Program teaches Winder students to like folk art

By Jennifer Johnson | Athens Banner-Herald | Story updated at 9:56 pm on 6/6/2009

WINDER — Although most art shows would offer wine and cheese, Kerry Bryant thought MoonPies and RC Cola might be more appropriate for the Southern Folk Art Show.
The seventh-graders who showcased their artwork seemed to agree.

The art show was the culmination of a yearlong, hands-on program that had Russell Middle School students exploring the connections between folk art and science, ecology, language arts and culture.

“Every step of the way, it’s been tying the art to the core curriculum standards,” said Bryant, the fine arts coordinator for Barrow County Schools.

Jocelyn Davis, a social studies teacher at Russell Middle School, connected an ancient Korean method of pottery-making to the similar Appalachia method to study different cultures.

“Through art, you can talk about anything,” Davis said.

More than 50 students participated in the program, made possible by a character education grant from the Harrison Foundation two years ago. When they started, many students knew nothing about folk art.

“It’s not an art that you’re used to studying,” Davis said.

And not all the students liked what they saw.

“At first, I thought folk art was really kind of bad, but once I got to meet the artists and learn about them, I really started to like it,” said 13-year-old Joshua Pharr.

In groups of five or six, students visited the home studios of folk artists like potters Michael Crocker and Roger Corn, visual storyteller Billy Roper and recycled materials artist Lisa Pirkle.

“We actually got to talk to her, not just learn about her from a book,” said Charlie Horne, who considered Pirkle her favorite artist.

After a visit, students would return to the classroom and present their experience to fellow classmates, often working with Russell Middle’s media specialist, Aprille Williams. Each student contributed PowerPoint slides, shared videos or brought back samples of the artist’s work to contribute to each lesson.

The students studied 53 artists over the course of the year, and got to try their hand at different folk mediums those artists use.

As the school year wound down last week, they displayed their clay whistles, recycled art and narrative paintings that reflected a childhood memory, with the story that inspired it written with markers on the back. These paintings were styled after pieces by Billy Roper, who came to the school to share his stories with the children.

The program was overseen by language arts teacher Robin Blan, who co-owns a folk art gallery in Dawsonville called Around Back at Rocky’s Place. Blan was instrumental in making the connections between the folk artists and the classroom. Blan’s friend Steve Slotin welcomed the students to his folk art auction at Historic Buford Hall in downtown Buford, where they had a scavenger hunt, finding the work of artists that they had studied.

One particular student, Brandan Cowen, was so taken with the art form that he asked his mother to take him to his first auction this past March, where he found a painting he loved.

“When the piece came up, Henry Slotin got up and told the crowd that he was a kid from my class who really wanted to start his folk art collection and to go easy on him,” Blan said.

When a woman in the audience bid against him, the crowd turned and gave her dirty looks. She backed down and Brandan won the piece.

When he went to pay for it, he was told that an anonymous contributor had paid the tab for him. The work, “Mississippi” by Lonnie Holley, was displayed at the students’ own art show last week.

“I think I enjoyed meeting the artists more than making the art. I’m not an artist, I’m an art collector,” Brandan said.

When the students took a trip to the Folk Pottery Museum of Northeast Georgia in Sautee-Nacoochee, their knowledge about folk art impressed even their tour guides.
“We knew a lot more than the people who were leading us,” Charlie said. “They were pulling out their note cards to tell us stuff we already knew.”

Some of the students who participated in the program served as docents during their own show, guiding mostly family and friends through the makeshift gallery, sharing what they had learned and their newfound appreciation for the art form.

“Folk art is taking what you feel in your heart and putting it on the wood or the canvas and replicating what you’re feeling,” Joshua said.

Now art connoisseurs, the students enjoyed seeing their classmates’ artwork displayed.

“Because each one of us has a different way to interpret things and to express ourselves, it was fun to see,” Elizabeth Perry said. “I grew as an artist through the program and during the program. It was a lot of fun.”

Bryant hopes to continue the project next year and will look for more funding.
“This year was the first time doing this, and now we see ways that it could expand,” Bryant said. “Kids learn like crazy when they have the experience with the subject.”