Organized and curated by Arts Mentoring Fellows Emmy Bright and Kedrin Frias, the Spring 2012 Conversation on Creative Practice Series concludes on Thursday, April 26 from 7-9pm with True Language, featuring writers Mary-Kim Arnold and Matthew Derby talking about balancing art, family and redefining notions of success. 

This event is free and open to the public. Snacks and refreshments will be served. For more information read Mary-Kim’s blog here or visit our website.

Join us for the second Conversation in the 2012 series of Conversations on Creative Practice: A Reading and Conversation with Al Burian, of the zine Burn Collector on “How to be a Famous Writer Without Making Any Money or Having Anyone Know Who You Are” Al Burian is the author of the long-running personal zine Burn Collector. His work has garnered praise from such legitimate institutions as the Utne Reader and McSweeneys Best Nonrequired Reading. Beginning in the mid-nineties, Burian has distributed his work through the tight-knit network of the DIY punk music/art scene. He has published 16 issues of the zine, two anthologies, and a book of comics. He has been doing reading/speaking performances since the year 2000. Burn Collector #16 (April 2012) is sub-titled “Music and Mania,” and examines the intersection between creativity and losing your marbles. Street musicians, arena rock, classical vs. computers, Little Richard vs. Elvis, and a wide variety of other topics are discussed as Burian contends that “the modern musician is essentially a maniac, living on a delusional dream, whose basic project– putting forth a unique voice into the general din and calamity of the oversaturated information age– has so little chance of success as to make it an act of ultimate, incredible optimism.” The zine contains comics, essays, reviews, and interviews with musician Tim Remis and radical mental health activist Sascha DuBrul.

Author bio:
Born 1971 in New Hampshire (state motto: “live free or die”); grew up in North Carolina (state motto: “to be and not to seem”); was an iconoclastic character at an early age. In his early twenties he began touring incessantly with bands, simultaneously producing small-run photocopied pamphlets (“zines”). He has published two collections of his zine output, Burn Collector (2000) and Natural Disaster (2007), as well as a book of comics, Things Are Meaning Less (2003).
He lives in Berlin.

For the past ten years, New Urban Arts has recognized individuals and organizations that demonstrate extraordinary commitment to New Urban Arts through the Sandra Olson Awards. Extraordinary contributions of time, expertise, money, energy, or support – often given without solicitation – qualify recipients. The award’s namesake, Sandra Olson, once mailed New Urban Arts a $2 check each week over the course of two years. Her gifts totaled over $250.

This year’s awards will be presented at New Urban Arts’ Annual Campaign fundraiser on Thursday, April 12, 7PM as we celebrate New Urban Arts’ fifteenth birthday. Please join us in our celebration and help us congratulate the 2012 Sandra Olson Award winners!

 2012 SANDRA OLSON WINNERS

Sara Bergman, alumni artist mentor and volunteer
Sara has continued to stay involved as a volunteer, donor and friend since being an artist mentor. She launched the Bergman Fund, an endowment to support RISD artist mentors at New Urban Arts and has been a dedicated volunteer leader in our capital campaign.

Emily Ustach, alumni artist mentor and volunteer
Emily has played a variety of roles at New Urban Arts, volunteer, artist mentor, and staff member. Last year, she voluntarily led a committee of advisors to help New Urban Arts prepare its programming for a new space and manage our rising youth enrollment. 

Site Specific, business
The Site Specific team went above and beyond in renovating New Urban Arts’ new home, finishing under budget, securing in-kind donations from vendors, and most importantly, building a beautiful and inspiring permanent space for our youth and artists. www.sitespecificllc.com

Emmy Bright, Arts Mentoring Fellow
Emmy has contributed an extraordinary number of hours, far more than expected, to our students and artist mentors. She invests deeply in the organization and the people in it. She asks more of herself than we ever could.

Noel Puello, student
Noel is a graduating senior admitted to several colleges including Parsons School of Art and Design and Massachusetts College of Art.

Noel has been an active student for several years and one of our most dedicated ambassadors. “Noel has made contributions to both New Urban Arts and Providence that I have never seen before in a high-school student. Noel is possibly the most courageous person I know.” -Nominee

Past winners are:
2002 – Peter Hocking, Jephry Floral Studio, Marly Louis, Echoing Green Foundation
2003 – Kathleen Connolly, Jason Yoon, Gasbarro’s Wines
2004 – Jesse Banks III, White Electric, Craftland
2005 – Michael Fournier, Kedrin Frias, Jennifer Rice, Cornish Associates
2006 – Priscilla Carrion, White Whale Web Services, Tamara Kaplan, Judy Vilmain
2007 – John Tabor Jacobson, Mary Adewusi, Esther Chak, Simon Moore, Jack Richter
2008 – Sarah Meyer, Myrth York, Aneudy Alba, Andrew Oesch
2009 – Deborah Obalil, Mathias Arling, Vilmain Inc., Erik Gould
2010 – Angelo Manioudakis, Andy Cutler, Rosalia Velis
2011 – Jane Androski , Virginia Branch, Jay Glasson, CJ Jimenez, Susan Smulyan

Congratulations to Sara, Emily, Site Specific, Emmy and Noel! We are so grateful for all of your work!

