Transcript
What inspires you from WFSU Public Media? Here's this week's Voices That Inspire. My name is Marilyn Proctor-Givens and I have been teaching art and design at Lincoln High School for the last 35 years. It all started, believe it or not, in high school. Before high school, I would say parents. Your parents tap into what you are good at when you're a child. They saw at a young age that was in the art. And then high school was where it really started happening and my art teachers, believe it or not, were my inspiration. I do like the kids to see that I work on art. I stay up late at night or get up early in the morning and I work on art and I'll say, I was up late working in Illustrator or I was working on this piece. And they're like, what? And it's like, yeah, if you love it, you gotta do it. So I just let them know that I still do it. And when we went to a contest, then they go, oh wow, look at you. So you're practicing your art. That's what's in you. The art is very therapeutic during this time and we just finished a portrait assignment and two kids, posters were about the division at the White House. I said, boy, look at the time. Look how your drawings are reflecting what's going on. They see it, they're hearing it all the time. It is affecting them. They are concerned. They have to have an outlet to get what they're feeling out and so art is helping in that respect. That's where I am so excited about coming every day, allowing these kids the space, the place to release that and to experience that and to get them to see that they can use this tool to create something that has a message is extremely important. My name is Marilyn Proctor-Givens and I'm an art and design teacher at Lincoln High School in Tallahassee, Florida. And a practicing artist. You're listening to voices that inspire.