By Eric Delli Bovi, Executive Director
I recently set out to DuBois Elementary where Urban Gateways is serving every student with residencies in music, visual arts, theater, and dance through the entire school year. DuBois is Chicago’s southernmost elementary school, near the Calumet River and within the Altgeld Gardens public housing project. Like many of the schools Urban Gateways serves, DuBois Elementary has limited resources to effectively implement robust arts and other educational experiences to best serve student needs. However, the arts remain a priority for the principal and we are excited to launch this new partnership.
On this day, students utilized the lessons of geometry to begin creating their own designs using numerical patterns of 4 and 8 around a single radial point, while aesthetically balancing out positive and negative space and complementary colors. This activity required a certain level of independent focus and discovery that can be challenging for many young learners, so it was great to be able to assist teaching artist James Jankowiak in guiding students through their own artistic process.
Eric donned an artist smock and helped students out with their art-making:
Check out more photos from his day at DuBois:
