Summer Apprenticeship Program 2012: Occupy Main Street

Each year Artspace brings 15 New Haven high school students into its galleries for three weeks to work as apprentices with a Master Artist. This year’s project, Occupy Main Street, will have the students collaborating with Yale School of Art alumnus Felandus Thames. Thames will guide the students through the fundamentals of silk-screening and branding. For their final installation in Artspace’s gallery, the team will rebrand themselves, their peer groups, and even the City of New Haven.

Felandus Thames is a cross-disciplinary artist engaged with questions of race, power, and identity. Born in Jackson, Mississippi, he received a B.A. in Painting and Graphic Design from Jackson State University before completing his M.F.A. in Painting/Printmaking at the Yale University School of Art in 2010. Thames has participated in a residency at the Smith Robertson Museum and Cultural Center in Jackson and has shown in solo and group exhibitions throughout the United States. He currently works in Harlem, New York, and is represented by the Tilton Gallery.

View the exhibition brochure here.