The Visual Arts Department
Our Teachers:
Ms. Cynthia Fontaine [email protected]
Ms. Elizabeth Hoorneman [email protected]
The visual arts are a unique language through which individuals communicate their ideas, feelings, and cultures. Multi-sensory experiences, such as the arts, are the means by which humans understand and express their world. Through art, students develop skills in a wide variety of materials, tools, and techniques that allow for creative, meaningful, and personal expression.
Our curriculum promotes creative problem solving, decision-making, and judgment skills which help to develop the whole intellect and contribute to the promotion and integration of concepts common to all academic areas. Additionally, citizens in today’s global community need these skills to succeed in current and future job markets. The arts expose our students to ecological, social, and cultural concerns facing their community and the world. With the growing complexity of visual culture, the study of art helps students to decipher multiple messages and make intelligent and thoughtful life decisions.
We provide a wide variety of visual experiences ranging from drawing and painting to ceramics, printmaking, and mixed-media materials. Through structured coursework, which includes knowledge of artists and historical periods, aesthetic elements, interdisciplinary and multicultural connections, art students understand and appreciate the role of the artist as designer and creator. They are consistently involved with their own learning from the inception of an idea to its concrete realization. The visual arts provide these opportunities for students to develop flexible mental skills and become reflective thinkers able to evaluate their own and others artworks. Ongoing assessment by both the teacher and student through meaningful dialogue fosters analytical and cognitive strategies. The student is an active participant in the entire learning experience.