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Home › News & Events › News › New studio aims to address racial justice

New studio aims to address racial justice

February 2, 2021

Arizona Arts launches the Racial Justice Studio with a new course to be offered in the fall, “Rehearsals in Anti-Racism,” taught by Drs. Amelia (Amy) Kraehe and Gloria J. Wilson, professors from the School of Art. The Racial Justice Studio is a new concept conceived as a hub for campus and virtual activities to promote a deep understanding of racism and anti-racism by centering artistic and creative practice.

Kraehe and Wilson co-founded the studio with Chelsea Farrar, curator of community engagement at the University of Arizona Museum of Art. 

Kraehe said the group was formed following the killings of several Black people, including George Floyd in May, and with support from College of Fine Arts Dean Andrew Schulz.  

Last spring Schulz called on the Arizona Arts community to challenge systemic injustice and use the power of the arts to affect change. 

“This is not a time to be quiet,” Schulz wrote. “Our promise is to speak up and take concrete action in this moment and beyond, because not to do so comes with a price. We stand with the victims of racism and anti-Blackness who experience the violence of social inequity often with fatal consequences. We will listen and support efforts to undo systemic injustice, and we invite you to hold us accountable as we pledge to focus on the power of art to create positive change.”

>> Arizona Arts stands in solidarity with social justice

Racial Justice Studio

The Racial Justice Studio was conceived to help Arizona Arts achieve three aims to: 

  1. Promote deep understanding of racism and production of anti-racist knowledge through creative practice and arts research broadly conceived; 
  2. Provide transformative learning opportunities and community engagement that build race-consciousness in and through the arts; and 
  3. Build connections, compassion, and co-conspiratorship among students, faculty, departments, initiatives, centers, and institutes within and beyond the Arizona Arts that share a commitment to anti-racism.

“Art studios are spaces of risk-taking, trying new things, and reflection-in-action,” said Farrar. “Racial justice is at the heart of this particular studio and has broad relevance to all the arts disciplines in Arizona Arts.” 

Dean Schulz feels that the Arizona Arts community is the perfect incubator to lead change through creative exploration and dynamic groups of educators who service both the public and University of Arizona students. 

“They’re starting with really impactful initial programs that focus on students, our faculty and staff, engaging in community, and really leading with their own expertise,” said Schulz 

Dr. Gloria J. Wilson installing “Blackademic,” her artwork featured in the 2019 Faculty Exhibition. From her artist statement, “In 2016, I made a doctoral gown as a response and metaphor to describe the intersections of my racial-ized and academic identity within a tenure-track faculty position.”
Rehearsals in Anti-Racism

The first initiative to come from the Racial Justice Studio is “Rehearsals in Anti-Racism,” which began to take shape in January 2021.

The course will engage students in personal, political, philosophical and aesthetic conversations about race, racism and their intersections with other markers of identity, by using workshop-style teaching methods that engage all the senses in  creative activities so conversations about race move beyond words to something more embodied and participatory.

This is a big initiative but the inaugural class, beginning in the fall, will be very small, with a max of 16 students. “There’s a certain kind of intimacy that needs to be created for racial dialogues to take place,” said Kraehe. “ And that requires vulnerability. Particularly when using artistic and creative methods, it means there’s an additional level of risk-taking that we’re asking of students.”

Kraehe’s scholarship, teaching and community engagement focus on how the arts and arts education can challenge, as well as reinforce, systems of inequality.

“When doing the work of raising racial consciousness, those who are interested and invested in the work understand that systemic transformation does not occur in the space of a single three-hour workshop. They understand that racism is endemic and that this work is on-going. Offering a course such as ‘Rehearsals’ allows for investment in a creative form of risk-taking. That risk-taking is necessary for developing the affective dimensions of understanding,” said Wilson. “Racial Justice Studio might be viewed as a  catalyst that sparks movement toward deeper engagement with race, racism, and anti-racism in and through arts modalities.”

Wilson’s work analyzes the cultural systems which work to produce race and racism, in general, and more specifically, examines constructions of racial representations across creative modalities and how these practices and processes work to reinscribe or resist systems of power. In addition to Rehearsals in Anti-Racism, the Studio is also pursuing two other initial programs:

  • Race/Remix – interdisciplinary dialogues with featured speakers and related podcast beginning this spring.
  • Creative Abolitionist Teaching (CAT) Fellows – an inter-level organizational network that brings together artists and educators who teach in schools and universities to develop anti-racist pedagogies and curricula using the lens of contemporary arts.

Farrar attests to the need for these programs. “I’m an alumna of the Art & Visual Culture Education program here at the School of Art, and I can speak to the need of teachers who are graduating with this critical focus in anti-racism and needing continued support and community when they go into the classroom and want to embed anti-racism into their teaching. As a museum educator, we too are in need of fellowship for this work. The Racial Justice Studio will begin to fill that need.”

