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Leading a Double Life: Advice, Strategies and Tips for a Successful Art Career while being an Art Teacher

JODY BOYER�MISSOURI ART EDUCATION ASSOCIATION CONFERENCE 2019

STUDIO.BOYER@GMAIL.COM

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Safe Space / Risky Conversations

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Setting the Stage: �Defining Success as an Artist

synonyms:

favorable outcome, successfulness, successful result, triumph; �

Hollywood ending �

"the success of the scheme"

Suc·cess

səkˈses/

noun: success; plural noun: successes

  1. the accomplishment of an aim or purpose.
  2. "the president had some success in restoring confidence"

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Setting the Stage: �Defining Success as an Artist

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  • Success can mean many things: economic gain, personal satisfaction, community status (academic, artistic, business)
  • For our purposes success will be defined as creating a meaningful and sustained studio practice and also attaining your personal goals.
  • My goal today is to share strategies I use to balance the complexity of a personally meaningful studio practice while also maintaining a satisfactory teaching practice.

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Teacher, Artist, Mama (in Reverse Order)

  • Success for me is not monetary gain, though economics are important.
  • Parent - 1st
  • Studio Artist - 2nd
  • Teaching Studio Art since 2001 in higher ed.
  • 2008 in Art in America, but broke

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  • Started to transitioned to K-12 in 2009
  • Still Part time faculty at the same University as my spouse.
  • Personal Goal #1 : Balance two teaching professions while achieving a satisfying studio practice
  • Personal Goal #2: Exhibit nationally in peer reviewed venues (RTP process for tenure)
  • Personal Goal #3: Don’t go into debt!

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Balancing Act: The Dream

Family

Studio Practice

Teaching

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Balancing Act: The Reality

Studio practice

Teaching

Family

Agony

Exhaustion

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Teaching: “Tied” to Our Profession.

Tehching Hsieh, Art/Life One Year Performance 1983-1984, New York. © 1984 Tehching Hsieh, Linda Montano. Courtesy of the artists and Sean Kelly, New York

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Teaching: A Culture of Stress

  • 2017 Educator Quality of Work Life Survey – BAT and AFT
  • In response to the question “How often is work stressful?” nearly a quarter of respondents said “always”
  • Educators and school staff find their work “always” or “often” stressful 61 percent of the time, significantly higher than workers in the general population, who report that work is “always” or “often” stressful only 30 percent of the time.

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Teaching: A Culture of Overwork

Sep 24, 2018Vol 192 No 12

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Teaching: A Culture of Deferred Responsibility.

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Teaching Strategies: Boundaries

  • Dispel the teacher savior narrative. Your job is to teach, It is not to fix.
    • Let it be broken.
    • If it is not your job it is not your problem.
    • The word “opportunity” usually means volunteering for extra work – be wary!�
  • Define your responsibilities.
    • Know your rights, know your contract.
    • Learn to say no. If it needs to be done, someone else will do it.
    • Use administrator phrases to shut down difficult situations such has �“I Don’t Disagree” and “That Sounds Tough.”
    • Learn to walk away.

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Teaching Strategies: Boundaries

  • Emotional Labor
    • Students – supportive relationships established on a foundation of responsibility.
    • I do not “fix” for students, I show them a path to “fix” situations themselves.
    • Trauma is real, but not an excuse.
  • Teaching job versus studio: for me - keep them separate
    • My studio practice does not enter my classroom
    • My contract is to teach the students, not to be a practicing artist.
    • My students know I am an artist but I am there to create a space for them not for me.
    • Legally if you make work on company time you enter fuzzy territory. Who owns the work? I am not comfortable with this legal gray area. My work, my time.

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Work: Balance Strategies

Matthew Rackham Barnes

High Peak 1936

Alexander Calder �Spider 1939

Martha Rosler She Sees in Herself �A New Woman Every Day 1976

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Teaching: Balancing Strategies

  • Let it go.
  • Don’t take it home.
  • Pick one or two days a week to work after duty hours. No More.
  • Use your time at work effectively!

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  • Classroom Management: The students do the work.
    • Facilitate Responsibility
    • Activate Engagement
    • Collaborate on curriculum – Ask the students what they want / need!
    • Fail - Try again tomorrow! (FAIL = First Attempt in Learning, even for teachers!)
    • Make your job fun! Love your job!

