Mar
27
Why the U.S. Census Counts

Emily Momohara: Why the U.S. Census Counts

Associate Professor, Emily Hanako Momohara heads the photography department at the Art Academy of Cincinnati. Her artistic practice engages issues of immigration, social justice, and communities of color. 

Momohara is part of the Japanese American Citizens League and has been appointed to the Greater Cincinnati Counts Committee to help raise awareness about the U.S. Census. Currently, on sabbatical, working on her professional practice, she is also spearheading a census initiative at the Art Academy.

Why is the Census so important?

“Every ten years we need to get the lay of the land and see how many people live here,” explains Momohara. “It’s supposed to be a maintenance kind of thing.”

The Census is mandated by the U.S. Constitution, but it’s much more than just a government formality. 

The data collected will be used—in both the public and private sector— to help figure out how to allocate funding and resources in our communities over the next ten years. 

It effects our lives in practical, everyday ways. For example, public transportation. 

“They actually use census data to figure out where to put bus stops in our city.”

The data is also used to make decisions related to schools, social services, and health care facilities. 

“When organizations go to put in a new facility, they look at census data. They say ‘well, where is this needed?’”

“If people don’t do the census, they’re going to think that not that very many people live there… so we really need to make sure there is an accurate count of everyone that lives in whatever spot they live in.”

Why do a census initiative at the AAC?

“I wanted to get the Art Academy on board the effort once I started learning about some of the heard-to-reach groups.”

Typically hard-to-reach demographics include students, individuals ages 18-25, residents of dorms and apartments, as well as the neighborhood in which the school sits.  

“Over-the-Rhine and downtown were some of the lowest recorded numbers of the last census.”

The initial plan was for the school to throw a party on April 1st, which is National Census Day. But given current public health measures, the initiative will be primarily online and through social media.

Who should fill out the census?

“Every single person. Unless you’re a tourist. [Tourists] are the only people in this country who should not fill out this census.”

Momohara adds that there is also zero risk in filling it out. 

“There is no connection between these census numbers and any other government agency.”

Privacy is guaranteed, and the questions are kept very basic. 

“Whether you’re documented or undocumented. Whether you have a visa, you’re a naturalized citizen, or you’re a born-here citizen— everyone should fill it out.”

How long does it take?

“The census used to be longer. There’s only nine questions this time. Because they really want people to do it… it literally takes 10 minutes.”

When can it be filled out?

“The census is actually open now. It opened March 12th.”

You can go online now, or you can wait to receive the postcard in the mail. It can be done via mail, phone, or online.  

“Technically it goes until July, but if you don’t want people showing up and knocking on your door, do it before the end of April.”

So I can actually make a difference by filling out the census?

“It’s actually very beneficial to us. Especially people who have special needs or who are in communities that have different needs than mainstream culture.”

And it makes a difference in federal funding. 

“The federal money that comes from census numbers is about $1,800 per year for each person that comes into the Greater Cincinnati area… that’s anywhere from social services to education dollars. So over ten years, that’s $18,000 for everyone who fill out the census.”

“So it’s really important that we do it!”

Oct
30
Dottie Stevens: 100 Years of Impressions

 

Dottie Stevens: 100 Years of Impressions

by Robin Stevens Payes

Women of Dottie Silverstein Stevens’ generation came of age in a time when most occupations were not open to them. And self-promotion frowned upon.

Their work was in the home: raise the family, keep a nice, clean and orderly household, serve as gracious hostesses or guests and be good helpmeets, volunteer in the community, and get together for bridge or mahjong with “the girls.”

They could have hobbies: cooking, painting, playing piano.

But to work outside the home, much less to promote one’s artistry in the marketplace, would be frowned upon.

“Father Knows Best” was not just a TV show, but a way of life.

Mom was typical of her era in that she did all of the above, and without reproach. But her passion was for her art.

She painted, sculpted, took classes, taught them…and never let go of the question that drove her all her life: “What is art?”

