Diversity Statement

The most moving feedback I’ve ever received from a student has been: “Your class taught me to be more kind to myself.” This from a young woman who came at the start of the semester visibly anxious, a self-proclaimed perfectionist, and clearly stressed by the courses and senior thesis in her International Political Economy major. While she struggled to learn the basic skills of throwing clay on the wheel, I gently encouraged her to slow down and asses her progress though the exercises of the introductory course. After sixteen weeks she had by no means mastered the skills, but her disposition has gradually changed and her willingness to experiment and laugh through the process had grown immensely. That personal growth is immeasurably more valuable in her life than the ability to make a nice cup.

The most meaningful observation from a peer was when a visiting artist to my classroom, a queer indigenous woman who later hired me as a sculptor and builder for her large-scale sculpture, told me that it was clear to her that my classroom was a safe space by the way the women students were inhabiting the studio: relaxed, spread out, and coming easily into the open studio hours to work on their projects. I had thought often about the power dynamic that exists between teacher and student and my positioning as white and male in that place of authority and was so relieved that my considerations showed through to her vigilant scrutiny.

Perhaps the finest diversity victory for me was with a non-binary student on the neurodivergent spectrum who, as my first semester progressed with them, began to audibly “whap” their fingers together during class. When I made no mention of it after several weeks, they confided in me that this self-stimulation behavior helped them relax and focus and that I was the only professor they felt comfortable enough to “stim” around.  In our third semester working together they had become capable and confident in firing their work using the dynamic and fiery raku kiln without supervision. They expressed to me upon graduating the importance of the trust I had placed in them as they learned to operate it safely and become a leader to others. This wasn’t overly generous of me; they had indeed demonstrated competence and safety to my standard and were perfectly capable.

Creativity is empowerment. I run my studio classroom in the specific effort of fostering a healthy and open environment and an atmosphere that champions creative agency and opportunity for social and self-expression. It may not be that artmaking is the committed career ambition of every student that passes through a studio class in college, even at the graduate level, and while training artists in the skill and vocabulary necessary to make meaningful artwork is certainly the objective of a rigorous art program, a more subtle and important goal is to nourish the self-realization that underlies making art for anyone and everyone.