Endeavour Arts Introduction
- 1. What a glorious year 2016 has been. ASC Combined Schools Concert, Visual Art Exhibitions, Media, Dance and Drama cross-arts initiatives, House Dance and House Drama, the Middle School Production of an urban Jungle Book, the challenging Senior School Production of The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui, the Mark Hill Performing Artist Residency, workshops facilitated by guest practitioners in Drama and Music, Primary Arts Focus Week and the interdisciplinary arts contributions to Roman Day and Mediaeval Day. Never have there been more students through the doors and using the facilities of the Barbara Godwin Performing Arts Complex. My strategic intent as Head of the Arts, Creativity and Innovation is to draw together staff and students from Facilities, Dance, Drama, Media Arts, Music and Visual Arts K-12, Old Scholars and parents to collectively achieving common goals, sharing ideas, engaging in meaningful collaboration and problem solving for the purpose of supporting our young peoples creative growth and personal development. Leading thinker on education, creativity and innovation Sir Ken Robinson had this to say in an acclaimed speech about the future of education: The arts address the idea of aesthetic experience. An aesthetic experience is one in which your senses are operating at their peak; when youre present in the current moment; when youre resonating with the excitement of this thing that youre experiencing; when you are fully alive. What we do in providing arts education is to demonstrate how deeply personal arts learning can affect and alter those involved, how it can improve communication, increase empathy, empower self-expression, foster creativity and nurture innovation and originality. Increased enrolment in the arts is a strategic priority for St Marks. This is inclusive of involvement in co-curricular activities such as productions, choirs, clubs, ensembles and other arts activities in addition to the increased uptake of a widening range of timetabled arts courses. The arts are what make us most human, most complete and fulfilled as people. Agents of change for the 21st Century. The arts cannot be learned through occasional or random exposure any more than math or science can. It has been my privilege to have been given the opportunity to ensure that provision is made for the students of St Marks to engage in the full range of arts subject experiences from K-12, including dance, drama, medias arts, music and visual arts and to gain confidence and aptitude in initiating innovative cross-arts collaboration, not just for those aspiring to careers in the arts, but everyone. Cross-arts collaboration allows for resources and expertise to be optimized, and when time, funding and space is finite, as it is in a school, it is in the cross-arts activities and curriculum that the greatest breakthroughs in creativity and innovation can occur. This is why we have expanded our theatre production program and are intent on increasing the level of creativity and innovation and collaboration in our approach to providing arts experiences. There are now more opportunities for technical theatre and theatre design participation and training, inclusive of lighting, sound, stage management, costume and makeup, and in 2016 Lionheart - The Youth Theatre of St Marks commenced for both Primary and High School students. The Lionheart team will soon be performing beyond the campus having been invited to provide the mainstage act for the 2016 Celebrate Reading National Conference at the Fremantle Childrens Literature Centre. The Arts Faculty draws together specialist arts teachers, tutors and technicians to deliver the widest and richest range of arts experiences for our students. As arts educators we are always receptive to the ideas of our students, to new, fresh approaches. It has been my privilege to work with the arts team in 2016. Our ever expanding arts community are, in essence, the reason we are all here, so invested in the success, cohesion and satisfaction of our current and future arts staff and students.