My supervisor, Danyett Tucker, is an artist and a member of the Empact art collective. Empact Art is a 501(c)(3) community-centered public art non-profit. It is dedicated to creating bold, inclusive, and meaningful art experiences and installations. In addition to her work with the collective, Danyett also pursues independent projects. These include puppetry, workshops, and mural painting.
I was Danyett's assistant in whatever she happened to be working on. Over the summer, that meant a huge variety of projects. I helped design flyers for events and sewed curtains for puppet theaters. I also guided community art workshops and spent a lot of time painting a 100’ mural in Essex with the rest of the Empact art team.
I was proud of leading a community mural at First Presbyterian Church’s vacation bible school with kindergarten and first graders since I’ve never worked with kids so young before. It was also exciting to get the responsibility of painting and drawing the deer in the large mural since it's such a major focal point, that being mostly my responsibility really made me feel confident in my painting and drawing skills, and made me want to do more murals in the future.
A big takeaway I got from working with Danyett and the other members of Empact art is that you don’t have to put yourself in a box as an artist, and that keeping a variety of skills and interests can be beneficial as a business person and an artist. I also really valued the chance to work with such a big team on so many different projects; the experience of collaborating was really gratifying for me.
This internship let me explore how I can continue to incorporate community arts into my own illustration practice and how teaching can continue to play a role in that.
