2015 News

2015 Anchin Art Exhibition

Our Common Thread: Art and Education United

The USF College of Education David C. Anchin Center is presenting the art exhibition Our Common Thread: Art and Education United, in TECO Hall from Monday, Oct. 5 to Friday, Oct. 9. The art is presented by the Anchin family, VSA Florida, Hillsborough County Students, FCIT/Tampa Theater, and the USF Preschool for Creative Learning. The arts have an incredible power to stimulate creativity, provoke thought, and drive inquiry. Join us to celebrate the impact of art in education.

"We are so excited that Isabel Anchin Becker has agreed to share her own work with the USF and Greater Tampa Bay Area community," said Diane Yendol-Hoppey Ph.D., College of Education Professor and Director of the David C. Anchin Center. "We are equally thrilled that through her generosity she has provided an opportunity for this event to celebrate the art of PK-12 students."

For most students, artistic pursuits enable them to express understandings and feelings in ways that promote both intellectual and social-emotional growth. At the P-12 level, arts integration entails curricula and instruction that infuse content and skills from the arts into other core subjects. A curriculum rich with arts integration promotes academically rigorous study, cultivates critical thinking and visual skills, develops multiple intelligences, and helps students become 21st century citizens ready to be leaders and innovators in our global society.

The exhibit is showcasing works from the following artists:

• Isabel Anchin Becker
• K-12 Students from Hillsborough County Public Schools
• USF Preschool for Creative Learning/ 3 and 4-year-old classrooms
• FCIT / Tampa Theatre Film Camp: Student Films
• VSA Florida and VSA arts of Nigeria present My Home, Our World

"Given the context of education today, the arts sometimes appear to take a back seat to other curriculum areas," said Yendol-Hoppey. "This exhibit highlights how the arts have continued to be essential to student learning within our partnership districts and schools as well as other community agencies that support arts integration."

Artist Statement: Isabel Anchin Becker was exposed to life in a household where the arts were important, as her mother Anne Anchin was an accomplished artist. Isabel learned at an early age about painting, sewing, and appreciating the artistic world around her. She experienced the joys of working with silver, of quilting and sewing clothing, and of marriage and raising a family of four sons. After thirty years as a realtor, she turned to being a fabric artist and watercolorist.

She is now enjoying life in Sarasota, Florida where she creates pictures that from cutting fabrics, designing pictures, and sewing them on the machine. The end result becomes a framed work of fabric art. More recently she photographs and prints onto fabric which result in becoming the fabric for her pictures. Her inspiration comes from life around her, travels, and some vague ideas that develop. Hence, the vast variety of subjects that form her collection: Fabric Play Arts.

Isabel is a member of the Fien Arts Society of Sarasota, the Art Center, the Art and Cultural Alliance of Sarasota and the Venice Art Center, all places where she also exhibits her art. Isabel has also established the annual art exhibit for residents of The Landings in Sarasota and teaches watercolor at the Kobernick-Anchin assisted living facility in Sarasota.
For more information about Isabel or for purchasing her art please visit: www.isabelbecker.com.