2014 The Alaska Experimental Video Mapping Project (Master Works Series) - Gastineau Edition
In this project, Conarro explores her interest in examining multiple people’s perspectives of the same place as they simultaneously create a cohesive large-scale collaboration. Conarro developed this large scale project as a way to answer the question “What is one important place to you in Juneau?” through educating students on color, shape, and collage in relation to their sense of place in a community they share together. To address the K-2 learning level, Part II in the Master Works Series broadened the concept of 'how to depict a specific location’ that was employed in Part I DZ Edition (see below). By standardizing the format of the collage, Conarro and Brooklyn-based artist Julian Bozeman collaborated on the repetitive presentation of the work through a live video format. The 150 individual works representing each ‘important place’ combine to make a singular video for public use and, combined with Bozeman’s instinct for repetitive sound elements, references the hypnotic nature of early television education animations. This project was funded by the Alaska State Council on the Arts.
2013 The Alaska Experimental Video Mapping Project (Master Works Series) - Dzantik'i Heeni Edition
In Part I of II (see Gastineau edition above) of this video mapping project, Conarro designed a project for two hundred 6th-8th grade students to create individual works to become one large-scale collaborative video. Conarro lead students in learning how to employ color, texture, line, shape, and surface sheen in collage format to represent specific locations and answer the question “What is one important place to you in Juneau?” Conarro collaborated with Brooklyn-based artist Julian Bozeman and added these collages to a live video format and internet map for public use. Bozeman's knowledge of light and video allowed students to experiment with a flashlight to add dimension to their work within the video. This project was funded by the Alaska State Council on the Arts and The Rasmuson Foundation.
2013 Tsu Heidei Shugaxtutaan
The Sitka Native Education Program invited Conarro to lead eighteen classroom teachers from areas of study in creating a collaborative mural for the Tribal Youth Center in Sitka, Alaska. Conarro designed this project for schoolteachers to learn in-depth strategies for visual arts integration and collaborative community projects. Consisting of 18 self-proclaimed ‘reluctant artists’ coming from different fields, Conarro guided the educator team in choosing imagery and creating their own designs while simultaneously executing a unified image. The team finished a twelve-by-twelve foot painting titled Tsu Heide Shugaxtutaan (translation: We Will Again Open This Container of Wisdom That Has Been Left in Our Care) by working with the Tlingit community and considering important cultural questions identified by the Tribe. Though the team was inexperienced in creative collaboration, Conarro’s lead enabled each teacher to add their touch to a cohesive mural. ” As one teacher remarked ” Sarah allowed the mural to be the group's mural and not ‘hers.’ She guided and yet allowed us to figure some things out on our own.” This project was facilitated by the Alaska Arts Education Consortium.
2012 "Boys' Dleigu: Haandéi ax choonéitk'i" Window Painting
Sarah collaborated with Musician/Teaching Artist Ed Littlefield to create a window painting/backdrop in the Thunder Mountain High School commons in Juneau, Alaska. The visual component was designed to relate to Ed's three musical interpretations (one Tlingit, one jazz, one contemporary/body percussion) of the traditional Tlingit lullaby "Boys' Dleigu: Haandéi ax choonéitk'i" by Charlie Joseph, a Tlingit elder from Sitka, Alaska.
Thunder Mountain High School's Art Teacher Heather Ridgway blogged about the window painting project: Post One - Plan/Design -- Post Two - paint/execute -- Post Three - finished product
2012 Quanemciput Pilialput-llu
One hundred and fifty middle and high school students travelled from rural villages into Bethel, Alaska, to participate in the culminating grand theatrical performance based on cultural storytelling. Sarah worked with Juneau Theater Artist Ryan Conarro and Brooklyn Photographer Katie Basile on this project as the third and final phase of the Pilinguat arts-based education project investigating local history and current stories. Sarah lead students in creating the set for their performances in collaboration with Hood River Teaching Artist Shelley Toon Hight. This project was designed to increase relevance and motivation for students in cross-cultural classroom and was funded by the Alaska Humanities Forum and the Rasmuson Foundation.
2012 Heroes and Talents
Sarah lead with educators and students in grades 9-12 at Yaakoosge Daakahidi Alternative High School in creating six panels of paintings for the exterior of the school along the entrance walkway. The project received funding from the Alaska State Council on the Arts and The Alaska Association of School Boards for building community and assets through art.
2011 I Choose Respect
Sarah was invited by teenagers to coordinate the creation of four 5 x 8 foot panels for the Nugget Mall in Juneau, Alaska. After completing the youth leadership in Anchorage “Lead On! For Peace and Equality in Alaska”, the teen group wanted to incorporate simple imagery integrated with local student response on how they choose and show respect, how they ask for help, how they set boundaries as well as why they love Juneau. Sarah ran the open-to-public painting sessions at the Juneau Arts and Humanities Council and at the University of Alaska Southeast.
