Building a Culture of Creativity and Excellence
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Grady High School Fine Arts department is dedicated to the idea that high school students are ready for immersion into the larger world of visual literacy, professional applications, and advanced portfolio development. Our dedicated and passionate faculty relish the opportunity to work with the students to connect their ideas and techniques with the larger world of professional artists, designers, and craftspeople.
I received a BFA in Graphic Design from the University of Michigan in 1990 and went on to produce corporate events and trade show installations for companies including IBM, Georgia Pacific, Sketchers, and Coca-Cola. This experience evolved into free-lance design work for a variety of specialty events, theater, and interior design. Eventually I felt the pull to work with schools and went to Georgia State University and earned a MAEd specializing in art education. I returned to GSU a couple years later and received my EdS in School Leadership. It has been a true privilege at Grady High School these 19 years. The variety of media, productions, collaborations, and facilities here make for fascinating challenges and constant innovation. My classes have included Drawing and Painting 1 and 2, Art History, Advanced Technical Theater, AP Studio Art, Sculpture, and Ceramics. We enjoy deep collaboration with the productions of the Fashion Program, Une Belle Revolution and Grady Drama. We also are active in creating a more compelling campus with mural production, sculptural inastallations, the street mural wall, and courtyard hardscaping projects. I am the sponsor of our chapter of the National Art Honor Society and the Director and Coach of our interscholastic ART THROWDOWN team. |
Photography
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My best advice to growing art students is to draw every day as a serious athlete would train or a pianist would rehearse. It is a discipline like any other. Get busy. Play with the toys.
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Art Throwdown
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Art Throwdown is an interscholastic, head-to-head art competition that was originally developed here at Grady High School about 10 years ago. I was approached by Community Artist/Educator Jeff Mather with the observation that almost all other activities both curricular and extra-curricular have interscholastic competition. Why not art? We worked together and created the very first competition between Grady and North Atlanta High School. Since then the Throwdown has evolved into a new paradigm for advanced school art programs to meet, compare collective skills, and create a platform for active art educators to meet and develop deeper professional relationships.
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