All the while, seeking to capture her own version of it.

Even though she thought “selling” herself and her work was unladylike, she found a way. Dottie entered juried art shows, and won. When her paintings sold, she kept detailed records about the purchaser, price, and date of sale, along with a Polaroid or Kodak picture.

She kept records of it all on file cards, painstakingly handwritten, with xerox copies in loose-leaf binders—this being the days before computers could spit out copies on demand.

But her journey started by accident, at the tender age of 6, in 1924.

 

A Teacher, a Poem and a Shadow as Gift for a Lifetime

In Dottie’s own words:

From the very beginning, it was all based on an innocent, naïve misconception.

In elementary school, we had a wonderful teacher who inspired all the children in a very clever way. She promised a special reward if we behaved and worked hard.

She would read a poem to us and then let us draw a picture about it. One day, our reward was a charming little poem by Robert Louis Stevenson, “My Shadow.”

I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me,

And what can be the use of him is more than I can see.

He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head;

And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.

After reading it aloud, we all took out our crayons to draw a picture about the poem. As Teacher walked around the class, I was surprised when she paused at my desk and asked me to come to the front of the room and hold up my picture.

Then, she proceeded to take me to all five other first-grade classes to display my “work of art,” to hold up my drawing in front of all the other children as an example.

Mom never thought to question why.

When little Dottie told her mother about this honor, my grandmother immediately proceeded to buy the six-year-old a beginner’s set of oil paints, a small palette, and a canvas board. She was signed up for art lessons after school and, in time, made her first oil painting—a copy of a beautiful lady by Thomas Gainsborough (note: this painting is in the retrospective).

 

From Hobby to Profession

Cincinnati was sponsoring a city-wide art competition downtown, called “Girls Hobby Fair.” After investing one dollar in a picture frame, my grandmother submitted my mom’s earliest still life: Two Books and Brass Candlestick. It won a first prize blue ribbon, and a $25 gift certificate to Wilde’s Art Supply Store. With that coveted certificate, Dottie bought her first wooden easel.

Art became a major part of her life. She pursued formal training in great art schools, beginning with the Cincinnati Art Academy in the 1930s, the Cincinnati Art Museum and later in universities and museums. During World War II, she studied at the Chicago Art Institute and did graphic art design working for the Manhattan Project in Chicago.

She was inspired by the Impressionists, and first copied, and later innovated on their style. She began experimenting with sculpture and printmaking, and ceramics.

Extensive travel with her husband, David Stevens, further enriched her experiences, and many of Dottie’s paintings took their inspiration from their travels around the world, making it altogether fitting that the proceeds of the art auction will go towards funding a scholarship for AAC students to study abroad.

In her 90s, when the physical processes of painting and sculpting became too demanding, Mom turned to writing. She wrote a play, “What is Art?” to explore this question using words as her medium.

And after she gave up painting and sculpting, she used to say she was always painting in her mind. For her, art became sustenance.

But she never got over thinking that the drawing that launched a career and a passion for art was really a happy mistake.

Again, Dottie’s words:

Thinking about that early inspiration, I can’t believe there was really anything aesthetically remarkable about my picture.

My guess is, that while other kids were naturally drawing a little child with its detached shadow somewhere nearby, perhaps my portrayal showed a little girl with her shadow attached to her feet, and with its shadow laying horizontally on the ground, as shadows do, according to the laws of physics and the direction from which the light was slanted.

In any case, because of my early misinterpretation of my first-grade teacher and her encouragement, a subsequent whole world of art opened up to me.

Fast Forward: Inspiration Comes Full Circle

It is fitting, then, and a great thrill for her family that, having started with the early inspiration of a teacher, Mom’s art, and the Wilder scholarship it endows will pay it forward: to support, to inspire, indeed, to fuel, an art-filled future for students at the Cincinnati Art Academy for generations yet to come.

