tomorrow

My show, Custom by Design has closed at the Historic Arkansas Museum, so it is time to transport my work. That means no blog post tomorrow as I will be driving all day. If you are new to the blog and are missing something new to read, type sloyd in the search box at upper left and see what turns up. If you like foreign travel, type in Sweden, Finland, or Estonia. Lots to read here if you don't mind old news.

Here in Eureka Springs we will be voting in February for a tax increase to build a new high school. I believe this could be the opportunity to not only get a new building, but to develop a new high school culture, one more effective for learning. That requires the engagement of the hands... studios, workshops and laboratories. So the following is my letter of support, sent to our county newspapers for publication.

To the editor:

The arts are the most certain way to engage children in a love of learning.

As a long time artist in Eureka Springs, I want to share with you my intention to vote for the increased millage to support a new high school. We currently have a much better than average high school in a less than average facility. I believe that the new facility will be a chance to bring the school culture much closer to the arts and offer a once in a lifetime opportunity to bring the arts to the center of the high school experience.

We learn things from the arts that can’t be found on multiple-choice examinations. While most of the world is teaching to the test, the arts present the opportunity to do and learn so much more.

Jacob Bronowski said: “The discoveries of science, the works of art are explorations — more, are explosions, of a hidden likeness. The discoverer or the artist presents in them two aspects of nature and fuses them into one. This is the act of creation, in which an original thought is born, and it is the same act in original science and original art.”

And so, I urge my fellow artists to vote with me. And then to hold a vision for our future. A school can be as much laboratory/workshop/studio as lecture hall, and indeed must be if it is to be as effective as our children deserve. I sincerely hope we will all vote for the arts.