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University of Arizona School of Art
2 days ago
University of Arizona School of Art

Great oil painting by Galadriel Gross who is currently studying studio art and is working on her portfolio for an illustration emphasis!
•
"Self Portrait After Rain"
This was my first self portrait, and it was a real joy to paint. Knowing there is a version of myself in this painting that is always at rest, always breathing fresh air after a rain, and always in close proximity to the mud is self-affirming and grants strength to my active, living self. While I really love visual drama and tension, these quieter and calmer pieces always resonate with me for a long time.
... See MoreSee Less

Great oil painting by Galadriel Gross who is currently studying studio art and is working on her portfolio for an illustration emphasis! 
•
Self Portrait After Rain
This was my first self portrait, and it was a real joy to paint.  Knowing there is a version of myself in this painting that is always at rest, always breathing fresh air after a rain, and always in close proximity to the mud is self-affirming and grants strength to my active, living self.  While I really love visual drama and tension, these quieter and calmer pieces always resonate with me for a long time.
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University of Arizona School of Art
4 days ago
University of Arizona School of Art

Currently on display in the Lionel Rombach Gallery is After America Day by Day: A Counter-cartography by Mariel Miranda. Mariel is co-founder and director of the International Festival of Photography Tijuana (FiFT) a self-organized and feminist platform created for the undisciplined reflection on the image and its current modes of production. This great exhibition is compiled of evidence of Mariel’s counter-cartographic response to the 1947 road trip that Simone De Beauvoir took through the American Southwest. Link in bio!! ... See MoreSee Less

Currently on display in the Lionel Rombach Gallery is After America Day by Day: A Counter-cartography by Mariel Miranda. Mariel is co-founder and director of the International Festival of Photography Tijuana (FiFT) a self-organized and feminist platform created for the undisciplined reflection on the image and its current modes of production. This great exhibition is compiled of evidence of Mariel’s counter-cartographic response to the 1947 road trip that Simone De Beauvoir took through the American Southwest. Link in bio!!Image attachmentImage attachment+5Image attachment
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University of Arizona School of Art
6 days ago
University of Arizona School of Art

Here are more of our amazing student artists currently featured in the Lionel Rombach Gallery. Link in bio!!
•
The School of Art and Art Advisory Board are celebrating the works of our accomplished scholars at the 2020-2021 School of Art Scholarship Exhibition in the Lionel Rombach Gallery. Congratulations to our scholarship recipients and thank you for representing the breadth of visual art making, teaching, and scholarship here at the School of Art.
•
Artists featured are Alice Qinghui Chen with American Gothic, Perla Segovia with Transcendent Hope, and Danielle Jones with Rising Systems.
... See MoreSee Less

Here are more of our amazing student artists currently featured in the Lionel Rombach Gallery. Link in bio!!
•
The School of Art and Art Advisory Board are celebrating the works of our accomplished scholars at the 2020-2021 School of Art Scholarship Exhibition in the Lionel Rombach Gallery. Congratulations to our scholarship recipients and thank you for representing the breadth of visual art making, teaching, and scholarship here at the School of Art.
•
Artists featured are Alice Qinghui Chen with American Gothic, Perla Segovia with Transcendent Hope, and Danielle Jones with Rising Systems.Image attachmentImage attachment+2Image attachment
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University of Arizona School of Art
1 week ago
University of Arizona School of Art

Mark your calendars, the UArizona Art History Graduate Student Association is hosting their 31st Annual Symposium! Tune into this free Zoom event on March 5, 2021 from 9am-5pm to listen to an amazing group of student speakers as well as our keynote speaker, Dr. Nicole Fleetwood discuss art in the era of mass incarceration. ... See MoreSee Less

Mark your calendars, the UArizona Art History Graduate Student Association is hosting their 31st Annual Symposium! Tune into this free Zoom event on March 5, 2021 from 9am-5pm to listen to an amazing group of student speakers as well as our keynote speaker, Dr. Nicole Fleetwood discuss art in the era of mass incarceration.Image attachment
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University of Arizona School of Art
2 weeks ago
University of Arizona School of Art

This amazing sculpture is titled “Temporary Structures” by Marisa Lewon and is currently in the Alumni Exhibition in the Joseph Gross Gallery— link in bio!!
•
Temporary structures is an amalgamation of sand, skin, self-understanding and time. I use personal history to understand how the experience of where and how we are raised can alter reactions and perceptions of new landscapes as adults. In this work, my perception of, and aversion to, ideas of home are echoed through exploration of personal memory.
... See MoreSee Less

This amazing sculpture is titled “Temporary Structures” by Marisa Lewon and is currently in the Alumni Exhibition in the Joseph Gross Gallery— link in bio!! 
•
Temporary structures is an amalgamation of sand, skin, self-understanding and time. I use personal history to understand how the experience of where and how we are raised can alter reactions and perceptions of new landscapes as adults. In this work, my perception of, and aversion to, ideas of home are echoed through exploration of personal memory.Image attachmentImage attachment+2Image attachment
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University of Arizona School of Art
2 weeks ago
University of Arizona School of Art

The School of Art and Art Advisory Board are celebrating the works of our accomplished scholars at the 2020-2021 School of Art Scholarship Exhibition in the Lionel Rombach Gallery. Congratulations to our scholarship recipients and thank you for representing the breadth of visual art making, teaching, and scholarship here at the School of Art.
.
Artists featured are Tehan Ketema with Netsela, Dan Newman with iusedtothinkthatway, and Ada Smith with Twelve Breakfasts.
.
Link in bio!!
... See MoreSee Less

The School of Art and Art Advisory Board are celebrating the works of our accomplished scholars at the 2020-2021 School of Art Scholarship Exhibition in the Lionel Rombach Gallery. Congratulations to our scholarship recipients and thank you for representing the breadth of visual art making, teaching, and scholarship here at the School of Art.
.
Artists featured are Tehan Ketema with Netsela, Dan Newman with iusedtothinkthatway, and Ada Smith with Twelve Breakfasts. 
.
Link in bio!!Image attachmentImage attachment+3Image attachment
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