the greenhouse gallery

The Greenhouse Gallery was La Escuela Fratney Students’ response to the to the Covid-19 Pandemic. The second and fourth grade students responded to a drawing prompt that was about growing the community you imagine against the backdrop of the last year. Each of those drawings is the center of all seventy-two quilt squares that create the greenhouse. 

Myself and Sue Pezanoski-Browne worked with students virtually and in person to develop a site specific installation that would extend Wisconsin’s growing season as well as our own. The beginning of this project was derailed in March 2020 when all students were abruptly sent home. We continued this March and found that this is something we wouldn’t have been able to make pre-pandemic. 

artist residency: La Escuela Fratney & The Fratney Art Builders

In collaboration with Lynden Sculpture Garden and La Escuela Fratney, I worked with the 5th Grade Art Club (later called “The Fratney Art Builders) to change the school’s relationship to single use plastics. The students felt the need to address this problem in their school culture after having extensive discussions on various social justice topics.

Working with them for the duration of the 2019-2020 school year, we held the first annual “Fratney Earth Fair” in which we invited community organizers to present on climate justice in Milwaukee, had an entirely zero waste pot luck dinner, and sold screen printed canvas bags (made by students and parents) to raise funds for biodegradable utensils for the school lunch.

In the Spring, we began to focus our attention to building a greenhouse on the school’s campus that can be harvested by all students as needed. This is an in-progress project, as we were interrupted by school closures due to covid-19, but plants are still growing in the greenhouse as we work on community guidelines and access from home!