Honors Visual Art Exhibition + Creatorkids

CreatorKids takes artists and the Minnesota Museum of American Art directly to elementary students in Saint Paul Public Schools. This year, through a unique fusion of spoken word and art-making, students expressed themselves individually and collectively while building visual literacy, critical thinking, vocabulary, and confidence. A sampling of works from the M’s collection grounded students’ work and offered an initial creative spark. Zetta Elliott’s book, Milo’s Museum, laid the groundwork for talking about the impact of seeing one’s self and community reflected in the art of a museum.

Teaching artists See More Perspective and Teresa Cox invited students at Galtier Community School, in grades 3 through 5, to consider themselves as poets and visual artists with unique perspectives on art and the world – each with points of view worth sharing and owning. See More Perspective prompted the young creators to write spoken word poems which you may listen to in the gallery. Teresa asked students to create their own individual symbols by identifying personal traits and then assigning emotion, color, and shape to them. What emerged are the mixed media, collaged pieces strung together into two group installations, on view at the M.

With the Honors Visual Art Exhibition for 2017, the Minnesota Museum of American Art continues a dynamic collaboration, now 26 years strong, with Saint Paul Public Schools (SPPS) and Ordway Center. The exhibition celebrates the competencies, creativity, and achievements of student artists from each SPPS high school. The works on view, all made by St. Paul Honors art students, demonstrate a variety of pathways to artistic self-discovery—from technically disciplined to playful, by turns globally-minded and highly personal.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website