 

Robin Stevens Payes, daughter of artist Dottie Stevens, is a Maryland-based author, science writer and storyteller who takes teen readers to the Edge of Yesterday through her time travel novels and “learning through story” interactive adventure portal.

October 24, 2019

 

Sep
20
Opening Doors to Study Abroad

Opening Doors to Study Abroad

The Art Academy of Cincinnati (AAC) is announcing an exciting new partnership with the Kentucky Institute for International Studies (KIIS). The partnership, spearheaded by AAC Dean Paige Williams, will make it easier for students to study abroad and for faculty members to teach courses internationally.

“Study abroad changed my life,” says Williams.

In 1985, she was studying at Eastern Kentucky University when a friend convinced her to study abroad. Up until that point, Williams had only ever lived in Kentucky, with the occasional visit to Gatlinburg or Hilton Head.

By the end of that year, she had lived in Bregenz, Austria, and traveled all over Europe. Since Bergenz was such a small town, the program’s tuition included a Eurail Pass.

“So every Thursday night we’d get on an overnight train, and we’d just pick a place. We went to Berlin, we went to Amsterdam, we went to Florence, we went to Paris…”

Williams says that the benefits of studying abroad encompass much more than just the coursework and college credits.

“Being someplace where you don’t speak the language—I think it builds empathy for other cultures. I think it makes you realize that you’re not the center of the universe. There’s a lot of other people out there that don’t look like you and don’t talk like you.”

And she found that navigating new situations not only makes for good stories— it also builds confidence and enriches perspective.

“I mean, when you’re stuck in the middle of a train strike in Milan in the middle of the night and you have to be resourceful,” says Williams, reminiscing, “[then] missing the bus in Over-the-Rhine doesn’t seem like that big a deal, you know?”

The program she went through in 1985 was the Kentucky Institute for European Studies (KIES), which would eventually expand beyond Europe to become KIIS. Nowadays, students can choose from program locations all over the world.

For an art student, the possibilities are fun to consider. Someone might want to explore firsthand the animation culture of Japan, for example. Or the quality of light in Greece. Or the cultural heritage of a major city like Paris and Florence, where art history lives and breathes right alongside the contemporary scene.

“The thing I remember being the most profound was seeing things in person that I’d seen in Art History on a screen or in a book. You know, seeing Rodin’s Gates of Hell, or seeing DaVinci’s Mona Lisa.”

In partnering with KIIS, the AAC is better equipped to help students choose a program location, enroll in courses, and find scholarships.

“It’s a really daunting thing to think about if you don’t have someone helping you,” says Williams.

In addition to expanding course offerings beyond what a single, small-sized school could ever offer on its own, Williams is enthusiastic to see students experience the impact of places beyond Cincinnati. And to witness the personal and artistic growth that happens along the way.

Jul
24
Making Art, Advocating for Affordable Housing

Making Art, Advocating for Affordable Housing

Dionna Flowers first entered Art Academy of Cincinnati (AAC) in the 90’s, when the school was still up in Mount Adams.

A graduate of Forest Park High School, Flowers served abroad in the Navy during Desert Storm before getting discharged in ’92. Back in Cincinnati, she had no framework for understanding PTSD and the addiction that was running her life, so she threw herself into going back to school.

“I have been drawing since I was seven years old. It was my way of escaping,” Flowers recalls. “So I jumped up and decided to go to the Art Academy of Cincinnati to try to ease the pain of being discharged from the Navy.”

Flowers got into the AAC on a full scholarship but quickly discovered that overcoming financial barriers was only half the battle.

“[The scholarship] wasn’t enough to keep me in there because, as I said, I didn’t understand the dynamics of what I was dealing with internally—dealing with PTSD and military sexual trauma and a survivor of so many different things as a child. I didn’t understand. I thought, if I just do this, and if I just leave that alone but still drink this, then I’ll be okay. And it didn’t work.”

What followed was rock bottom—and a vicious cycle.

