OVERVIEW

This month Sidewalk Radio presents both a radio show and an art show that journey along the path to discovery in Atlanta’s arts and culture realm. The radio show delves into the world of education as told through an arts critic, an arts collector, and an architect who specializes in design for student life.  The art show, by way of The Sidewalk Art Project, is the end product of a creative partnership between Sidewalk Radio and SCAD Atlanta that exhibits student work about our history and culture. What we learn through our exploration is that education is both in itself an art form and a producer of art, how it is constructed many times parallels the path of the student.

Art collector and explorer, Bill Arnett, is Founder and Chief Curator at Tinwood Media. While extremely accomplished, being perhaps the foremost collector and educator about the art of the southern black slave tradition, Arnett is himself “self-taught".  Joining Gene in the studio this month to talk about his journey toward knowledge and the unorthodox route he took, Bill enlightens and educates about discovery in the arts and within the individual. AM 1690 has extensive coverage about Arnett’s work, and can be further enjoyed by listening to an interview done by “The Voice of the Arts” own David Lewis in his interview.

Jeff Stebar is an architect and student life expert with Perkins+Will. Jeff joins Gene to talk about the future of education from both the built environment and from life outside the classroom. Since the students for whom Stebar is now designing are only in the 6th and 7th grade presently, predicting how they will learn and where they will learn when they get to college makes the work he and his team embark upon interesting and a challenge. What our discussion uncovers is that buildings are being designed not to predict the future, but to adapt to it. The interests of the students and the advancements in technology are highly considered as is the new reality of having to recruit in higher education.

Cathy Fox is a long-writing Atlanta arts critic and founder of ArtsAtl. While Cathy does not have a focus on arts education per se, she is certainly one of Atlanta’s top voices when it comes to covering the arts. Her interview is in part to educate upcoming artists such as those who participated in The Sidewalk Art Project about how to and where to learn, and in another way meant to take a critical eye on education within the arts.

And, speaking of arts critique, we must take a moment to recognize our Juror Panel who helped select “Best In Show” for the art show portion of this month’s exploration.  Special thanks to Spalding Nix, Ronnie Land, Bruce McEvoy, and Stuart Horodner. Each of these individuals are big in Atlanta arts, and dedicated their time and expertise not only to help the SCAD students learn more in the way of exposure to success in the arts, but also to learn themselves about the students and their work.

Congratulations to the two students selected “Best In Show”, Elizabeth Castaldo for “Miss Winter (Juniper)” and to Nate Kamp for “Kights Armor, Palisade, Lucky Penny”.  To see their work and read the artist’s statement visit us on Sidewalk Radio’s Facebook Page.