Listen: In our transition from a week on Art and Creativity to Employment, Artworks for Milwaukee acts as a natural stepping stone. They hire teen apprentices, who may or may not have had experience in the arts, to work on a creative project that’s eventually shown to the public. As I toured their space, seeing the teens engaged in creating mosaics and writing poetry got me a tinge jealous, making me wish I could have a summer opportunity like Artworks.
That being said, being employed to produce creative output, especially in a group setting, has its own set of unique challenges. There are so many opportunities for personal frustration and disagreement that can totally derail the project. And since Artworks is at its core a program that teaches employability skills, walking the apprentices through these processes is an important part of their work. In this piece, listen as Helen faces a road block and turns it into a learning experience: see podcast below.
Want to see the invitation in question? Here it is!
To learn more about Artworks, check out their website. You can also follow the mosaic apprentices all summer on their blog, or by following their Flickr account. Finally, you can see these talented young artists in action at their unveiling event, The Upside of Art: A Community Event!, which will be held at Artworks (706 S. 5th Street) on August 21st from 1-4pm.
Produced by: Adam Carr