“[It was] a long, twenty-five year journey of homelessness, dereliction, in-and-out of jail, in-and-out of institutions, in-and-out of halfway houses […] Clean, dirty, clean, dirty.”

The road to recovery began with intensive therapy at the Fort Thomas VA, then was sustained through the gift of affordable housing—thanks to OTR Community Housing and other local advocates—which gave Flowers the stability and the dignity to begin to dream again, for herself and for her community.

“Once I got equitable and affordable housing, I vowed that I would always give back to the community that I took so much from […] to make good the part I played in the destruction of our neighborhood.”

Finishing What They Started

Flowers is now celebrating five years of being clean, with restored family relationships, a strong support network, and a chance to finish what she started decades ago at the AAC.

“This is like a dream that I lost and was given back.”

Flowers is finding ways to merge art and advocacy work. Outside of class, she is a circuit speaker for the Homeless Coalition. In addition to silent auctions, her work can be found at the YWCA, the OTR Senior Center, and Algin Retro Furniture (as part of Visionaries and Voices), and at an upcoming show at the VA themed around PTSD among female veterans.

This Final Friday, Flowers is hosting “Art Extravaganza,” an art show fundraiser at the OTR Senior Center, with proceeds to benefit local senior services and affordable housing. The show features prints of Flowers’ original paintings made on 4×4’s that were left behind at the end of the school year, which she reclaimed and upcycled.

Flowers is grateful that in spite of everything, including a criminal record, art remains an open door to her. And she is all in.

“I’m open, like a sponge, you know, soaking up everything that I learn here [at the AAC]. And I’m willing to learn more and more and more. I’m ready for class to start back up. I’m ready to come back to class.”

This article was written by Sarah Dupee.

Jul
15
Meet Art Academy’s Newest President Joseph Girandola

Joseph Girandola Named Art Academy of Cincinnati’s Next President

The Art Academy of Cincinnati’s Board of Trustees has named Joseph Girandola as the college’s next president. Girandola will assume office on August 1, 2019.

Girandola succeeds Mark Grote, who is retiring after one year as interim president and returning to serve on the college’s board.

No stranger to the arts, Girandola currently serves as the interim associate dean of graduate studies and research at the University of Cincinnati in the College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning. Prior, his roles included the Director of Graduate Studies for the School of Art at DAAP and director of the MFA program at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia.

During his tenure at DAAP, he sought and secured new external funding opportunities for creative research and was part of the steering committee for the University of Cincinnati’s 1819 Innovation Hub.

“Girandola brings not only the empathetic position of being a practicing artist, but also the experience of being a seasoned higher education administrator,” said Tysonn Betts, chair of the Art Academy’s board of trustees.

Bringing a Vision

His expertise is timely as the Art Academy, which is celebrating its 150th anniversary, recently launched major strategic initiatives to increase enrollment and transform its campus.

“My vision for the Art Academy’s next chapter is to become an open door for problem-solving in the city through the creative practice,” said Girandola. “Building upon its amazing history, the Art Academy will look to collaborate with all of the game-changing innovative entities in the region to provide its students with the best possible skills needed to survive in the global creative economy.”

When asked about his new role at the Art Academy, Girandola sees a team effort. “The tremendous students, alumni, Board of Trustees, faculty and staff will be partners in the journey to solidify the success of the Art Academy into the near and distant future.”

Read Girandola’s full Q&A here.

 

May
21
From Military Service to Art with a Purpose

From Military Service to Art with a Purpose

Each year, the Yale Norfolk School of Art selects twenty-six undergraduate art students from across the globe to attend its six-week intensive summer residency. The students are chosen from a pool of five hundred rising seniors who have been nominated by their school.

In a nutshell—it is a highly competitive program.

Which is why Art Academy of Cincinnati (AAC) student Kimberly Walker was floored when she received her notice of acceptance for Yale Norfolk’s 2019 session. She will be the first AAC student in seventeen years to attend the residency.