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Teaching Strategies: Mental Health

  • #1 Life Skill in Education: Say No to Adult Drama.
    • Don’t hate kids. Really, I am serious. Middle School is Awesome! If you don’t like kids, don’t teach!
    • Dealing with Adult Hallway Negativity:
      • Use your shut down phrases.
        • “That Must be Tough”. “It is Hard Being a Kid.” “Relationships Take Work.”
    • Besties at work? NOPE.
      • Fences make for good neighbors, they also make good colleagues!
      • Collegial yes, co-dependent – NO! Be “professional” friends with everyone, but do not do other people’s jobs.
      • You do you. Be the bright shiny thing you need to be!
      • Be firm but be pleasant.
        • Someone wants you to fix something – great pushback phrases include “That sounds like a “you” problem”, “Above my pay scale” “That is not my job” and “I got nothing”

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The Studio:�Literal & Metaphoric Space �

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Your Studio Practice:�Metaphoric Space in Mind / Body

Dan Miller Untitled 2016

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Kiki Smith �Brain from Possession Is Nine-Tenths of the Law 1985

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Your Studio Practice:�Metaphoric Space in Mind / Body

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Your Studio Practice: Studio Thinking

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- Develop your System, what is right for you��- Make time/space every week��- Studio Habits of Mind��SMART GOALS:��Specific�Measurable �Attainable �Reasonable�Timely�����

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Literal: Studio – The Illusion

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Literal: Studio (Finding Your Garden)

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Literal: Studio – The Reality

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Art is a Sport: Train & Practice��

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Practical: �Your Making Work – Now What?

  • Decide on your next steps. �
  • Does your studio practice remain for you or do you want to share with a larger audience? �
  • Ready to share your work? Get training on strategies to professionalize your studio practice. �

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www.springboardforthearts.org

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Pave Program in Arts Entrepreneurship – ASU

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https://www.amplifyarts.org/

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Books that are helpful all around

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Practical (and personal):�Getting Your Work Out There

What does out “there” mean? Understanding your framework. �My funny story of the LT. Governor versus Instagram.

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Practical: Getting Your Work Out There - Strategies

  • Define your purpose (based on your “success” goal)
  • Define you market (based on your “success” goal)
  • Target your campaign (based on your “success” goal)
  • My personal example from this last year 2018:
    • Looking for Solo and juried exhibitions in regional or nationally peer reviewed exhibition venues who are educational institutions or community nonprofits.
    • Within a single day drive (15 hours of the Omaha region)
    • How: Research, research, research.
    • Submit to open calls that are available.
    • “cold call”: Email, send an artist package, follow up phone call a week later. Always find a personal connection as an entry point.
    • Results: 7 solo exhibitions scheduled in the next three years.

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Practical: Getting Your Work Out There - Resources

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Richard Serra� Television Delivers People 1973

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Rejection

IF YOU DON’T PUT YOUR NAME IN THE HAT YOU DON’T HAVE A CHANCE

IT WILL HURT, BUT IT WILL PASS. TRY AGAIN UNTIL YOU FIND YOUR COMMUNITY

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Practical: Business Strategies

SMART GOALS:

Specific

Measurable

Attainable

Reasonable

Timely

What is capital to you:

Define your risk / investment capacity

Create a quarterly, biannual goal for your ROI

IS your ROI financial or experiential?

For me I am investing in creativity and my returns on investment are in connections and experiences in a larger art community.

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Marion Post Wolcott "Working Men Lunches" Café Where Construction Workers Eat in Pineville, Louisiana, on Highway to Camp Livingston 1940

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Practical: Business Resources

  • Get quality small business training:
    • Amplify Arts Workshops (Omaha)
    • Union for Contemporary Arts (Omaha)
    • Do Space (Omaha)
    • Extension offices – small business courses
    • Community Colleges – One and done courses
    • Being an artist is being a small business!
    • Get a good accountant!

Arthur Rothstein Auto Parked in Tourist Camp Used by Migrant Fruit Workers, near Belle Glade, Florida 1937

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Practical: Business Resources

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Jenny Holzer Truisms (1994)

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Artist Residencies

  • http://www.artistcommunities.org/
  • Res Artis
  • Art Rabbit (England)

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VLAA – Volunteer Lawyers and Accountants for Artists!

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Questions / Comments / Criticism?

studio.boyer@gmail.com