art teaching
The 2026-27 school year began in early August with a variety of workshops and meetings, and classes started on August 19th!
I am teaching relief printmaking (which I renamed to Stamp Carving & Stencils a few years ago to draw in more non-majors, which has been a real success!) and Graphic Design I, as well as Graphic Design Internship, as well as Advanced Studies in Design and Graphic Design.
When drawing and painting on paper, artists typically tape more delicate papers down to a board unless that paper comes as part of a pad already. Taping loose papers to boards allows artists to keep the paper flat and unwrinkled while being able to easily move it around and draw on it at more upright angles. (Drawing flat on a table or in an artist's lap can often introduce unintentional perspective distortion, while drawing closer to upright minimizes those issues.)
Note the white tape diagonally placed on top of the corners of the paper. You can click into this to see it more clearly in a larger view!
I don't believe I've ever really been taught how to tape; I think as students we all just convergently evolved similar techniques to tape each corner down at a diagonal. Then at the end of the painting, you peel it back and extend the artwork into those blank corners if necessary.
As a teacher, I did start to tell my students to aim for a small but not tiny amount of corner coverage: too much and you have more to fix at the end, while too little and the paper pulls free from the tape and falls at inopportune moments. I also tell them that if you want the tape to be sticky-but-not-too-sticky, you can press it to your pants or shirt first for easier removal.
While I was doing my first artist residency at Arts Itoya in Japan in June 2024, I used this same taping technique and it damaged several of the delicate washi papers.
To the right, you can see an image of my in-progress Paper Snow in January 2025 with taped corners.
I innovated a new technique during my second artist residency at Arts Itoya in June 2025! The new method is to place a piece of acid-free archival tape onto the back of the paper. That tape can remain indefinitely if the paper is prone to tearing, or can be gently removed if desired, and even if it does cause slight surface damage upon removal, that's happening on the side of paper no one's seeing. Then I place another piece of tape onto the first and extend it out past the edge of the painting so the sticky side is face up. Then I place a piece of tape sticky side down onto that. Here is an image of this taping technique:
Note that the tape is now not touching the face of the artwork at all!
I strongly recommend this new technique for:
paintings and drawings on delicate papers
paintings and drawings where the media will extend to the corners, so that you don't have to carefully match the markmaking, color palette, etc. afterwards but can just actively address the whole picture plane at once
I'm teaching Painting I this semester, and so I showed my students both options at the beginning of the semester. Most students have chosen to adopt this new method even when dealing with sturdy substrates like canvas paper, due to the second point above.
The spring 2026 semester is in full swing at Morningside University!
I am teaching Graphic Design I, Painting I, Graphic Design Internship, and Senior Art Seminar.
In Spring 2025 here at Morningside University, I will be teaching Graphic Design I, Painting I and II, Senior Art Seminar, Graphic Design Internship, Internship in Arts Administration, and Senior Project in Arts Administration. Enrollment in Senior Art Seminar has been steadily climbing, so keep your calendars open for all the exciting senior show receptions that will be happening in April and May!
While I haven’t finished posting about my summer adventures, time is still progressing and the new academic year has begun! Today is the first day of classes this fall at Morningside University. I am teaching Design and Graphic Design I as well as overseeing Graphic Design Internship and Advanced Studies in Graphic Design.
It’s fun to get to see familiar and new faces, and I’m looking forward to getting to see all the new artwork my students will be making!
In Spring 2024, I will be teaching Graphic Design I, Painting I, Advanced Studies in Ceramics, Arts Internship, Arts Administration Internship, Senior Art Seminar, and Arts Administration Senior Project at Morningside University.
Time flies, and we’re starting up another school year again! This Fall 2023 I will be teaching Design, Graphic Design I, Graphic Design Internship, and Advanced Studies in Graphic Design at Morningside University. I will also be taking Intro to Japanese!
Miriam Moore’s new Sioux City Garden Club logo design!
I love to partner with community organizations in art department coursework with beneficial, real-world projects. This semester, I agreed to host a design competition within our graphic design program for the Sioux City Garden Club! Their president, La Vone Sopher, reached out to me and we worked out a plan: students in Graphic Design I and II would submit logo designs, and the club would proffer a $50 first place (and use that logo) as well as a $25 second place prize.
Students in these two courses submitted 26 designs, and there were a lot of quality options for the garden club to choose from! The board winnowed it down to six, and had the club members vote to select their first and second place designs. Graphic design and history major Miriam Moore’s logo was the winner!
I like to take on these sorts of projects - even though it invariably adds to my workload - because students get to work with actual clients, the top designers receive compensation, and all students create portfolio pieces while the winner sees their work enter the community. It also raises both the winning artists’ and our art department’s visibility… particularly when we issue press releases about the successful conclusion of the partnership!
Here’s the Morningside University press release (complete with a quote from me), which was picked up by KWIT and a KTIV television interview.
Now that I’ve gotten the last workshop’s pieces published, I can tell you about the one I just finished! It took place on Saturday, April 22, 2023. Despite that late April date, the weather was decidedly more wintry - it was 34 degrees Fahrenheit with snow on the ground when we arrived, and I think it warmed up to around 40 by the time we left 8 hours later. Fortunately, the inside of the garage/storage room we glazed within got a bit warmer with the help of some space heaters, but I was still happy I wore my snow boots for extra warmth!
Possibly due to the weather, though, I had my best raku luck yet! I brought nine pieces, and all nine survived without even one crack - and my glaze results all fell on a scale of good to fantastic. I’ll share those with you shortly, but here are some photos from the workshop day itself first. In attendance from Morningside University was me, our ceramics instructor Paul Adamson, alumna Deb Allard and student Hannah Nichols.
