Last January I had the pleasure of talking with Howard Skinner, the art teacher at North Rose Wolcott High School about the possibility of his students working with recycled glass. What a fabulous surprise to get photo’s of the projects. These students are doing some seriously cool glasswork.
From an artist’s point of view, this is really about the best thing that can happen. If my work and knowledge can inspire kids to branch out and explore, then I’m doing my job right! (of course, having an expert like Howard as your teacher helps too…)
Here’s a bit of info about the school:
North Rose Wolcott High School is located in between Rochester and Syracuse New York. We are a smaller school of about 650 students; we have a very competitive art program, with classes
in the drawing arts, 4 levels of ceramics, a new sculpture class and or fused glass class. The ceramics room has 13 wheels, a 24 x 36h front loader kiln ,a raku kiln, and new hot box kiln and a new scutt glass kiln. The principal has been fantastic this year getting two new glass kilns in one year. We love to do competitions with the other schools. Some schools being much larger. This year the kids sent work to 8 different shows, some national and winning some top awards. I guess that is why we get the support we get. These days you have to push and put in the news papers any thing positive to keep your budget for the art dept. But after 25 years of teaching its still fun and developing new exciting glass class is why. Giving the kids the love and appreciation for art, is the secret of keeping the arts alive.
And here are the photo’s:
