AMARD&V was founded 27 years ago by Mariam Merced and Isabel Nazario, with a shared vision of organizing arts and health-related projects for the children of New Brunswick. The artistic director of the project, AMAARD&V, Claudio Mir, is the advanced project coordinator of community outreach at the Community Engagement Center and the co-director of the Rutgers Bonner Leader Program, responsible for the daily operation of the project and the coordination of training courses. Mr. Mir holds an MFA in creative writing from Rutgers Newark, a BFA in visual arts from Mason Gross, and a BFA in acting from the National School of Theater in the Fine Arts Palace of Santo Domingo, D.R. In the following interview, Mr. Mir shared his understanding and experience of Mr. Liu Shiming's art based on this summer camp activity.
Why does the program choose Liu Shiming’s sculpture exhibition as a learning venue for the workshop? Please explain the rationale behind organizing the workshop at this exhibition.
Claudio Mir: Yes, we have a working relationship with Mason Gross, with Cassandra Oliveras-Moreno, and we were searching for places to take the kids to like the Zimmerli Museum here at Rutgers. Actually, this building is a historical space. This was the social service agency.
So I think that the university and the city have a moral duty to invite people into spaces like this, that are free, that don't cost the families anything. So one of the objectives with Cassandra is to familiarize the kids with this space and maybe they'll come with their families and they'll see a show by a Chinese artist. For them, China is on TV for whatever political reasons of the United States and China but for them now it is closer. They see this artist who had a grandchild and he depicted the grandchild as an older man, as a wish for this grandchild to have a long life.
So I always say that we are wired or we tend to do stuff because of our references like where do we place ourselves in the world right? Now I think they're closer to China, closer to a Chinese artist and they will go by and they'll remember this even if they sat and you think they were not paying attention but something is there. We planted a seed, so now life is not only the people they know from school or the people that come to visit their parents. You know, it's also that there's an artist in China.
There's all this work that I was able to see. You know, it somehow stays there. So that's what we want. The arts can do that. It did it for me from a very poor neighborhood in the Dominican Republic. And it was my connection to my way out. So we try to provide opportunities like that for them. And this exhibit was perfect for that purpose.
Do you think the cultural appreciation and awareness is the unique aspect of this art exhibition?
Claudio Mir: I think that the idea of seeing someone else from a different culture, from a very distant place that has a grandchild, that has family. They saw and they heard the story of the Chinese Cultural Revolution and how he went through all those problems. And he still was able to make art. I think that creates connections that we don't know how far they would go, but it definitely creates maybe some sort of impact because this population, these kids come also from very traumatic experiences of migrating in whatever conditions they have had to come to the United States or their families in that, you know, trauma travels from one generation to the other. So I'm sure that they can relate to the experience of Liu.
How does Liu Shiming’s sculpture exhibition contribute to empowering youth in developing life skills and abilities through a multidisciplinary arts education and health mentoring program?
Claudio Mir: In our program we have through the years created five or six different studios. So this year we have photography, we have music production. We also have dance and we also have performance art. So for them that are not painting or drawing this year, they could definitely relate and see other aspects. Like you could make stuff with your hands with clay, right? Like you have an idea in our program and then make something out of it. And they can see that in the artist.
So I hope that this group also is doing the same thing, that they can try their hand in something that they maybe just brush up on. They'll know that it takes a lot of work and a lot of concentration in that. That's also what we're looking for, that through art making and seeing art and being exposed to art, the work of other artists. They'll see that you get an idea and what happens when you try to make what you thought of like this space between thinking, conceptualizing something and making it that bridge is what teaches humans. You may end up with something that is not exactly what you thought, but in doing it, that process is what brings you all the joy, all the knowledge that in solving issues, solving problems that you can use in your daily life, in public schools or in your career, whatever that is or whatever you decide to do.
So that's where we are. That's what we want. We want to provide experiences that they don't see, that they don't get to experience in their daily lives, in their families or in public schools.
How does the program leverage the experience of Liu Shiming’s sculpture exhibitions to create a holistic and enriching learning environment for the students?
Claudio Mir: I think that this experience will be one of the things that they'll remember as part of their summer of 2023. I don't know if I said this, but I always say it about these kids that they only know their relationship with the school. That's their world. And with experiences like this, then the world, their world grows. I mean, they said, like I said before, China is a concept like an abstract concept, that becomes is real. Like all this sculpture brings a human experience, which is what we're trying to do with them, like to be able to be just like the artist who is able to reflect on his life. And they'll see it's not as easy as they thought, just a little finger.
What do you hope students gain from the experience of this exhibition? How do you think this collaboration adds value to the students' learning experience?
Claudio Mir: I hope that they would find this space welcoming, familiar to them, that they could just think of this space as another space where they could go and spend time with their families and it won't cost them anything. And that they'll find shows as beautiful as this one where they can also find themselves and recognize the humanities and strive for something, work, work for whatever they want to achieve in life. So if they come on their own in the future, I think that would be more than enough for us, definitely.
Were there any sculptures that you like personally that conveyed a powerful message or evoked strong emotions for you?
Claudio Mir: There's a sculpture there of a giant pushing these mountains, and I was trying … I graduated from this school with my BFA in 1999, and I had a chance to do bronze sculptures it’s called the lost wax method where you sculpt in wax, and then cover with the sand and silica until you create a shell around this sculpture … so I was trying to figure it out and ask “this is not lost wax is it? This is really big!” So I was just trying to figure out how much work there was in that sculpture. Specifically, when you can see the knife, the working of the artist, the roughness, the texture of that. I really love that sculpture for the quality of the manufacture. It's not a beautiful thing like how we know beauty now, but the work, the hours in it, or the capacity to have all those things like the body weight on one leg, the dynamism of the opening, the pushing through mountains, is beautiful. And also the smaller stuff, the skill of an artist like Liu. He's very precise. I can see this depiction of the child doing all sorts of things, his grandchild. His skills are amazing, a master!
Beautiful. Beautiful. Because it's also very metaphorical -- pushing to let the water flow, the knowledge, the life giving water by reaching other communities. Also, I think that's beautiful and it's like a Hercules, kind of like a mythical or mythological figure we see, but with that roughness , you can feel the presence of the artist when you see it. When the surfaces are so soft you may think maybe a machine did this. But here you see the hand, the human hand at work.
Interview Text Edited by CAFA ART INFO
Thanks to the organizer for the interview and relevant information