Sketchbook Toledo takes art to the masses

Samoria Russell, a sixth grader at Toledo School of the Arts, draws in a sketch book as fellow sixth graders Imani Allen, back left, and Emma Omlor wait their turn.

The Blade/Andy Morrison
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Samoria Russell, a sixth grader at Toledo School of the Arts, draws in a sketch book as fellow sixth graders Imani Allen, back left, and Emma Omlor wait their turn.

The assignment: make art that spurs conversation in the community and adds spice to the city.

The result: an irresistible invitation.

As soon as the higgledy-piggledy constructions were installed, curious passersby began opening the little doors, removing sketch books and colored pencils, and getting creative.

Indeed, even before students in the Installation and Performance Art class at the University of Toledo finished securing one of their six “sketchboxes” at Wildwood Preserve Metropark on Tuesday, children started doodling in the books. The same thing happened the week before at Toledo School for the Arts where a trio of sixth-grade girls passed the book from one to the other while the UT students posed for photos by art professor Barbara Miner.

For the 15 young adults in Ms. Miner’s class, the project was both unexpected and intriguing.

“We didn’t think that anything was going to get this huge. We had planned on doing individual projects and then this got proposed,” said Carl Krumroy, 24, a senior specializing in wood sculpture.

After all, this was art by committee and “people generally don’t like to work in groups unless the river’s rising and there’s sandbags to pass,” noted Ms. Miner. “But I’m pretty astonished at the synergy that’s taken place.”

Designed by Mr. Krumroy, the skinny four-foot-tall plywood structures have four chambers stacked off-kilter from the one below. Each compartment has a Plexiglas door, and on one is etched instructions and an invitation to a 3 to 5 p.m. April 25 reception in UT’s Carlson Library where students and those who drew, reflected, or commented can meet and celebrate the engaging agency of art.

“The social aspect of it becomes a piece of art itself in which people are able to manifest their ideas,” said George Figueroa, 21. It is a demonstration of creativity’s capacity that it can be triggered along a wooded path or on a downtown sidewalk.

Sketchbox Toledo is activist art meant to live and play outside the thick walls of traditional museums.

Students named the project, designed a logo and Facebook page, printed temporary tattoos (located in the top chamber), and wrote promotional materials. They sawed, drilled, and glued; laser-etched and rubbed ink into instruction on the doors, and hauled boxes to six installation sites. Armed with replacement materials, they check boxes weekly to ensure all is intact. April 21, they’ll collect boxes, review the books, and archive pages.

“We fed off each other to make it what it is,” said Kelsey Telquist, 22, who set up the Facebook page. “Anything to get out of the classroom and get other people involved was a great opportunity.”

Socially engaged art is focused more on process (often collaborative) than product, said Nathan Mattimoe, coordinator of art in public places at The Arts Commission.

“It’s intended to nourish and may have a positive impact on people, especially people who don’t think of themselves as artists. And it breaks down the walls between artist and audience,” said Mr. Mattimoe.

It tells a slice of Toledo’s story. And because such projects are usually inexpensive, they’re often done by young artists whose work doesn’t command a hefty price.

Students learned about projects such as the Little Free Library, for which people build an attractive small box with a door, mount it on a post, and fill it with books for giveaway. In the five years since a Wisconsin man mounted one in memory of his mother, an estimated 15,000 Little Free Libraries exist around the world.

In the last few years, artists have covered 19th-century walls with color-screaming murals in South Toledo and Uptown, and yarn bombers have quietly affixed their subtle handiwork to fences, trees and street signs.

Barbara Miner, professor of art at the University of Toledo, and art majors Carl Krumroy and Shalissa Bailey, install a sketch box.

Sketchbox shares the spirit of the innovative You Are Here project of 2012 in which 100 three-foot-diameter circles (dots) were glued to sidewalks at 100 interesting locations around town. Nearly 100 people designed dots that reflected the locale’s importance.

Each dot contained a QR code from which smart-phone users could learn more about the artist and the history of the site. Aimed to give pedestrians a closer look at their city, it was a collaboration between the American Institute of Graphic Artists, Toledo Chapter and The Arts Commission.

The class also discussed whether or not to get permission to install the boxes or go guerrilla. But most significantly, they talked about right and wrong.

“This is the first time I asked them about the morality of art and their responsibility for the dialog in the public domain, which is different than when art is in a gallery,” said Ms. Miner, who has taught the course many times. It was a topic she’d been mulling herself.

When they considered putting Sketchboxes in a cancer hospital and at a homeless shelter, the conversation turned to whether they’d be using vulnerable people to obtain dramatic results as well as to how people at those locations would perceived the project.

“We needed to know how it would be interpreted. We did not want to be offensive,” said Ms. Miner.

Students are recording their roles in and thoughts about the project on a professional e-portfolio. And, they’ve agreed to build and stock another four boxes to be placed indefinitely in libraries near high schools by the Toledo-Lucas County Public Library.

Contact Tahree Lane at: tlane@theblade.com or 419-724-6075.