ACE Spectrum
ACE Spectrum
Ace Spectrum is about you — the ACE Learning Centers.
It’s a quick sharing of ideas, inspiration, opinions and best practices among our continuing education organizations.
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The Art in STEAM, and the Science, Technology, Engineering and Math in Art
By Martha Sessums, President, ACE
Science and Art can be a team. That was obvious in two art exhibits I saw recently. Leonardo da Vinci used science and the study of nature as inspiration for his art and painting style. Piet Mondrian, the abstract painter of the 20th century, was inspired by geometric form that would become his style – even in his early paintings.
The educational trend to add Art into the Science, Technology, Engineering, Math (STEM) focus so it becomes STEAM makes sense to me. I’m not an educator and will never claim to be. I leave that to the amazing educators that run the ACE Learning Centers. But I have visited the schools and ACE Learning Centers, talked to students, teachers, program managers and principals, and have seen that to capture the imagination, interest and hope of a student to succeed beyond her or his dreams, it takes more than appealing to the techie side. There’s the human art side in everyone and that can be the entry and inspiration on a journey to success.
“Lady With an Ermine” by Leonardo.
The Leonardo exhibit at the Louvre in Paris focused on the artist’s scientific side. He was driven to explore a new way to find and paint “the truth of form” which he felt was constantly moving. To understand and convey movement, Leonardo questioned the physical world and looked beneath the surface for how movement happened. The result was extensive notes, studies and experiments on how humans are built and move, from bone and muscle structure to flight. He needed an understanding of movement via the laws that govern it which he regarded as fundamentally mathematical in nature.
The exhibit had a whole room of his notebooks, drawings and sketches of humans and the math and science of movement. His notes included studies using geometry, science, anatomy, botany, architecture, mathematics and a host more to create inventions of movement such as flying machines, solar power and even military tanks.
Science also gave the artist the freedom and insight to master shade, light, space and that movement he was looking for with his invention of the sfumato oil painting technique. Colors and tone are blended in such a subtle manner that transitions and edges are imperceptible. This became Leonardo’s masterpiece style of painting. His genius “truth of form.” Leonardo brought Science to Art.
Painting of a barn by Mondrian, one of his early figurative paintings.
Piet Mondrian’s journey from figurative painter to abstract artist filling canvases using shape, form, lines and color was on display at the Musée Marmottan Monet. He started out painting scenes of barns and windmills, but even then there was obvious emphasis on geometry in the form of these buildings. Mondrian brought Art to Science.
Much of his art inspiration was in his search “to capture the very essence of nature and not merely our perception of it.” Ultimately, he distanced himself from the figurative, naturalist styles and colors and focused on pure, bright and strongly contrasting colors (red, blue, yellow, black, white) displayed in balanced geometric shapes and planes.
Abstract painting by Mondrian.
The horizontal and vertical lines were drawn not using geometry’s ruler and protractor but by what he called “high intuition.” The result was a harmony and rhythm which he considered the “basic forms of beauty…(which) can become a work of art, as strong as it is true.”
My artist friend Jeannie Crockett said, “Mondrian’s work is so balanced. If you removed a line or a square, the balance would fall apart. It would not work.”
Mondrian’s style has even inspired fashion. Yves Saint Laurent designed shift dresses with blocks of primary colors bordered in black for his Fall 1965 collection. It was so popular it inspired coats, boots and more.
Art is actually a part of many student’s journeys. The walls of Oakland International High School and San Francisco International High School are covered with student art that tells stories of immigrant journeys. KALW’s Audio Academy is focused on the art of telling stories out loud. The Alpha Parent Center uses pictures as a tool to help English learners explain what they see.
There is Art in STEM. There is STEM in Art. Leonardo and Mondrian are examples of how their use of Science and Art became a team that can inspire many a journey.
High Fives for Audio Academy Magic and Championship Raspberry-Rhubarb Pie
By Ben Trefny, News Director, KALW Listener Supported Public Radio and Sona Avakian, Audio Academy Fellow
The 11 entries in the 2020 Pie-Off competition. Angela Johnston’s raspberry-rhubarb pie (on the left, with the lattice crust) took the cake. Photo credit: Ben Trefny.
We just held a New Year’s party to celebrate 2020. It was great fun — a potluck dinner followed by our annual Pie-Off competition. This year, Angela Johnston, Audio Academy class of 2014, defended her championship with a delicious raspberry-rhubarb pie. As is the case with most KALW events, Audio Academy alums were everywhere: David Boyer (’14), Rai Sue Sussman (’14), Shereen Adel (’16), Christine Nguyen (’18), Maggie McKay (’19), Sarah Lai Stirland (’20), and Sona Avakian (’20).
