Featured photo: Credits:
Mark Steven Greenfield, “Patron Saint of Middle Passengers,” 2000,
Mixed Media. © Courtesy of Mark Steven Greenfield
Mark Steven Greenfield (b. 1951)
Mixed media on paper, 91.44 x 60.02 cm (36 x 23.63 in.)
Mott-Warsh Collection, Flint, Michigan
Courtesy of Mark Steven Greenfield
Written by Tanya Terry
Two forms of arts were merged-visual arts and literary arts-in order for fifth and sixth grade students from Freeman Elementary to create beautiful collaborative pieces, which they recently shared with the community.
“Pairing the study of visual arts with poetry writing through Poetry Paints was an inspirational idea conceived by Flint’s Poet Laureate Semaj Brown,” said Anna Johnson, principal of Freeman.
The Poets Laureate Fellows by the Academy of American Poets fellowship, through which Semaj Brown, Flint’s inaugural poet laureate, was named one of 23 poetry fellows, will soon come to an end. The fellowship was made possible with funds from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
“Poetry Paints: Ekphrastic Writing,” Brown’s collaboration with Flint’s Mott-Warsh Collection and the students of Freeman Elementary, was one of Brown’s many P3 projects and recently came to fruition. Ekphrastic writing is commentary on a work or works of visual art.
For the project, Brown helped the fifth and sixth-grade students to create the collaborative poems based on pieces in the Mott-Warsh Collection. The collection is a private one of fine art created by artists of the African diaspora and others who reflect on it. Stephanie James acts as director, curator, & collection educator for the Mott-Warsh Collection. Mott-Warsh Collection Gallery Assistant and Programs Coordinator Janice McCoy provided students with contextual background for each selected work of art and skillfully helped guide the students through exercises of exploration and discovery.
In session two, for example, the students were told a synonym is a word or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word or phrase in the same language. A worksheet they were given showed close to be a synonym of shut. They were asked to list some additional examples of synonyms.
They focused on the artwork titled “Patron Saint of Middle Passage.” In doing so, they were asked to use their imaginations to answer the questions about the woman depicted in the artwork: What is her title before capture?, What did she do?, and What was her purpose? They were asked what her name was, if she was able to move and what her movements looked like. In addition, they were asked to imagine what she smelled like, what she looked like and what she said.
The students, who call themselves the Freeman poets, were given the definition of a metaphor as a figure of speech in which a word or phrase is applied to an object or action to which it is not literally applicable.
Brown, working closely with Johnson, asked the students to give examples of metaphors.
This is the poem the Freeman Poets were able to create:
Freeman Poets respond to artwork by Mark Steven Greenfield, “Patron Saint of Middle Passengers”
Poem Title: Dear “Patron Saint of Middle Passengers”: A Collaborative Poem
She was a pretty melanin girl from a village.
Her name is Glory.
She moves like a human.
She moves like a princess.
She smells like a cloud.
Her name is Aurora.
She smells like a powerful flower.
When she speaks, she has kind things to say,
she says, “Hi Kiddo.”
She smells like royalty, a halo with a golden touch
Crown of light and glory
God of Glory.
The Zeta Foundation-Flint, in alliance with chapter Zeta Beta Zeta of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc. presented the Freeman Poets writing implements, books from Brown’s Poet Laureate Library, Mott-Warsh-related materials and a certificate of completion.
The Zoom presentation in which some of the Freeman poets recited their poetry and some of the community partners offered background and words of gratitude was recently broadcasted, with technical support from Librarian Rebbeca Robertson.
Brown’s community partners for the poetry fellowship included The Zeta Foundation of Flint and her collaborators: Mott-Warsh Collection, Freeman Elementary, Peoples Church of Flint, The Ron Allen Project, The “New” McCree Theatre, Flint Institute of Arts, The Flint Courier News and the Flint Chapter Pierians Inc.
Johnson thanked Brown and everyone who made “Poetry Paints: Ekphrastic Writing” possible.
“We know that our educational system is always necessarily focused on all that we need,” Johnson said. “Sometimes we are working on the bare minimum, but when we have an opportunity to give something else to our students that allows them to be what they dream about being…I often tell our families we want our students to be able to compete not only within the city and the state, but within our nation and internationally. When we’re able to provide opportunities for student to grow and to show who they are, than we’re preparing them for the real world.”
