In honor of International Museum Day this Friday May 18, the Philadelphia Museum of Art will offer free admission all day! Free admission will also be extended to the Museum-administered Park Houses: Cedar Grove and Mount Pleasant.

This day is an annual occasion to raise awareness on how important museums are in the development of society.  Organized via the International Council of Museums, which is unique network of about 30,000 members and museum professionals who represent the global museum community.

The Association of Teaching Artists (ATA) is declaring  this week, National Teaching Artist Appreciation Week, a week to pay tribute to Teaching Artists, to honor local Teaching Artists and acknowledge the crucial role Teaching Artists play in making sure every student receives a quality education.

Let us celebrate + we would love to hear from you with a Teaching Artist story!

White Mountain National Forest & Arts Alliance of Northern NH Applications for 2012 WMNF Artist-in-Residence Program

Artists in all media are invited to apply for the 2012 White Mountain National Forest (WMNF) Artist-in-Residence program, a collaboration between the WMNF and the Arts Alliance of Northern New Hampshire. The program seeks to highlight the ways the arts can be used to explore and interpret the forest environment and forest-related issues.

The residency offers professional and emerging artists from around the country (visual and performing artists, craftspeople, writers, composers and choreographers, eco artists and media artists) an opportunity to pursue their particular art form while being inspired by the surrounding forest and, on several occasions, sharing their work and their artistic process with members of the public.

Leading technology firm offers two $2,500 scholarships for adult students

Destiny Solutions, the leading innovator of lifelong learning business solutions, announced that applications are being accepted for the annual Mary Cone Barrie Scholarship.

Named in honor of the late Director of the School of Continuing Studies at the University of Toronto, Dr. Mary Cone Barrie, the scholarship is awarded annually to two non-traditional students.

“A trusted friend and mentor, Mary tirelessly championed the lifelong learner and always supported non-traditional education. Devoted to her students, staff and instructors she went above and beyond to ensure the success of non-traditional education,” said Shaul Kuper, president and CEO of Destiny Solutions. “It is our hope that by helping students succeed with the Mary Cone Barrie Scholarship, her legacy is carried forward.”

The students in Rosi Dispensa‘s spring 2012 Photo I course have agreed to share the websites they built as part of the requirements of a documentary photography final course assignment.

The process involved the creation of Photoshop mock-ups to be used as guides. The students understand the importance of having a solid idea of what the design “should” look like before starting on the coding and how it can be a great help. It is important to remember that a website is not an image. A finished website is a flexible, moving thing, built with HTML or CSS. Photoshop gives us (and the client) an “expectation” of how a website will look – but not how it will behave. The students were also challenged to thinking about how their design would translate into code all the way through the design process - never forgetting- for a good designer, content drives design!

May 4, 2012

Terra Hall, 17th fl.

Community Engagement Photography is a UArts undergraduate class that fuses together elements of photography, community arts and art education.  The course is firmly rooted in principles of collaboration and reciprocal learning in order to prepare students for a ten week partnership between UArts photographers and photographers ages 5-12 from Goodlands, a Latino non-profit organization in North Philadelphia.

Opening reception: May 4, 4:30 – 7 p.m.

Terra Hall

211 South Broad Street

Enjoy the Fairmount Arts Crawl this Sunday from 2 – 6 pm in the lovely Fairmount neighborhood.

The Fairmount Arts Crawl is an annual event that attracts over 4,000 residents, visitors and art lovers alike to the Fairmount neighborhood.

Come and stroll down the avenue visiting over 45 different businesses-turned-art-venues housing over 70 installations. Along the way enjoy music, dancing, kids activities, live demonstrations and so much more!

The Fairmount Arts Crawl is an annual event sponsored by the Fairmount Community Development Corporation that transforms over 45 local businesses into art galleries for the day. The free event hosts over 70 artists and is open to the public.

In conjunction with the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s current exhibition, Van Gogh Up Close (on view through May 6), a panel of contemporary artists will discuss the significance and influence of Vincent Van Gogh’s work on living artists at a special lecture held at the museum this Friday evening, April 27.

Featured panelists include Zoe Strauss (whose photography exhibition, Zoe Strauss: Ten Years, just closed at the PMA), as well as local artist Emily Brown and Hiro Sagakuchi, a local artist and educator who also serves as the Museum’s art handler.

Be Honored by Leaders in the Photographic Community … And Win the Workshop of Your Choice!

The portrait. Environmental, studio, candid or posed. Self or pet, color, black-and-white, alternative process or iPhone. No matter what the genre, there’s a power in a well-captured portrait, a sense of breath and life. A portrait can comfort us, unnerve us, cause us to smile, or move us to tears. Whatever the emotional response, portraits possess the capacity to connect us all through shared encounters.