"Arts learning cultivates inclusive, dynamic literacies by creating multiple access points for learners to both share their stories and perspectives, and engage in ways that are responsive to their needs and preferences." - Arts Education Partnership

Arts & Literacy truly come to life for BRAC’s 2024 Cultural Immigrant Initiative at the Kingsbridge Heights Community Center in Council Member Eric Dinowitz’s District Council #11. Continuing a collaboration started in 2023, Printmaking BRIO Award winning artist Tammy Wofsey will once again collaborate with ESOL teacher LIs Chirinos and her advanced students to expand their studies of English for speakers of other languages through Storytelling and the Book Arts. Tammy will build upon last year’s programming, where she successfully ran an intergenerational series of Printmaking workshops on Saturdays with a group of 17-20 adult ESOL students, ranging in ages from mid-20’s to older adults. They produced mono prints made with her mini mobile printing press. The majority of the class was from DR and Mexico with a few from Honduras, Peru and a woman from Turkey. This year’s group is once again predominantly from a range of LatinX countries.

For 2024 Tammy will continue to align her Printmaking program with the class curriculum focusing on the themes of Daily Living, Free Time, Health and Body Parts. The first project will be to produce an Acrostic poem using single letter stamps exploring the theme of Daily Living visually through the lens of how they relate to their individual cultures and personal experiences. She will then show the class how to use her mobile printing press or washer press, to produce monotypes with shapes from cut outs, leaves and flowers to produce silhouettes that illustrate visual aids to further assist the students in expressing the images in English words. Their next series of projects will focus on creating children’s books in the form of an accordion fold book, where they will combine text and imagery to express the children's stories they write. The wonderful thing about Fold Books is that they can be stood up and read on both sides when on exhibit. Their final project will once again utilize monotype printing, focusing this time on the Garden, with both new vocabulary in conjunction with their individually produced imagery.

Tammy will start her program at Kingsbridge Heights Community Center on April 6th with the ESOL students, and meet with them for a total of eight 2-hour sessions on Saturdays from 2:30 to 4:30, culminating in a final exhibition during their graduation ceremony and celebration on June 8, 2024. Tammy will also take part in the Kingsbridge Heights Community Center’s Annual Neighborhood Festival, where she will set up a table with her mobile press for three hours to introduce attendees to the basics of printmaking. Further expanding participation in this CII program from 20 direct attendees to 40, and over 100 indirect participants.

After graduation, members of the class will be invited later in June to come with their families, teacher Lis Chirinos and Administrative Director Carlos to hone their printmaking skills in BRAC’s state-of-the-art facility, where they will see their artwork prominently displayed in BRAC’s gallery as part of our Final Spring Student Exhibition.