Palmer Trinity School

17 F A L L / W I N T E R 2 0 1 6 BI R D'S EY E V I EW Summer Residency in Vermont is past June, I attended the Vermont Studio Center. Immersing myself in books, technology, the painting studio, and the serendipitous company of other artists and writers, I embarked upon a very large and exciting project. Stirred in part by the faculty speaker series event hosted here at PTS by Dr. Samira Alayan, I became interested in creating my own collection of paintings and texts that would document the development of art history as it has influenced me and my family. I studied the authority of those who write textbooks and those who define aesthetics. e inquiry called into question many assumptions of authorship, power, cultural blindness, and factual analysis. Much of history is conjecture. My personal perspective should have universal appeal due to its abundance of good stories and characters. e thirteen paintings I created share my artistic inheritance from the Paleolithic era through the Dark Ages and the Reformation to the turn of the 19 th century. I hope to spark the interest of young adults who have found history to be boring. At VSC my project was critiqued by the current Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, Jane Hirshfield, the Chair of the Visual Arts Division at Columbia, Gregory Amenoff, as well as from well-known artist critics Jessica Hutchins and Steve Locke. ey were unanimously impressed by the "authenticity" of my project and fascinated by the weavings of my family tree with significant developments in the field. I have learned a tremendous amount about my own family and how it flows back through all the branches of art and politics. I have also distilled an essence of what art has served through different ages and why we need to know this. Each month, VSC welcomes over 50 artists and writers from across the country and around the world to their historic campus in northern Vermont. e majority of them are professors from various disciplines just coming out of the school year. While I was there I got to know three other high school teachers who were using the time to perfect their craft and delve deeper into their practices. Time at the residency provided me a rich collection of experiences and insight into teaching. Using our vacation time to expand the depth of our teaching and creative skills is a rare and valuable opportunity. is August, I returned to PTS renewed and passionate about painting, history, and the purpose of an art education. Last January, during professional development day, I presented to the faculty the rewards of prioritizing time for research and study in the areas that fuel our passion for teaching. Notre Dame de Chatres by Tilly Strauss BY TIL LY S T R AUS S, V IS UA L A RTS DEPA RT MEN T

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