2011 Swapping Fish Tales
Sarah coordinated visual design for Dear Fish, a project coordinated by Annie Calkins and funded by the Kennedy Center Partners in Education grant. For this project, schools in Alaska and Maine explored fishing cultures of both communities using integrated technology. Research collected from trips out in the field and interviews with local fishermen formed the basis for a play written by Dave Hunsaker performed by elementary and high school students in both communities in Spring 2011. Collaborators include = Brice Haberger, Ryan Conarro, Sarah Doremus, Lorrie Heagy.
2011 This is Who We Are
Over one hundred middle and high school students travelled from nine rural villages into Bethel, Alaska, to participate in the culminating interview-based theatrical performance based on cultural storytelling. Sarah worked with Juneau Theater Artist Ryan Conarro and Brooklyn Photographer Katie Basile on this project as the second of three phases of the Pilinguat arts-based education project investigating local history and current stories. Sarah lead students in visual components of the performance incorporating Yup'ik elders' portraits. This project was funded by the Alaska Humanities Forum and the Rasmuson Foundation.
2011 Complements Grid
Sarah painted fifty-six 2x2 ft panels with 375 K-5 students at Mendenhall River Elementary School for permanent installation on their school's outside covered play area in Juneau, Alaska.
2011 Patchwork Collage Grid
Auke Bay Elementary School invited Sarah to work with their 150 K-2 students in painting and collaging thirty two-by-two foot wood squares for permanent installation in the school interior. With Sarah's lead, students created individual drawings, tore their papers and shared the remnants with one another to begin the process of collage. Students painted the boards together to provide a home for the individual collages they had created earlier in the process.
2010 The Great Lessons
The Montessori Borealis School invited Sarah to work with their 120 K-8 students in Juneau, Alaska. Together they painted, collaged and wrote a continuous narrative of 'The Great Lessons' for permanent installation reaching from the entrance to the building, through the hallways, and up a stairwell. Chris Trostel, upper elementary teacher, lists the` lessons within the theme as the following: 1. The Creation of the Universe 2. The Coming of Life to Earth, 3. The Emergence of the Human, 4. and 5. The Human Gifts: The Story of Invention/Math & The Story of Communication in Signs (our alphabet).
2010 Raven From Downtown
Sarah designed and executed a one-percent-for-art mural for the Zach Gordon Youth Center in for the City and Borough of Juneau in Juneau, Alaska.
2010 Art Shops
Sarah taught for an arts-in-education program for at-risk youth in low income housing developments. Her focus was student learning through art projects and field trips, community collaboration, multicultural awareness, and parental and familial communication and involvement. During this program, children created a backdrop for the Juneau Arts and Humanities Council Savikko Park Concerts. This program is funded through a Drug Elimination Program Grant from the Alaska Housing Finance Corp. and facilitated by the Juneau Arts and Humanities Council.
2010 We See Our Tundra
The White Mountain, Alaska community and school invited Sarah to fulfill a Cultural Collaborations Project Grant from the Alaska State Council on the Arts. White Mountain, an Iġaliuŋmuit (Fish River tribe) Iñupiat village with a population of 200 located by the Bering Strait, lost their school in 2006 to a late-night furnace room fire. The new school, built in 2009, is set on a slight tundra hill on the perimeter of the village with a 90 foot chain link fence separating it from the rest of town. Sarah collaborated with over half of the White Mountain community -- from elders down to pre-K students --in creating 89 colorful shape cut-outs representing their community on the fence to visually connect the school to the village.
2009 Thunder Mountain
During the 2009-2010 academic year, Sarah taught drawing, mixed media, and painting with an emphasis on community involvement in Juneau's newest high school. Students created work under three main objectives: 1. Here We Are -- To broaden experiences of their own community, students took their work out into the community by creating the backdrop for Juneau's 36th annual Folk Festival featuring local sea life. Out of 104 students, 87 were born in Juneau, and prior to this year, only 4 had yet to attend the free music festival in their town. 2. Come On In -- To broaden interaction of the Juneau community within the schools and to highlight the importances of Juneau youths' voices in the world, students hosted an open-to-public evening to present Current Events Works. Students showed individual mixed media works to raise awareness on local to worldwide current events, and performed a live interpretive painting and music to fundraise for the Art Creation Foundation in Haiti following the 2010 earthquake. Results from the event attendance poll showed 215 of the 407 visitors that night had never been to Thunder Mountain School before. 3. I Am Me -- To broaden personal art creation and awareness of how individuals create work, students drew a series of self portraits exploring style, scale, perspective, and metamorphosis. Students also kept sketchbooks and studied the positive impact of personal art practice, including having individual correspondences with artist Samuel Stabler about his own sketchbook. Student-written questions to Sam included: 1. Do you ever second guess and erase the sketches all the time? When I draw in my sketchbook I think to much about what to draw and if I do have a good idea my drawing isn't as good as the image in my mind. Do you have a trick you use to just not be so tough on your own work? 2. On sketch book 7 page 55, what were you thinking when you drew this? Was it that people see everything or that people look but they aren't really seeing? Also, I am wondering if you make yourself draw every day or if you just really like to draw every day?
