Welcome Address by Ryan for the Grand Opening

 

Dear fellow art educators,

 

We are living in the world of a new normal, uncertainties, and escalating distraught of racial, social and political turmoil. The realm of art education goes through unexpected challenges, doubts, and unsettling post-human conditions in schools, museums, and communities. Even though students and teachers are desperate for equity and inclusion, the oppression and persecution of human rights and authentic voices goes beyond the measure. Now, any local issue in our communities can become global, requiring all of us to experience both minority and majority status under transnational citizenship, as our lifestyle moves us to and from one location to another. As nomads, we face mapping and building more equitable education and society through art.

 

Now facing the unpredictable time and future, it is important for us to connect and support each other as teachers, museum educators, and community practitioners from the local to global scale. Our art education field also need to reflect on and re-envision our current practices in schools and other settings as a response to the pandemic and newly emerging health and safety issues. Virtual classrooms, digital projects, and networked learning are a few indications of the new normal. We have more stories to tell. At this conference, I am eager to learn from key notes, presentations, and virtual gatherings about forward thinking and transformative art educational stories beyond the immediate fix or makeshift as responses to COVID-19. I believe that international and collective knowledge and wisdom collected through this conference will strengthen and further the values of learning art, facilitating communication, and supporting humanity in our institutions and communities.

 

In this pandemic, we all face significant challenges to deliver a strong art curriculum, overcome limited art materials and resources, invent virtually engaging projects, and secure physical and mental safety of ourselves and our students. We also believe that while revising and revamping our curriculum and student learning, it is critical for our students to develop the critical consciousness by engaging with key questions and self-reflexive learning in and through art and visual culture. Especially, our curriculum should facilitate healthy and empathetic relationships between and among ethnic and cultural groups when minoritized groups of people are greatly insecure by the racialized rhetoric. I hope that this conference offers an excellent venue for us to share equitable and inclusive art pedagogical approaches. This opportunity to connect with other art educators helps us share equitable and inclusive art education practices, which we usually didn’t consider for collaboration and networked learning before the pandemic.

 

This virtual conference, Art Education in the Time of Coronavirus, will collect art educators’ unheard voices, share thoughtful reflections, and highlight emerging pedagogies and strategies in response to the global crisis of the pandemic. With the expectation of and commitment to building an equitable society through art, I welcome you all to intercontinental, intercultural, and planetary conversations among COVID-19. With our collective wisdom and vision, the conference will pave a new way in the history of art education. I hope your participation in the conference is engaging, fruitful, and mutualistic for mapping your future art education research and practices. Welcome to the conference towards our inter-connecting future!

 

Ryan Shin

President, United States Society for Education through Art