The Sculpture Lab in the Broad Art Center was abuzz with activity this summer with preparations for a very special exhibit. But instead of UCLA students creating works of bronze, ceramic, and other traditional media for their respective portfolios, the young artists, who were culled from underserved high schools in Los Angeles, were shaping something less tangible yet by no means less significant: dreams of developing their artistic talent and an understanding of what it means to go to college.
Barbara Drucker, Associate Dean of Community Engagement & Arts Education in UCLA’s School of the Arts and Architecture, is the founding director of the Visual and Performing Arts Education Program (VAPAE). While leading VAPAE, she established and spearheaded a number of arts education programs that provide UCLA students the opportunity to work with diverse populations of school-age children and youth, such as “Classroom-in-Residence” at the Hammer Museum. This summer, Drucker, along with Ben Refuerzo, Associate Dean of Equity, Diversity & Inclusion in the School of Arts and Architecture created the FORM (Fabricate, Originate, Reimagine, and Make) Academy. They saw a need for more quality summer arts experiences in low-income schools. For this inaugural program, the theme of “Dreaming Identity” guided the six-day academy, which was held Aug. 1-6 at UCLA.
The FORM Academy exposed 30 students from 18 high schools throughout LAUSD to a variety of resources across campus, including tours of the School of Engineering and Applied Science, the Earthquake Lab, the Center for the Art of Performance, the Fowler Museum, and the Hammer Museum. Studio Sessions in visual and performing arts were held in Perloff Hall, the Broad Art Center’s Sculpture Lab and Royce Hall. Finally, parents and families were invited to a culminating exhibit and reception on Saturday of that week to view the students’ work.
“The UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture is committed to community engagement and outreach and to providing more arts opportunities for under-served kids,” Drucker said. “SOAA has other summer high school programs in our School that are offered through summer sessions,” she says. “But they all cost $3,000 to $4,000 for two weeks, so that tends to bring in a certain group of kids. Inner city kids don’t have access to those kinds of funds and so they can’t participate.”
Working with FORM faculty and mentors, Drucker developed curriculum for the program that would not only teach art techniques foster college aspirations and fulfilling careers that students and their families may not have thought of as options. Projects included “Walking Taller,” which explored how a student could have improved a past experience through creating sculpture and “Scaling the Imagination,” where students contemplated the meaning of the word, “shelter,” and built a miniature environment based on their musings. The projects were focused on understanding and reflecting upon self-image, goals, and collaboration with others. Writing and brainstorming were key skills that were developed as well as arts techniques and the creative process.
Drucker and Refuerzo enlisted the support of professors in the UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture who also volunteered their time for the FORM Academy, including Casey Reas, Design Media Arts; Hirsch Perlman, Art; and Aparna Sharma, World Arts and Cultures/Dance. In addition, studio sessions were facilitated by SOAA graduate students and alumni who served as mentors to the high school students.
David Roussève, dean of Arts and Architecture, provided funding for the mentors and for the continuation of the FORM Academy next summer. Additional support was provided by the Departments of Art, Architecture and Urban Design, Digital Media Arts, World Arts and Cultures/Dance (WACD), and from a private donor. The Arts for Moore Fund of The Tides Foundation and The Ring Foundation also supported the program.
Luis Tentindo just graduated with his MFA from WACD and has contributed to the VAPAE program with workshops in puppetry. He says that his experience as a mentor in the FORM Academy has been “an amazingly inspiring time.”
“It’s reminded me that making art with different populations and making new friends is a very healthy thing to do,” said Tentindo, who has taught workshops and master classes at UCLA, Sarah Lawrence College, NYU, and in New York public schools.
Participation in the FORM Academy was based on applications by students who had an interest in the arts; an essay describing why they would be good candidates for the program was part of the application process. Leslie Roman and Vanessa Morales, who will be seniors at UCLA Community School this fall, applied for the academy because of their interest and skills in art, which have been developed by Grace Maddox’s art classes at UCLA Community School. Roman, who wants to become an architect, completed an AP art class this year.
“The thing I like about Ms. Maddox is that she says that you have to be a person who controls your art – art doesn’t control you,” said Roman, as she and Morales built a pair of wooden stilts as part of the “Walking Taller” workshop.
“Even though you may think you’re not good enough, Ms. Maddox is there telling you, ‘You can do it,” said Morales.
Michael Aguilar was among the students from UCLA Community School who participated in VAPAE’s “Classroom-in-Residence” program two years ago. He said that the FORM Academy was “fun but still very educational” in the way that it allowed students to explore different types of visual and performing art. He also enjoyed being given a glimpse of college life at UCLA.
“Since we’ve explored the campus, I have an idea of what the lifestyle of a college student would be and it makes me more comfortable with it,” Aguilar said.
Drucker said that combining 9th-12th graders in the FORM Academy afforded an opportunity for peer mentoring, especially from recent high school graduates who are headed to college in the fall.
“Everybody in the different grades mixed well together,” Drucker said. “Those who have been accepted to colleges are role models. When a student entering the 9th grade can interact with a student who just graduated and is going onto college, it provides peer guidance that the younger students probably wouldn’t get during the regular school year.”
Refuerzo, who taught an arts enrichment program at the University of Texas, Austin, shared his upbringing as the child of farm workers in Central California. The UCLA professor of architecture and principal architectural designer for the firm R-2ARCH recalled that his school, family, and community never considered the possibility of college for students like himself. He said that students who are raised in similar settings never think they can go to college, but that programs like the FORM Academy demystify higher education.
“My parents never thought I would finish high school,” Refuerzo said. “We students were all channeled toward shop [classes], and my dad had my farming implements ready for me when I graduated. But I wanted to do something different.
“The thing that really made a difference for me in terms of coming to the university was having the opportunity to visit UC Davis for one day,” he said. “That’s why we want more kids to have this chance. It doesn’t matter if they want to study art or architecture. I just want them to visit the university and understand they can be here too and realize their dreams.”
On Saturday, the last day of the FORM Academy, an exhibit of the students’ work was displayed in Perloff Hall. The high school students and their mentors proudly shared the experiences of the past week with their parents, families, and friends. Drucker and Refuerzo welcomed the guests with a reception and a looping video of the workshops and campus tours.
Aguilar shared a collaborative project that he created with several other students, who built separate elements from a grab box of materials and then combined them to make a single, harmonious sculptural work in a studio session titled, “Making Dreams Move.”
“We created a sculpture out of our dreams – I did this building” said Aguilar, indicating a cardboard high-rise that was blended into a four-foot-tall sculpture with a guitar, a window, and a wolf’s head, all made from found materials. “I learned how to collaborate with other artists and to make this look like the parts were all meant to be together.”
Drucker welcomed the assembled parents and families and thanked them for their commitment to the FORM Academy this summer. One family traveled from Palmdale every day for a week to bring their student to UCLA; another student took four buses in order to be able to participate. Refuerzo underscored the organic nature of the FORM Academy and told the audience, “This has been an opportunity to learn from all of you.”
“When I look into the faces of the students here, I see my face years ago,” he said. “I had an opportunity to visit a university and it made a difference in my life.
“When I was growing up, the elders in our family talked about the future and how we were their ‘Harvest of Hope,’ so I know the sacrifice that families have made in bringing their kids here for six days,” said Refuerzo. “You parents have invested your lives in your children planting the seeds for a new harvest in the hope that they will in turn, help their own children and their children’s children to increase their opportunities and create a bountiful ‘Harvest’ in the future.”
Above: The FORM Academy ended with a reception for parents and families to exhibit the students’ interpretations of “Dreaming Identity.”