month plan will those activities be most effective? Perhaps you have a contact at one of the galleries who has offered to make an introduction for you. Are you actually ready for that to take place or do you still need to get your work photographed or your statement written? Perhaps you need to do more research on your own before you take advantage of this valuable resource. To follow this example, in the sixth month, you could plan to take your contact to lunch.

To ensure success, do not be tempted to fill your life with too many actions. Only commit to three actions each month. Take it from my experience with dozens of clients—three actions a month are plenty.

One of the most challenging yet beneficial characteristics of a six-month strategic plan is that it forces you to eliminate all activities that do not bring you closer to your six-month goals. It helps you see that, for example, “taking a workshop in papermaking” or “attending a conference on art licensing” just don’t fit in your plan right now. It doesn’t mean you won’t ever do those things; it just means that for the next six months you’ll make the concerted effort to only take those actions that serve your vision.

You begin to see why reaching your goals have not been easy. Good luck to all and I wish you a productive and joyous 2012!” -Janet Bloch

For more detailed information on Strategic Planning and other topics go to www.janetbloch.com.

Buy the Book!