JUDICIARY AND THE ARTS

Principal: Joaquin Vega
Teacher: Rachel Levine

Project Title: NATURALIZATION PROCESS

Principal: Amanda Bueno
Teacher: Gordon Baldwin

Project Title: PATHWAYS TO CITIZENSHIP

Principal: Bernadette Drysdale
Teacher: Gloria Adams

Project Title: ARCHITECTURAL ELEMENTS FOR A FUTURE COURTHOUSE

Principal: Bernadette Drysdale
Teacher: Chris Curti

Project Title: VARA & NATURALIZATION

Principal: Gideon Finkel
Teacher: Laura Blau

Project Title: EXPLORING THE VISUAL RIGHTS  ACT, COURTHOUSE DESIGN AND THE PATHWAY TO CITIZENSHIP

Principal: Maximillian Re-Sugiura
Teacher: Matt Lassen

Project Title: PATHWAYS TO CITIZENSHIP

Principal: Maximillian Re-Sugiura
Teachers: Andrew Bencsko & Chris Spaterella

Project Title: CELEBRATING THE VISUAL ARTISTS RIGHTS ACT (VARA) OF 1990

Principal: Peter McHugh
Teacher: Adam Gordon

Project Title: OUR STORIES, OUR JOURNEYS

Principal: David A. Cugini
Teacher: Michael Young

Project Title: DESIGNING THE JUDICIARY

Principal: Joaquin Vega
Teacher: Rachel Levine

Project Title: PLAGIARISM VERSUS INSPIRATION: LEGALLY PUSHING THE BOUNDARIES OF CREATIVITY

Students learned about three court cases and acted as the jury and judge to determine whether the client in the case they were learning about was guilty or not guilty of plagiarism as per the “fair use” in copyright law guidelines. The students were introduced to different ways artists throughout history inspired each other’s work and influenced each other’s creative process. The students then chose a piece by an artist who inspired them and created their own works which would be considered a “fair use” alteration of the work inspired by their chosen artist and piece.

Principal: Enrique Garcia
Teacher: Laura Ricca

Project Title: COURTROOMS OF THE FUTURE

For this project students designed a courtroom that would represent the feel and the mood that they would like to see happen in a courtroom. The students wanted to emphasize peace, tranquility, harmony and a safe feeling in their courtroom. They did this by incorporating their culture, home and what they feel the future would want to feel when entering a courtroom.

Principal: Burnedette Drysdale
Teacher: Chris Curti

Project Title: TWO-POINT PERSPECTIVE COURTHOUSES OF THE FUTURE

Using two-point perspective, students have designed various images focusing on the facade of a courthouse of the future.

Principal: Burnedette Drysdale
Teacher: Gloria Adams

Project Title: GREEN COURTHOUSES OF THE FUTURE

Inspired by futuristic and historic architecture and with a resolve to create green infrastructure, CCMA students created models of sustainable courthouses of the future.

Principal: Gideon Frankel
Teacher: Laura Blau

Project Title: INDIVIDUALLY SELECTED PROMPTS

Students at FSSA had the option to choose their own prompt from the four possibilities. Some chose to focus on “Fair Use” cases while some explored the naturalization process and were inspired by personal and family stories of gaining citizenship. Some who are interested in design or architecture chose to explore the Courtroom of the Future. Some students sign for the Jury Duty ad prompt.

Principal: Maximillian Re-Sugiura
Teachers: Madhulika Singh and Gerald Rabel

Project Title: FUTURISTIC COURTHOUSE DESIGN

With this project, six groups of 4 were tasked to create a courthouse that broke away from common belief. The students were entrusted with the creative expertise to reinvent such a stern structure bound to tradition. The term “futuristic” is not bound to the neo-futuristic sci-fi aesthetic it is usually associated with, futuristic is a much broader term as we don’t know what the future holds. Each person has a different vision of the future, and groups have combined these ideas to construct clever complex courthouses that retain the fundamental principles that the court must respect. Students showcased their hand drawn concepts and process diagrams along with their technical skills in AutoCad and model making to illustrate their final design.

