Use themes and big ideas driven by essential questions to frame your investigation. Integrating contemporary art and themes into teaching requires a shift from predominantly technique-driven ...

Abigail DeVille was born in 1981 in New York, where she lives and works. Maintaining a long-standing interest in marginalized people and places, DeVille creates site-specific immersive installations ...

Nick Cave was born in Fulton, Missouri in 1959. He creates “Soundsuits”—surreally majestic objects blending fashion and sculpture—that originated as metaphorical suits of armor in response to the ...

John Baldessari was born in National City, California, in 1931. He received a BA (1953) and MA (1957) from San Diego State College, continuing his studies at Otis Art Institute (1957–59) and Chouinard ...

David Brooks was born in 1975 in Brazil, Indiana, and lives and works in New York. Brooks’ work is driven by his interest in the ways in which humans interact with natural and built environments. His ...

Catherine Opie was born in Sandusky, Ohio in 1961. Opie investigates the ways in which photographs both document and give voice to social phenomena in America today, registering people’s attitudes and ...

Lucas Blalock was born in Asheville, North Carolina, in 1978 and now lives and works in New York. Citing the poet and playwright Bertolt Brecht’s insistence on a theater that reveals its labor, ...

Kerry James Marshall was born in 1955 in Birmingham, Alabama, and currently lives and works in Chicago, Illinois. The artist was educated at Otis Art Institute, where he received a BFA in 1978 and an ...

Mark Bradford was born in Los Angeles, California, in 1961. He received a BFA (1995) and MFA (1997) from the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia. Bradford transforms materials scavenged from ...

William Kentridge was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 1955. He attended the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg (1973–76), Johannesburg Art Foundation (1976–78), and studied mime and ...

Brian Jungen was born in Fort St. John, British Columbia, Canada in 1970. He draws from his family’s ranching and hunting background, as well as his Dane-zaa heritage, when disassembling and ...

Carrie Mae Weems was born in Portland, Oregon, in 1953. Weems earned a BFA from the California Institute of the Arts, Valencia (1981), and an MFA from the University of California, San Diego (1984), ...