Central Vermont High School Initiative’s lead humanities teacher, Eric Gray, is currently visiting Europe on an amazing odyssey through the art world. He will be visiting the Venice Biennial, the “Olympics of Art” where the city is overtaken by installations and displays of artists from all over the world.
In addition Eric will be participating in “Sommerakademie” in Berlin, Germany. The program focuses on questions of “place,” emphasizing how art can create and activate critical discourse in the public sphere. Berlin offers fertile ground for such investigations, with its numerous architecture and art sites that display both the city’s contemporary international cultural significance and its traumatic past during the Third Reich and Cold War division. Through lectures, site visits, discussions, readings, and intensive studio practice, participants gain understanding of the critical, historical, and social dimensions of art in Berlin. The continuing value of the course lies in how participants will apply the lessons of their experience to wherever they may later practice art. The program culminates with a group show featuring works that are informed by “place.”
Eric has a passion for exploring historical events through an artistic voice. In particular offering living memorial’s to the unheard voices in historical events. He shares eloquently how, unlike the art world in the United States that is so strongly driven by commercial forces, there are countries, cultures and even governments who utilize art to address social change and offer a vehicle for problem solving. Eric describes how for him it is important to see the way that other people live, the way other countries and communities cultivate and support discourse, artistic expression and address problems.
We look forward to welcoming Eric to Central Vermont in late June.
The Initiative: A Vermont Waldorf High School 