Principal: Maximillian Re-Sugiura
Teachers: Matt Lassen

Project Title: BEATRICE GOES TO COURT: THE PURPOSE OF JURY SERVICE ZINE

Students worked in a group to make a collective black and white zine to show the steps and benefits of jury service. They researched and wrote their narratives while creating full page and spot illustrations to accompany their text. Their work is completed traditionally and digitally using pen and ink and screen tones. The zine was laid out in Adobe Photoshop and printed in the High School of Art and Design copy room. Each zine is folded and bound painstakingly by the group.

Principal: Maximillian Re-Sugiura
Teachers: Matt Lassen

Project Title: NATURALIZATION CEREMONY COURTROOM MURALS

Kailei Leo-Farol created a three-part courthouse mural based on the naturalization process and ceremony. Kailei worked in oil paint on Masonite boards measuring 4 feet wide by 3 feet tall. The mural is inspired by their family members’ journey to citizenship. Actual photos from Kailei’s family were used to reference one of the panels. Kailei hopes the paint is dry.

Principal: Maximillian Re-Sugiura
Teachers: Matt Lassen

Project Title: FAIR USE CASES COMIC PAGES

Students reviewed each fair use case and worked in groups to research their case. They broke the case into parts and wrote narratives for their individual comics based on their research. Each group worked on a unified color or rendering scheme based on unique aspects of their case. Everyone worked to tell their narrative visually and sequentially through their own comic page. Everyone’s comic page came together to tell the whole story of the case. Students worked traditionally in pen and ink, ink wash and digitally with grey tones and fully rendered in color. Each comic is printed and lettered in Adobe Photoshop.

Principal: Peter McHugh
Teachers: Adam Gordon

Project Title: PATHWAYS

Students created mural designs about the naturalization process for a courthouse. Through personal interviews with people who have gone through the naturalization process, students learned about the different steps of becoming a citizen of the United States. The murals reflect both the different parts of naturalization as well as individual stories from the people students interviewed.

Principal: Herman Guy
Teachers: Hannah Arroyo Rivera

Project Title: MURALS ABOUT US

Students were challenged to represent their personalities, emotions, and cultures to create a mural design that could be seen in a courtroom. Students first looked towards the collaborative artists who created the murals at the Milwaukee County Courthouse as their main source of inspiration. Students took inspiration from the bright vivid colors from Nayfa Naji’s mural expressing her Arabic culture and equality as well as LUNA exploring Lady Justice through butterflies and nature to increase Latinx artist representation. Other students were driven to create art with the theme of inner peace and beauty inspired by Black Paint Studios and others wanted to showcase taking care of our Earth when viewing the mural of Scott Hill. Each student took a unique approach to playing around with imagery, symbolism, and art materials as a collaborative effort to celebrate their individuality. A wide variety of mediums were available for students to use- pencils, pens, markers, colored pencils, pastels, watercolor paint, acrylic paint markers and collage. From creating sketches to looking at reference photos, each student created drawings, paintings and collages surrounding our topics: freedom, love, peace, and our individual cultures living here in the Bronx.

Principal: Ebony Russell
Teachers: Amie Robinson, Sarah McDowell, and Katherine Marte

Project Title: WELCOME TO AMERICA!

Welcome to America! was inspired by the students’ experience attending a naturalization ceremony. Artists designed public works of art, both murals and mosaic floor designs, to make new citizens and their families feel welcomed at the courthouse. The designs are also informed by each artist’s own unique family story and heritage.

Principal: David Cugini
Teachers: Michael Young

Project Title: PATHWAY TO CITIZENSHIP

This year, our students decided to create courthouse murals featuring the pathway to citizenship. We attended a naturalization ceremony at the Moynihan Courthouse in April, where we witnessed 163 people from 51 countries receive their United States citizenship. Afterwards, we spoke to the judge who presided over the ceremony about his life experiences and career. Students drew upon their independent research and this field trip to help inspire their original artwork.

Principal: Brian Cordon
Teacher: Melissa Nakos

Project Title: UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL, OUR STORIES OF NATURALIZATION

Students attended a naturalization ceremony in March 2024. Challenged with the idea of creating a composition that embodied this ceremony, they interviewed people close to them that have gone through or were currently going through the process. The focus was to find a word that represented their experience. Using a light source, students experimented light painting these words with long shutter speeds on digital cameras. With their skills in Adobe Photoshop, they digitally created compositions that layered photographs, light painted words and other imagery. Overall, the students collectively felt that the naturalization process was not just about obtaining American citizenship but was also about the emotions and the experiences that came with the process.