Their Story is Unique

Walker’s story is unique in that she became an art student only after serving seventeen years of active duty in the U.S. Army. When a spinal chord injury forced her into medical retirement, she did an about-face toward art.

“I retired down to New Mexico to do some healing. And then I ended up in art school,” she says.

If it weren’t for her now-mentor Sarah Stoler—an ‘00 AAC graduate who chairs the art department at the University of New Mexico-Taos—Walker might still be in New Mexico doing still life paintings.

“She brought the subject of the military out of me. At first I was kind of avoiding it. I just wanted to paint mountains and adobe homes.”

Under Stoler’s guidance, Walker found her way to Cincinnati where she is now a rising senior at the AAC. Her work investigates the ongoing realities of sexual harassment, abuse, and violence against women in the military through the medium of sculpture and installation.

Having a Story to Tell

Though it’s emotionally draining work, Walker draws motivation and energy from having a story to tell.

According to her most recent artist statement: “One out of three women who enlist in the U.S. military will be sexually assaulted or raped. Some have even been murdered by a brother in arms. In this sociopolitical climate, now is the pivotal moment to create this type of art.”

In the process, she has found there is something very satisfying about the physical work of building installations.

“I love the hard work. It’s almost like being a construction worker and an artist at the same time. So there’s some power there where you’re working with power tools,” Walker says. “I have a chain saw which I love to use.”

Unfortunately, the Yale Norfolk School of Art has a strict “no power tools” policy, so Walker will have to leave the chainsaw at home. But she anticipates a valuable opportunity to build on her study of color symbolism.

“I usually do red, white, and blue pieces. Or camouflage green and hot pink. But right now I’m trying all black.”

Otherwise, she is gearing up for an intense, full-immersion experience—something akin to boot camp.

“[The residency] is seven days a week, you can’t leave the grounds, you’re housed in private residences, eating in a dining hall together—breakfast, lunch, and dinner,” she explains. “And I’m like, oh this is basic training—I can do this! And I imagine some special relationships are gonna be built.”

Apr
03
Charley Harper & Tony Tasset Named Distinguished Alumni

Tony Tasset & Charley Harper Named the 2019 Distinguished Alumnus

The Alumni Council of the Art Academy of Cincinnati is proud to confer upon Charley Harper and Tony Tasset the 2019 Distinguished Alumnus Award. Tasset will also join as the Academy’s Commencement speaker.

About Charley Harper

Charley Harper (August 4, 1922-June 10, 2007) was a Cincinnati-based American Modernist artist. He was best known for his highly stylized wildlife prints, posters and book illustrations.
Born in Frenchtown, West Virginia in 1922, Harper’s upbringing on his family farm influenced his work to his last days. He left his farm home to study art at the Art Academy of Cincinnati, and won the Academy’s first Stephen H. Wilder Traveling Scholarship. While at the Academy, and supposedly on the first day, Charley met fellow artist and fellow Distinguished alumnus, Edie McKee, whom he would marry shortly after graduation in 1947.

About Tony Tasset

Tony Tasset fuses unstinting candor, dizzying scale shifts, and precise prismatic rendering of familiar objects and forms to create towering sculptures, paintings, and installations that transfix, startle, prickle, and captivate viewers around the globe. These massive spectacles provoke spontaneous dialogue among persons encountering each other as they come upon Tasset’s outdoor sculptures, characterized by luminous color and unimaginable depth, weight, height, width, and impact.
Tony Tasset’s works are anything but “tacit.” Rather, they are astounding, radical, commanding, and arresting. The artist’s own uncurbed, seemingly boundless, and momentous art has held innumerable people around the globe spellbound for 35 years.

Feb
13
Four Year Tuition Promise

The Four Year Tuition Promise

The Art Academy of Cincinnati (AAC) is in the process of rolling out a four-year tuition promise. This promise will effect this coming fall 2019. This new measure represents the school’s commitment to protecting its students from tuition increases over the course of their four-year undergraduate studies at AAC.

