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University Teaching and Committee Experience

Established university educator since 1998 teaching among diverse student populations with teaching experience in drawing, painting, open media, 2D & 3D design, Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, iMovie and Premiere with committee and advisory duties.

Lecture courses include Math in Art (capped at 128 students) with studio assignments. History of Architecture course with tests and essay assignment and a New York City travel study course with seminars and essay assignments. Other seminar courses include professional practice of the Honours Seminar course involving written assignments and student presentations.

Administration experience includes scheduling and introducing a series of guest lecturers for the “Art Now” course, coordinating Foundations and Minneapolis Field Trips. Currently at the School of Art, University of Manitoba with a full time status with service on various committees.

Exhibitions and Performances

Solo exhibitions/performances in gallery spaces including directing participatory and unscripted collaborative performances at the New Orleans Jazz Museum (2018, 2019 & 2021) Solo exhibitions spaces include 3rd EYE(sol) in Brooklyn (summer 2013) and at Local Project in Long Island City (summer 2012) and Plug-In Institute of Contemporary Art and Ace Art in Canada. Other performance spaces include at the Collective Unconscious in New York City and Art Klub in New Orleans. International and national group exhibitions include Florence Italy, Santiago Chile, Vermont, Chicago and New York City.

Teaching Philosophy

Central to my objectives as an instructor is the goal of expanding the student’s art lexicon as preparation for a career in the arts. As an artist I view the art profession as a complex environment often involving divergent ideas and challenges. My experience as a practitioner leads me to believe that the more knowledge and the more opportunities for problem solving made available to emerging artists or art students, the greater equipped the person is able to navigate within the arts.

In my courses students are challenged to examine and question their preconceived ideas and methods of art making. Using a wide range of aesthetic approaches and theories, my courses are structured to develop the student’s technical skills and critical awareness. Various combinations of constructive criticism and supportive comments are offered in individual discussion and group critiques, with the goal of enhancing the student’s personal sensibilities, confidence, and critical thinking. Additional components of this learning environment include sharing my dedication as a viewer and maker of art, as well as a curriculum that reflects my personal working process of balancing a sense of play with order and structure.

My professional and teaching practices parallel a broad range of influences in relation to historical and contemporary ideas that include traditional to digital media practice, transcultural thinking, and formal aesthetics and conceptual ideas. As a teacher I strive to enhance the student’s awareness and understanding in order to cultivate the broadest possible range of art practices and ideas.

As in my own research, I encourage students to be open to new or unusual ideas and aspire to versatility in their own work. I share my own interest as an artist who expands knowledge and informs his practice through a synthesis of viewing work and reading text with art making processes involving intuitive explorations, editing/experimentation, and risk-taking.

Similar to my own practice, student activities involve researching inherent languages of any given discipline with the expectation of eventually exploring interdisciplinary practices that blur discipline boundaries. Even when working in single discipline assignments, interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary research methods are always advocated.

Overall I am reflexive in my teaching style in order to meet the needs of each class. The backgrounds, interests and levels of sophistication in any given group will always influence my course content and my approach with the individual student. Ultimately I view my role as a practitioner who facilitates, broadens options, and gradually clarifies to students that one approach to art making is not more "correct" than another. In the end it is always my goal to free the expressive power of each student’s particular vision.

University Art Educator Derek Brueckner - Examples of Work by Students

Tuesday, February 21, 2017

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