Work and ish

There are some exciting things happening at the School of Creative Arts (SoCA). The school was started in 2005 and has been providing free arts classes to members of the community. They focus on vulnerable people, like those living in shelters, but anyone is welcome. Up until now all the classes have been performing arts: poetry, music, voice and drama. So now I'm starting to develop a visual arts program for the school. We're also making a lot changes with the way the school is run to provide more commitment and consistency among the students and volunteer facilitators.

I've been working pretty hard lately at making connections with other visual artists and people who are doing similar things (teaching workshops, etc...) in Pretoria. We're getting quite a network of people together. This means that we have many more resources available to us. For instance, I've met some artists who may be willing to facilitate classes at the school.

We also get to plan some pretty cool events. Right now we're working on some events leading up to World AIDS day on Dec 1st. This Friday we're having an Art Factory, which is our platform for our performing arts students and a free venue for community members. The theme will be HIV/AIDS. The following week we'll have a series of workshops addressing AIDS awareness through different art disciplines. I'm especially excited about this, because I'll get to facilitate a painting workshop. I really enjoy working with my supervisor, Zee. When we brainstorm together, our ideas just build on one another and we work so well together! She’s also very patient with me through cultural and other misunderstandings.

I'm also teaching two outreach classes per week. I go to two different shelters to teach sculpture. It's pretty chaotic, but I'm learning a lot. It’s given me a good chance to prepare for the coming term at the end of January, when I’ll hopefully be able to begin teaching oil painting.

In addition to my work at SoCA, I’m also working on a few other projects with TLF. I’m on the design committee for the anti-human trafficking campaign leading up to the World Cup in June and July. I’ve also been spending a lot of time working on the web based contest inviting artists and designers to submit project proposals for the [re] branding homelessness initiative. The idea is to create a new language and new images surrounding homelessness in order to encourage a new kind of awareness and sense of responsibility for making a healthier community for everyone. I’ll post the website once it’s completed.

So work is busy, but I love it. I am amazed at how much I’m learning and also how much opportunity there is for me to get real work done here. After several years of jobs which I don’t think have really fit me, it feels like a miracle to be doing meaningful things that I truly love and feel like I’m good at.