The NAEA National Convention 2017

Last week I had the privilege of attending the National Art Educator's Association 70th Annual National Convention in New York City for the first time and I am excited to share my experience while it is still buzzing in my brain. Despite some minor hiccups involving hotel changes, some impatient Uber drivers, and a biting cold wind, for the most part my trip went smoothly and left me feeling inspired.

Over seven thousand people attended from all around the country and from all different artsy professions. Some teachers were veterans with prestigious doctorate degrees and others were fresh-faced college students looking for inspiration and guidance. The three day convention was kicked off with a wonderful speech by artist Jeff Koons. He spoke of his journey as an artist and keeping alive that feeling that children get when they make a piece of work without judgement. After a quick breakfast we moved on to the part that I was really excited about- a huge room full of free STUFF! I was very impressed with the amount of different vendors and all the stations where you could try out funky new products. After filling our tote bags with samples, lesson plans and brochures we attended a seminar called "Transforming the Curriculum Through Art" which focused on museum educators working with students of diverse backgrounds. I especially enjoyed the presentation involving special needs students creating an enormous splatter painting inspired by Jackson Pollock after learning about the artist and seeing videos of him in action. I enjoyed the inclusion of supplemental materials, such as videos and books to help amp-up the learning in many different formats. After a couple shorter seminars we headed over to the Sheraton (with over 1,000 presentations the convention needed two hotels!) to attend the "Sketchbook and Visual Speed Date" which was an interactive session where people exchanged sketchbooks and rotated every three minutes so everyone could meet someone new. This session made me want to start journaling again even if it's just for a few minutes each day.

That night we attended the Opening Night Party where there were several interactive art activities including a monumental Lite Bright and Etch-A-Sketch to play around with and several drawing tables with post-its. We had a blast on the dance floor and meeting new people, but my favorite part was spontaneously running into my high school art teacher in the artisans gallery. He took his picture with us and I believe I even saw a happy tear lingering in the corner of his eye! On Friday we took a little break from the convention to walk around, enjoy the city and visit both the Natural History Museum and The MET. For the record I would NOT recommend attempting both museums in one day-our feet were in PAIN! Luckily we stopped at a delectable Mexican restaurant called The Frida Cafe (we are artists after all) where we indulged in some tasty food, warm soup and delicious frozen cocktails. Saturday we were back at the convention and I believe it was my favorite day of presentations. Here are a few that I found beneficial: SidexSide is an arts integration program based out of Maine where a visiting artist will work in collaboration with the art teacher and the teachers of other subjects to create these three part projects that infuse art into general subjects like math and science to create an enriching experience for the students. (www.sidexsideNE.com) We saw Phyllis Brown of the popular blog "There's a Dragon in my Art Room" explain how to create bright batik paintings using a mixture of lotion and toothpaste which I thought was so interesting and inventive. Then we saw a presentation called "Art on a Cart; How to Make it Work" by fellow art-carter Katrina Barge. I thought Katrina's presentation was extremely insightful and hilarious. (she definitely understands the struggle!) We listened to Shirley Forpe explain the importance of engaging students through storytelling in a presentation called "Grandma's Attic; Junk in the Trunk". The last seminar we saw was about putting together a successful teacher's portfolio by Nan Park from the Maryland Institute College of Art, which I thought was one of the most helpful seminars that I saw during the entire convention. I love the beauty of art teacher portfolios as opposed to stuffy black and white resumes.

At the end of the last seminar we decided to treat ourselves and head to the famous melted cheese wheel restaurant in SOHO called Raclette. We were not disappointed and there is nothing better than hot melted cheese scraped over your food to end a crazy few days in bustling NYC!