With support from the California Arts Council, LIBERTY PAINTING CORP will offer arts education opportunities to all Siskiyou County students through the gallery’s Explorations program. Class visits are structured using the California Arts Education Framework, following the definition of an advanced comprehensive art program and are adaptable for all learners.
The liberty arts education team has made it a priority to reach out to remote communities that have been recognized as historically underserved and direct our resources towards those facing disparities in art education opportunities. Through our LIBERTY ART DAYS, 8-12 artists travel to schools up to 75 miles away, bringing projects and supplies- even a printing press, to spend a day sharing projects with students not normally tackled in a classroom. Grant funding will support educators and materials.
Our core programming is through our exhibition schedule which is generated from our community, and includes: LOCAL FOCUS- exploring work by regional artists; BRIDGE SHOWS- bringing new work and ideas in from metropolitan areas, and OPEN-CALL opportunities, inviting the community to participate, often for the first time, in curating, creating and exhibiting work.
Annually, members are invited to propose a show. As future curators, they prepare a presentation, outlining the theme/invitation/artists to be exhibited. All proposals are considered, with a vote by community participants selecting the most promising for inclusion in our upcoming exhibition schedule.
Art education is delivered through our Explorations outreach classes, which introduce students to art in a gallery setting, with local artists often sharing their knowledge and creative inspiration. Students are introduced to work through context, language and process. They have time to individually view the art, then come together for discussion. In our dedicated studio they then create work related to the themes and processes they have just learned about. Liberty Arts transports artists with supplies yearly into outlying schools for projects not normally seen in a classroom. We have made the 150-mile round trip journeys to schools in the lowest HPI quartile areas or even so remote they have no score.
Liberty Arts also serves our community as a venue for performance and special events, including hosting musicians, our biennial fashion extravaganzas, and “Special Delivery” evenings which feature twelve speakers who introduce audiences to a wide range of art, culture and local topics. We also participate in city street fairs, where hundreds of families and community members have made free creative art projects such as our “print a bug” linocut prints last year, first inked and then printed using an etching press.