After learning so much at Mia, The Minneapolis Institute of Arts, where I worked from 2005-2012, as Intern Judaica Curator in the Dec Arts, Textiles and Sculpture Department, Teacher in Public Programs, and Volunteer Assistant to the Registrar of Main Collections,
I wanted to dedicate myself more to New Media and Digital Technology as a Visiting Artist working with museums. I loved being at the museum, but felt like I needed to grow and went forth. I didn't have a plan that first Monday. I wondered if I had made a terrible mistake! All my friends were at work while I was on my iPhone playing the new mobile game, Draw Something, (Zynga).
Something just felt really exciting about drawing works from museums on my mobile device all day. I felt more connected to them...
In the game, I got the word "Hunter" and drew Wooded Landscape with Watermill, painted by Meindert Hobbema, (1655). When done, I tweeted my drawing with a link to the original on the museum's website. I was excited to associate these words to artworks at the museum, and full of anticipation if my game opponents would guess the words correctly.
Many of my game opponents guessed my drawings of the words correctly! I felt like the smartest, most brilliant, Art Historian in the entire world!! What happened over the next couple of years, with #DrawArt, I could not have anticipated from this beginning. After drawing 400 more words with works of famous art from museums, posting each on social media sites with links to the originals, they became liked and shared across the world. It seemed time to develop my own drawing program.
A creative collaboration with Dr. Clement Shimizu, of The Elumenati. was formed at American Association for Museum, AAM2012. He showed me how to design and implement my ideas for a mobile drawing program ideal for museum education, engagement and multiple visitor experiences. Since then, I have used #DrawArt to re-animate over 2000 works of art and share them online, with museums, art galleries, special audiences, mentoring teens, Games for Change, and social-good projects in multiple ways.
This Video Demonstrates #DrawArt by illustrating the story of Achilles & Penthesilea