University of Maine at Augusta artist and faculty member Susan Bickford held a weeklong artist-in-residence program at Islesboro Central School in early March. She spent four days working with students in grades K-12 combining wire sculpture with storytelling to create a dynamic video presentation, which the whole school community was able to view at the end of the week.
The narratives illustrated in the final video originated as stories written by the students themselves.
“We learned unique storytelling techniques using wire and film in ways that I had not dreamed possible before,” said art teacher Shar Piper. “In the future, I intend to do more with this medium in my art classes here at Islesboro Central School.”
Students had fun creating stories in this innovative style of art, and Piper believes it also inspired them to think deeply about the magic of combining storytelling and art, where the whole can frequently seem greater than the sum of the component parts.
As an artist, Bickford focuses on bringing people together for interdisciplinary collaboration. She expresses this goal as “creating community and provoking conversation,” both of which she accomplished with demonstrable success at Islesboro Central in March. Although Bickford had never previously worked with people quite as young as some of Islesboro’s elementary students, Piper said she did an excellent job in adapting the project to that age group.
The culmination of the project was a student field trip to the Center for Maine Contemporary Art, where Bickford is one of four featured artists exhibited in a current show — entitled “The Next Generation” — which also features work from 48 Maine college and university art students.
Bickford’s residency, the subsequent video and the field trip were made possible through a grant from Rockport’s Center for Maine Contemporary Art, and the H. King and Jean Cummings Charitable Fund of the Maine Community Foundation.