From tar beach to star-flying

The Artdog Image of Interest

Faith Ringgold, Tar Beach (Part I from the Woman on a Bridge series), 1988.

Faith Ringgold's story quilt Tar Beach (Part 1 from the Woman on a Bridge series), 1988, rewards some time spent looking at it closely. The quilt has enough going on in it to provide several of the illustrations for Ringgold's 1991 children's book, also titled Tar Beach. 

The book Tar Beach is a semi-autobiographical account of a little girl, Cassie Louise Lightfoot, in Harlem, New York in the 1930s (not coincidentally, Faith grew up there during the 1930s).

At night in the summer, Cassie sleeps on the "tar beach" of her apartment building's rooftop, and dreams that she owns everything she can see. Her prized possession is the George Washington Bridge, and in the story the stars lift her up so she can fly over it. Here is a video from NPR, of Faith reading the book.



The other story quilts in the Woman on a Bridge series (that I could find) are Double Dutch on the Golden Gate Bridge: Woman on a Bridge #2, 1988; Painting the Bay Bridge: Woman on a Bridge #3, 1988; and The Winner: Woman on a Bridge #4, 1988.

Tar Beach, the most famous of the series, is in the Guggenheim Museum in New York. Here's a glimpse of the size of the quilt and more about its background.

Faith enrolled in the City College of New York in 1950, planning to study art--but women could only enroll in certain majors at the time, so she studied art education. She taught in public schools until 1973, when she turned to creating artwork full-time. Listening to her read, however, I'm not sure her inner teacher went away. More likely that's the part of her who wrote and illustrated 17 children's books.

I also thought it was fascinating (because I'm fascinated by cultural exchanges) that she picked up the idea to put a fabric border around her paintings from a Thangka exhibition she viewed in the Netherlands.

IMAGES: Many, many thanks to Gathering Books, for an image of Tar Beach that was big enough to allow us to some of the richly-worthwhile view smaller details in the quilt, and to NPR on YouTube, for the video of Faith reading her book.

Pop-up books!

I've always loved pop-up books, from the first time I saw one. They've always seemed sort of magical, but in the manner of a well-executed magician's trick.

A page from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, art by Robert Sabuda

My kids had them, loved them as they grew up.  We wore several out.

My students loved them, too, when I needed a way to teach 3-D principles on a paper-glue-and-markers budget and I pulled some basic pop-up technology how-to articles from the Internet, to create a final project assignment for the color unit.

Dai Food, by Colette Fu

Pop-up books led me into the realm of turning the 2-D medium of paper into a 3-D creation, so yes--they are the origin of my explorations into paper sculpture.

Anyone who follows this blog also knows I'm a science fiction and fantasy fan, as well, so you can imagine my delight when my son turned me on to the amazing Game of Thrones Guide to Westeros pop-up extravaganza shown in this YouTube video:

I'm happy to give credit where it's due.  The paper engineering is by Matthew Reinhart, whose website reveals a wealth of other wonderful projects as well.  Do NOT miss it!

The art is by Michael Komarck, who also has done a lot of other wonderful illustration work, most recently for Magic: The Gathering from Wizards of the Coast.

A steal at $65.00, this will  become a collectible. ISBN: 978-1-60887-314-2.

You'll probably also enjoy the video on THIS wonderful pop-up, America's National Parks, from the National Parks Conservation Association:



This one was designed by paper engineer Bruce Foster (I bet you'll enjoy his blog).

The art for America's National Parks is by Dave Ember.

This one's got a two-tiered price structure, with a limited-edition version and a mass market version.  Part of the proceeds go to support the National Parks Conservation Association. ISBN: 978-0-97589-603-7.

IMAGE CREDITS: The Robert Sabuda page from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland came from The Alpha Mom blog.  Colette Fu's amazing image Dai Food is from her website.  The wonderful YouTube video  for the Game of Thrones guide comes from HBO, ultimately. The National Parks Conservation Association and InkinMotion created that book's YouTube video.

The Public School Devastation Project

Recently, I had lunch with a fellow art teacher.  We have known each other for several years professionally, but this was the first time we'd gotten together socially.  The more we talked, the more things we found we had in common.

We both are women of a certain age, whose teaching careers have been cut short by forces not within our control.

We both had built popular high school programs focused on teaching students about publications and print media. We both had seen our students move from these programs to graduate and seek post-secondary education, preparatory to going into related careers.

When I was forced by a drop in enrollment to leave my program, it ended. Now she is being forced to leave her program, because the district is terminating it.

Talking together, we worried about our students who were only partway through our programs when they were ended. We worried about what will happen (has happened, in my case), when other students with similar aptitudes and interests come along, but no program exists to excite and guide them toward interesting careers.

This is our perspective on the fruits of “school reform” in the age of slashing budgets. Class sizes are going up. Good, passionately engaged teachers are being thrown away. Options are narrowing for students. Fewer and fewer different learning styles are being accommodated.

We are at a loss to see how this will improve education.