Attend Fellowship Information Sessions to learn more about this opportunity on Monday April 16, 2012 from 7-8pm or Wednesday April 25 from 6:00 – 7:00pm, located at 705 Westminster Street in Providence, RI. 

New Urban Arts will award 2012-13 fellowships to two established artists and educators in a yearlong position to (1) support artist mentors who volunteer to mentor high school students in the arts; (2) bring their creative practice to our community art studio as an artist in residence, and (3) explore and share intersections and ideas across creative practice and community practice as a reflective practitioner and active presence in the New Urban Arts studio. The fellows jointly curate New Urban Arts Conversations, a public series in which diverse individuals share how they integrate creativity into their personal and professional lives. 

The fellowship is a yearlong commitment of approximately 15-20 hours per week that begins October 1 and ends June 1, with an opportunity for a one-year renewal.Fellows receive a financial stipend, studio space and the opportunity to investigate and explore the intersection of creative practice and community practice within a nationally recognized community art studio. 

Click here for the RFP due May 1, 2012. 

Click here for details on Fellow roles and responsibilities.

Organized and curated by Arts Mentoring Fellows, Emmy Bright and Kedrin Frias, New Urban Arts is excited to announce the Spring 2012 Conversation Series on Creative Practice. 

Our annual series of public Conversations are held in March and April from 7:00-9:00pm at our art studio, located at 705 Westminster Street in Providence. Free and Open to the Public. Refreshments served. 

Wed March 28: From the Page to the Stage: Shedding a Light on Spoken Word and Improv Performance Artwith Jorge Vargas and Rudy Cabrera.

Thurs April 5: How to be a Famous Writer Without Making Any Money or Having Anyone Know Who You Arewith Berlin-based writer, musician and comic book artist, Al Burian, most known for his long-running zine, Burn Collector. Also featuring Cafe Intelligencia! 

Thurs April 26: True Language with writers Mary-Kim Arnold and Matthew Derby about balancing art, family and redefining notions of success.

Don’t miss our annual mid-year show of student artwork, Mid Year Makings, opening on Friday, Feb. 17, 5-8pm. Witness brainstorms, beginnings, and the blooming of mid-year makings in this interactive exhibition of student artwork. This event is free and open to the public.

“Encounter” is a program resource guide based on New Urban Arts’ Summer 2010 Art Inquiry with artist mentors Jane Androski and Alice Costas as well as artist/scholar in residence Laurencia Strauss. 

The 86 page paperback book (7.44″ x 9.68″) with saddle-stitch binding and full-color interior ink costs $22.70. To purchase a copy of the book, visit our Lulu store here. The resource guide can be downloaded as a pdf at no cost. 

This publication is one of a series produced annually. The program model reflects research from the National Summer Learning Association, which describes that the most effective summer learning environments allow students “freedom to digress from a prescribed curriculum” through project based learning and encourages sustained in-depth exploration of one theme. 

We hope you find this resource guide useful in sparking new ideas for your own creative practice, individually, collaboratively or even in the classroom. The publication’s format allows readers to adapt, combine or alter the activities to your liking to best meet the needs of your specific environment.

 A winter-time studio sale. 

December 17th, 11AM-4PM at New Urban Arts 705 Westminster St, Providence. 

Cardboard Pancakes will play host to an awesome group of all-star local artists, craftspeople, and makers, in a somewhat-commercial-yet-also-sociable context at the new NUA studio. Art, crafts, prints & posters, cards, comics & zines, ceramics, tapes, joolry, objects & curios, foodstuffs, and clothings will all be findable there, made by really great people.

Last-minute presents, things your friends make that you would rather buy from them in person than over the internet, unique objects, messy multiples, cheap art as well as fancy stufffff…. it’s all gonna be here. We hope you will be here too! 

I spent last week in El Paso TX (from the littlest big of Rhody to the biggest continental big of Texas!) at the second annual Artography convening. New Urban Arts is very proud to be one of nine arts organizations across the country recognized by LINC and the Ford Foundation for exemplary artistic practice and community responsiveness. I attended with an amazing team from our studio: Arts Mentoring Fellows Emmy Bright and Kedrin Frias and youth alumnus and STAB chair CJ. Kedrin shared some of the work we did with our inaugural Institute of Other Significant Pursuits, our three-day leadership institute dedicated to supporting alumni artist mentors working to apply what they learned at New Urban Arts in diverse “other significant pursuits.” Emmy shared our contribution to the X-treme Studio exhibition at Columbia College in Chicago and CJ shared her piece from the 2010 Art Party and discussed the independent study she is currently pursuing post high-school. It was inspiring to have the chance to learn and share with our peers.