As we start the new year, Sona wrote up some thoughts about her part in the class of 2020:
Sona Avakian (left) and Sarah Lai Stirland at KALW’s New Year’s party. Photo credit: Ben Trefny.
I feel incredibly privileged to be in the Audio Academy class of 2020. When a friend of mine [Rai Sue] enrolled in the very first class seven years ago, I was so jealous whenever I heard her name on the air as part of Crosscurrents‘ closing credits. Finally circumstances in my life aligned, and I applied. Luckily, I got in.
I don’t think I have ever high-fived as many people in my whole life as I have in the past five months I’ve been in the Audio Academy. Pitched a successful story? High five! Got some good tape? High five! Nailed a tricky interview? High five! The staff at KALW are extremely supportive, and I’m grateful. My ideas have been encouraged and cultivated. Every success, no matter how minor, is celebrated.
At the station, some days are slow. Some are frustrating. Some days go by in a blur of high fives. As I write this, my first feature is about to air this week, I’m reporting for my next feature and getting together a pitch for a third. It’s busy!
And why did want to be in the Audio Academy so badly? Several reasons. Radio as a medium has stood the test of time. It’s portable. It’s in your car, your shower, and directly in your ear. It kept countries around the world informed during World War II. Radio has adapted itself in the Internet age in way that other mass media have not been successful. Oration is the oldest and purest form of communication and entertainment we have. Radio is just an extension of telling stories around a campfire, which has happened since the beginning of time. And on radio (or in a podcast) sounds that accompany your story can make or break it. You can have crickets, eerie music, the slam of a door. All are sounds that manipulate emotions. It’s invisible work. It’s magic. And who wouldn’t want to be in that world? In a blur of high fives?
Judges carefully consider the competition at the 2020 Pie-Off competition. Photo credit: Ben Trefny.
An Audio Academy Lesson: Empathy is the Act of Refusing to Dismiss Another Person
By Ben Trefny, News Director, KALW, Listener Supported Public Radio
As we wrap up the year (the decade, actually — hard to comprehend), I wanted to share one more blog post from KALW. This one was written by Audio Academy fellow Christopher Egusa, whose intelligence, creativity, and enthusiasm always help raise the spirits and achievements of our newsroom.
Christopher Egusa and his father respond to a moment in his first broadcast piece at KALW. Photo credit: Ben Trefny.
This week I started work on my first feature (full length audio piece). It’s a personal story that touches on some difficult topics. As I discussed my reporting plan with my editor, something she said stood out to me. We were talking about the difference between the kind of interviewing I’d done in the past, and the interviewing I’d be doing on this project. Then she said, “Remember, this is not an intellectual interview — it’s an emotional one.”
Now, that may be fairly obvious to many people, but it clarified for me what we’re really doing as storytellers. I think that it’s our job to go out into the world and try to create empathy. In fact, I think that empathy is the currency of public radio. A 2013 study from the New School found that “reading literature improves … the capacity to identify and understand others’ subjective states.” If this is true of the written word, how much greater is the power of audio — a medium that carries so many subtleties of meaning, and connects us to our most ancient oral traditions?
Christopher Egusa and his father are surprised to find KALW training coordinator Marissa Ortega-Welch also listening to his first broadcast piece. Photo credit: Ben Trefny.
To me, empathy is the act of refusing to dismiss another person. It’s a tough impulse to quash, but it’s also when we’re at our best. I’ve been impressed, and personally buoyed by the collective spirit of KALW so far. It’s a culture that attempts to embody that spirit. The series Uncuffed, in which inmates from San Quentin and Solano state prisons report and share stories from behind prison walls, is an active refusal to dismiss a population. It requires us to sit with their voices, enduring any discomfort that our biases may create, and allowing our understanding of human experience to be expanded, even if just a little bit.
For me personally, I’ve appreciated just how warm and welcoming everyone at the station has been, including my fellow Audio Academy fellows. I’ve been constantly mentored and encouraged to pursue things I’m intrigued by — from reporting to sound engineering and more. But it goes beyond that. I’m one of over 130 million Americans living with chronic illness, and because mine is mostly invisible, I find that I’m generally uncomfortable communicating my limitations. When I first started at KALW, my difficulties were not only “not dismissed,” they were fully embraced, and accommodations were happily made. Even more important, though, is that I was embraced — my thoughts, ideas, and identity. I feel that it’s my mission to create empathy by embracing the complexity of people, and I think I’ve found a great home to begin that journey here.