2009 Hands, Mud, Found
Sarah taught mixed media and painting to middle and elementary students during three summers in Sitka, Alaska. Every year, Sarah also coordinated a participatory/performance-based visual arts event for the Sitka Fine Arts Camp Teaching Artists and students as well as the Sitka community.
2009 Nometown
Sarah lead fifty 6th-8th grade students at the Anvil City Science Academy in the creation of a 320 square foot exterior painting. The painting served the role as a scenic backdrop in the interview-based production Nometown Tales and is now permanently installed on the exterior of the public swimming facility. Students designed the painting through reading interviews featured in the play.
2009 Statehood Celebration: Tundra Style
Sarah collaborated in an interdisciplinary performance project featuring students from nine villages in the Lower Kuskokiwm district celebrating Alaska's 100th year as a state. Sarah lead visual design including preliminary work painting/collaging a 160 sq. ft. painting with 100 K-12 students in Kasigluk, Alaska. Kasigluk is a 550-person Yupik Alaska Native community accessible by plane, snow machine or boat. This painting in was flown into Bethel, Alaska to act as the backdrop for the Statehood Celebration: Tundra Style production and then returned to Kasigluk to be permanently installed in Akiuk School's lobby. Collaborators for this project include Stephen Blanchett, Ryan Conarro,and Project Pilinguat. This project received funding from the Alaska Humanities Forum, the Rasmuson Foundation, and the Alaska State Council on the Arts.
2009 Sea Creatures
Working with 200 K-1 students, Sarah created 380 sq. ft. of sea creatures for permanent installation on their chain link playground fence. This project included community involvement and students of Sitka's local alternative school, Pacific High.
2009 Xóots
Sarah guided the thirteen K-10 students in Klukwan, Alaska in writing and illustrating a continuous narrative about Xóots (bear). The group painted & collaged a 2’ x 45’ continuous narrative for permanent installation in Klukwan School's community room. Students translated character names into the Tlingit language.
2008 Thread the River Through
Sarah conducted a 500 square foot exterior painting for permanent installation on the community gymnasium with Gustavus School. Gustavus, Alaska is a community only accessible by boat or plane and home to 400 residents. The gym is the largest gathering space within this town. Approximately seventy-five K-12 students, teachers and community members participated and all participants had the opportunity to integrate their own designs. This project received funding from the Alaska Brewery Company and the Alaska State Council on the Arts.
2008 Between The Gastineau Channel And Mount Roberts
This project is a mosaic created in collaboration with 80 students in grades K-5 for Capital City Park, a public park in downtown Juneau, Alaska.
2007 The Sea as They See It
In conjunction with 'Sea Week', Sarah worked with 350 students in grades K-5 to design and create an imaginative painting/collage for permanent installation in the school commons. This project received funding from the Alaska State Council on the Arts.
2007 Village by the Cliff
Sarah created 192 sq. ft. painting/collage for permanent installation in the Hoonah, Alaska cafeteria with 200 children in grades K-12. A predominantly Tlingit Alaska Native community, Hoonah, population 750, is located on Chichagof Island and only accessible by boat or plane. Imagery includes salmon trollers, fish and birds, all inspired by the place-based connection for students. This project was funded by the Alaska State Council on the Arts.
2006 Outside the Box
Sarah consulted, curated, and taught with The Canvas, as they were getting their feet off the ground and determining aspects of their identity. This Juneau, Alaska art studio and gallery has since gained national attention for providing arts-based training for persons with disabilities. Sarah curated The Canvas's first exhibition, an interactive art, video and sound installation created by 30 REACH artists entitled Outside the Box.
2006 Kids in Movement
Sarah created a painted/collage piece for permanent installation of the exterior school entryway with 350 K-5 students at Harborview Elementary School in Juneau, Alaska. Students' design drawings were based on the school's theme 'Kids in Movement'. Design images were collaged into the final image. This project was funded by the Alaska State Council on the Arts.