She said balancing being an educator and artist can be challenging.
“Especially when you do it all day, and then to go home and do it some more, but it’s something that I love, and I get joy from teaching my students how to do something and then also when I go home and do something that’s meaningful for me,” she said.
Lisa Chizmar uses art to teach science at Stallings Island Middle School in Martinez, Ga.
“I teach physics and chemistry, and then we teach astronomy at the end of the year when you can apply the chemistry and the physics,” she said, showing colorful painted tiles that are the result.
“My tiles are based on nebulas. I research the nebula and determine what elements are present and what wavelengths they would reflect, and then I chose those colors,” Chizmar said.
“I change the density of the acrylics by adding oil or water so they’ll mix but not blend, and then I pour them on the tile. Fifty percent of them I wash off and start over,” she said.
“Some of them I really like,” Chizmar said. “Almost all of them are happy accidents.”
Sabrina White, a charcoal portrait artist who has taught at Aiken High, displayed three works from a portrait series that incorporates collage.
One began as a teaching example but became a personal work. The class was using three different materials to form a collage, then drawing or painting on each material with a different medium. Her multimedia work uses dictionary pages cut into strips, two colors of paper, charcoal, charcoal pencil and ink.
“I do a lot of work that revolves around ancestry and the African American experience,” White said. “When you see the silhouettes within the pieces, those are representing the ancestors. The charcoal portraits are living ancestors, based on people I know and people who are an important part of my life.”
“This is a wonderful show,” she said. “This gives us as educators an opportunity to show our work. It also gives the community and our students an opportunity to see us as the professionals that we are and not just as teachers.”
