Went to a wonderful show earlier this month at the Art Museum of Southeast Texas. It was not in the main galleries, where so much amazing work is brought to us in the way only AMSET can do. This was a more intimate exhibition on a Sunday afternoon in the Sue Mann Weisenfelder Gallery. It is an addendum of Café Arts, the lovely eatery within the museum.
Digression is my tour de force, and I must employ it now because there is so much to say about all of this. Sue Mann was an excellent art teacher who worked for a time at St. Anne’s school. She always reminded me and others that she was my first art teacher. This was a point of pride to her and an honor to me that she felt so strongly about that fact. An honor to me because I sort of sucked at art, which was offered once a week, late on Fridays. But being the first is something one can never take from us. You cannot be surpassed or out done. It is always there.
Secondly she later married the father of Jane Weisenfelder, who was a classmate of a beach neighbor of mine for all of our formative years. I was also her Neches River Escort. Small world, long story!
So there I was to see a good friend’s work, Wayne Goodman. Wayne has helped us at The Studio like he helps many people, I assume. I met him years ago as he bought paints and other art supplies from us. Eventually he presented some work during various shows and sales. The Art Museum was savvy enough to offer him an exhibition, seeing the same thing I did, i.e., an acute understanding of narrative painting in a form we tend to call folk art, outsider art or naive art. All of these terms try to point to someone who creates their own approach to the story they are driven to tell, and Wayne has found his niche.
Delightful in color and form, he speaks of the African experience in America, telling stories that somehow maintain their humanness in the face of the greatest tragedy in our history.
Wayne has always been soft spoken and thoughtful. A cup of coffee with him ultimately provided me with a revelation about life and hope. What I found in his work, and his explanation of his work, revealed something more than that. It revealed his deep understanding of the history of the African experience and the key people who moved his community toward freedom. The works’ innocent beauty belies the depth of the stories they tell about deep courage, gentle resistance and the amazing capability to maintain some form of joy in a difficult world.
As Wayne guided us through his work he revealed something else — his vast knowledge of the players in the movement to freedom so beautifully depicted in his work and so concisely explained in his usual gentle voice. To say I was moved is to understate my emotional experience, and at that moment I wished everyone in the world could hear what he said.
So, dear Wayne Goodman, let’s find a way to let people hear you tell your story. It makes no difference how it happens. What matters is hearing your gentle, sweet voice telling this story through your art as often and as long as possible. So glad we met.
Something wonderful is happening to The Studio! If you haven’t visited in a while you might be surprised at the transformation that is occurring. Through the renovations from Harvey, we began to address other needs that can make The Studio more efficient, useful and functional like a well-made coffee cup!
Over the past month we eliminated my office up front, removed the bars from the front windows, expanded the library by 16 feet, created a resident sales gallery and made a place for our clay supplies. We are developing an archive of historical information about The Studio, and in the next month we can expect general refinements to make our facility more functional and less chaotic.
We are still working on improvements on restrooms and the darkroom and are making refinements within the class spaces. We are addressing needs in the 840 space and our accessibility overall.
This might be a good time to remind our readers that volunteers and supporters are an integral part of this advancement. If you can make time to be part of this transformation or help fund some part of the improvements, it would go a long way in our long-term plans. After 25 years since our last improvements, it is time to get a little face lift to our home.
Sure there are the web joists and brick walls and all the things that make The Studio The Studio, but we are making an attempt to raise our bar and our funding to address issues that are beneficial to the residents and our members.
We are at the point that requires us to do some administrative housecleaning. A few of the changes address Board of Directors insurance, a review of our bylaws, a strategic planning meeting to set goals for the next 25 years and a new level of transparency so anyone can see our finances, board minutes and activities.
These directives will put us on a path to better funding and more board participation.
Directors insurance protects our board from personal litigation and has been the standard of the industry for quite some time. Without it, we will have a difficult time recruiting new and influential members to direct our organization. The strategic planning meeting is a serious look at where we are and where we are going. Through a facilitator, we will scrutinize our policies, our bylaws, our goals and purposes, and set a course for the next 25 years.
Having consensus among the leadership in a system like this creates confidence that the organization is not drifting in a sea of uncertainty. In fact, the last time we had a planning meeting, some 28 years ago, it brought us to the goal of owning our own facility among other changes!
Transparency is another excellent means of letting future donors take a close look at us without having to glean the information from us. Through Guidestar.org our information is open to anyone wishing to see if we fit their goals for funding. Currently we have a platinum level of transparency through Guidestar but we are working to provide all board notes, bylaws and financial information available for their scrutiny. Guidestar is the go-to site for assurance a group is a nonprofit organization, and through them we have a donate button for our organization on their site. They help fund $6 million a year to various groups. We hope to be one.
We are asking graphic designers to offer assistance in developing different logos for the various programs we have or will have in the future, including exhibitions, Band Nites, Poetry Renaissance, studio art basics, essential knowledge for children, clay classes, photography classes, drawing group, summer art programs, studio volunteers, summer spree, Shop-O-Rama and a return to the old Studio logo, originally designed by Tina Novelli and featured on our current T-shirts.
We are also looking for instructors to teach various art disciplines to adults and children on a year-round basis. Call me and let’s talk about the possibilities. We also are working to offer classes to children from Girl’s Haven and Buckner Children’s Village this summer and throughout the year. We have a long history with these two special organizations, and I want to reignite our ties with them. I hope our classes can become an addendum to art education in school districts, home schools and institutions. As to the support for children, I think it is imperative that once a child is safe, fed, housed and loved, that we can offer a second wave of support through the creativity of art, raising their thinking skills and offering an outlet for their personal expression.
After 35 yeas of struggling to keep The Studio a viable institution with the monikers “Hope Springs Eternal” and “One Day We Are Going to Make It,” it is our hope and dream we can serve this community with our eye on the future and our hearts firmly imbedded in the arts.
Greg Busceme, TASI founder