With her signature dangly earrings and lively personality, the new addition to the Monte Vista art department is hard to miss. A transfer from Ascend School in Oakland, Mrs. Gardner recently joined the Monte Vista staff as a new Ceramics 1 teacher.
“The campus is really big and beautiful, [and] everyone is incredibly friendly. [The] students are bright and excited for all things,” Gardner said. “I’m just really excited to be here.”
Gardner’s artistic experience encompasses work in animation, app development with Google, studio work, gallery exhibitions, and, of course, ceramics. So despite being a fresh face on campus, she’s no rookie in the art classroom.
“I’ve been teaching art, all things art, for about 25 years,” Gardner said. “[Specifically] ceramics, probably around 10 years give or take.”
She hopes to bring her long-held passion for the arts to her new Ceramics class. Gardner describes her teaching style as very student-centered, inspired by her deep love for the craft. In her classroom, students have the freedom to choose their own details and designs for projects, so the products are unique to their individual artistic expressions. Through her teaching, she is committed to giving students a space to find their voices. Her goal for her class is simple: to help students foster an appreciation for the process and experience of clay.
“[I hope my students find] a joy of all things art, and a joy of trying new things,” she said. “I want them to learn that failure is part of the process and it’s totally fine to fail.”
This mindset, centered around a willingness to explore, is a core value to Gardner as a ceramist and artist. She often uses elements like embedded glass and metal in her personal work, breaking various traditional “rules” of ceramics. This experimental mentality is something she hopes to impart on her students.
“We talk about it in class as the Golden Rules of ceramics,” she said. “I really like to break them, because you don’t know the limits until you’ve actually tried it.”
She highly encourages all students to take the Ceramics class at some point during high school.
“I’d like to see everyone cycle through my class at some point in the future,” she said. “Try it, you’ll like it!”