“The standard across higher education is that when you come in as a freshman, you can expect your tuition will increase every year,” explains interim president Mark Grote.

By billing students the same tuition each year, the AAC seeks to reduce financial stress by making education expenses more predictable, transparent, and affordable.

“We want our focus to be on our students, and we know the cost of education is one of—if not the most—critical factors for students today.”

The four-year tuition promise will also apply to the AAC’s returning students. For example, “if you’re a sophomore this year, your tuition will remain the same when you’re a junior and senior.”

This puts the Art Academy at the forefront of what is sure to be a growing trend.

As it stands, the AAC will be the only private art college in America to implement the four-year tuition promise. And one of just three colleges in Ohio.

“This is one of the reasons we like being small,” Grote says. “Because being small, we can make really fast changes.”

To learn more about the Tuition Promise, click here.

Nov
20
AAC Hosts the Regional Scholastic Art & Writing Awards

Art Academy of Cincinnati Hosts the Regional Scholastic Art & Writing Awards

For its third year, The Art Academy of Cincinnati (AAC) will produce the Regional Scholastic Art & Writing Awards of Southwest Ohio, Northern Kentucky, and Southeast Indiana on our urban campus in historic Over-the-Rhine. Established in 1923, Scholastic is the nation’s longest-running and most prestigious national recognition program. Participation ranges from grades 7 to 12.

Through the Regional Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, students from public, private, and home schools receive rare opportunities for national recognition, exhibition, publication, and scholarships. Last year, students from across the country submitted a record-breaking 346,000 original works of art and writing. These submissions were in 29 different categories with nearly 5,000 submissions from the Cincinnati region.

The Awards Ceremony will host both art and writing awards recipients.

Selected art and writing works will be on display at the Art Academy (1212 Jackson St., Over-the-Rhine) presented by Summerfair Cincinnati from January 28 to February 8, 2019. A celebration and awards ceremony is set for February 1, 2019, at the School for Creative and Performing Arts. The event will draw thousands of visitors from across the Tri-state. 

Each June, national Gold Medal recipients from across the country gather in New York City to attend the National Ceremony.  Over the years, numerous artists have been recognized by these awards when they were still students.  Notable alumni include: Andy Warhol, Robert Redford, Truman Capote, Richard Avedon, Steven King, Sylvia Plath, Charles White, Kay WalkingStick, Ken Burns, John Baldessari, Mozelle Thompson, Joyce Carol Oates, Hughie Lee-Smith, Zac Posen, and Lena Dunham. Cy Twombly, Donald Lipski, and Tom Otterness.

Submissions are accepted until December 12, 2018. For more information about the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards or how a teen can participate, visit www.artandwriting.org or https://www.artacademy.edu/scholastics

Oct
17
For Freedoms: Never Again is Now

About For Freedoms Billboard

Two years ago a billboard appeared in Pearl, Mississippi that sparked confusion and conversation. The image on the billboard was of an iconic photograph from the civil rights era with the words, “Make American Great Again”.
It was the work of For Freedoms, an organization using art to promote democratic participation.

Now they’re commissioning artists from across the country to create billboards addressing political and social issues of their choice.

Professor Emily Momohara Responds

Art Academy Associate Professor, Emily Momohara was commissioned to create two of these thought provoking billboards.

One billboard is currently located on I-75. It depicts a young Japanese girl in an internment camp with the words, “Never Again is Now!”. During WWII, Momohara’s family was incarcerated because of their Japanese heritage. This was a result of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s unconstitutional use of power, when he signed Executive Order 9066 incarcerating all Japanese Americans. In turn, families were separated.

Recent accounts of children being separated from parents at the U.S.-Mexico border have inspired Momohara to speak out through art. Using documentation of the WWII incarceration to compare today and the past, Momohara stands firm with immigrants in Never Again is Now!