Happy New Year! This spring 2023, I will be teaching ART 210 Graphic Design I, ART 225 Painting I, ART 470 Graphic Design Internship, and ART 490 Senior Art Seminar here at Morningside University.
I’m thrilled to share that I am a 2022 Sharon Walker Faculty Excellence Award honoree!
From Morningside University: “Thanks to the continued generosity and love for Morningside shared by Jim and Sharon Walker ‘70, three faculty members were honored with a Sharon Walker Faculty Excellence Award. The 2022 honorees are Dr. Kim Christopherson, educational technologist and a professor in the Sharon Walker School of Education; Dr. Tom Paulsen, a professor and department head for the Regina Roth Applied Ag and Food Studies program; and Shelby Prindaville, art department chair, director of the art galleries, and associate professor in the School of Visual & Performing Arts.
Established in 2003, recipients for the Sharon Walker Faculty Excellence Awards are selected from a field of applicants by a panel of three outside evaluators. Each receive a $10,000 honorarium and $2,000 to use for faculty development. Several themes guide the Sharon Walker Faculty Excellence Awards process:
The committee firmly believes that there must be a holistic approach to examining the criteria (teaching, scholarship, advising, and service) and no single item should be seen in opposition to another. Indeed, effective teaching is enhanced by quality advising, active scholarship, and dedicated service to the university.
These awards are meant to celebrate Morningside University’s extraordinary faculty by recognizing up to three exemplary recipients each year.
The committee takes its charge from the President and the donors very seriously and recognizes the difficulty of the selection process.”
The application requires a minimum of seven letter of recommendation writers, and I am really grateful for all of my letter writers’ time and support! I’m very happy both personally and because this is the first time anyone in the art department has received this honor, which feels like important representation.
Late last spring, I budgeted for and acquired two types of color-blindness-alleviating glasses for my design class in specific and the Morningside art department in general. Today was my introduction of our first color theory project in that class, so I brought the glasses out and said that if any students were having trouble either grasping the assignment or seeing colors change, they should try the glasses out to see if they could make a difference.
One of my students told me that he was not seeing the colors change in the project examples, but he was sure he wasn't color blind. I shared that there's a spectrum so it doesn't have to be all-or-nothing color blindness, and he could just test out if the glasses would help or not. He tried the deutan pair on and saw no difference. Next he tried on the protan pair and was surprised as he immediately registered color changes. I sent him outside just to check the world out and he came back after a few minutes and said he had no idea how much red was in our bricks or that there were maroon/brown moments mixed in the grass. Then he rocked the glasses for the rest of the class period while working on the color theory exercises.
You guys. I knew the glasses would help some students eventually, but on their debut they are already making a difference to a student for this project and more meaningfully for his general understanding of and experience with the world around him. I am so happy.
If you’re curious, the company I bought them from is EnChroma, and by coincidence it also happens to be International Color Blindness Awareness Month, so I’m both doing my part by raising awareness but also if you wanted some yourself, EnChroma is currently celebrating with 20% off.
Though we began having faculty meetings and events last week, classes start this Wednesday here at Morningside University. I will be teaching ART 103 Design, ART 210 Graphic Design I, ART 405 Advanced Studies in Graphic Design, and ART 470 Graphic Design Internship this semester!
Here are some day-of photos from the April 2022 raku workshop I attended at Dakota Potters Supply in Sioux Falls along with Morningside ceramics instructor Paul Adamson and students Lauren Hedlund and Debora Allard. The photo of finished works are some of the student pieces - I’ll post separately about my own!
It’s pretty neat to see former students continue achieving in art! A former student of mine, Paul Stouffer, who took one-on-one lessons from me while I was in graduate school at LSU is a finalist in the 2020 Pabst Blue Ribbon Art Can Contest.
Recently, I was invited by my mentor and former professor Kelli Kelley to guest lecture via Zoom in Louisiana State University’s ART 4889 Advanced Drawing Workshop! It was fun to get a chance to catch up with Kelli and to virtually meet LSU art upperclassmen and graduate students.
I am teaching ART 103 Design and ART 210 Graphic Design I in addition to overseeing ART 401 Advanced Studies: Design this semester, and today is the first day of classes here at Morningside College! Given the pandemic, I’ve been working hard all summer at adapting Design and Graphic Design I to accommodate a hybrid and/or remote learning model if necessary. I have really enjoyed using the software VidGrid to record video lectures for asynchronous content delivery!
I can’t believe it’s already the end of the semester; my Design and Drawing classes are almost wrapped up, and finals are next week - then we’re on to winter break!
I’ll be teaching Figure Drawing and Painting for Spring 2020, as well as co-teaching Senior Seminar and overseeing a number of internships.
Haha, my art students are doing such cool things that we can’t help but dominate the news cycle here in Leavenworth - this time, senior student Gwen Logan is in the Leavenworth Times for her art restoration side business and potential career interest, which grew from a homework assignment I gave to her last fall in Painting I!
Citizens Savings & Loan has partnered with the University of Saint Mary to offer a university-branded debit card that raises money for student scholarships - and they put out a contest call a few months ago for designs. The winner was to receive a $500 scholarship and have their design printed as the inaugural card… and sophomore art major Adeline Pagan Sanchez won with the submission to the right!
Addy took the initiative to compete and worked very hard on this contest. She created and submitted a variety of designs since she wasn’t sure what aesthetic - cartoonish, sporty, refined - the selection team was looking for. Her classy, modern take on the USM spire and surrounding architecture hit the mark. Here’s a picture of us presenting her with the award, via an oversized ceremonial check!
I’m proud of her and look forward to more of her successes. For further details, check out USM’s press release, which was published in the Leavenworth Times too!
