Image description: promotional image for “Our Ocean, Close-Up” exhibit. A collage of paintings and photographs of students painting. Text reads “Our Ocean, Close Up. What species can you recognize? By the Maui High School Marine Science Class, May 2025. Teaching Artist: Maggie T. Sutrov. Classroom Teacher: Lacey Brandt. Artist in the Schools Residency funded by the Hawaii State Foundation for Culture and the Arts.
SFCA Artistic Teaching Partner Maggie Sutrov worked with the 11th and 12th grade students in Lacey Brandt’s 2024-25 Marine Science class through an Artists in the Schools grant, funded by the State Foundation on Culture and the Arts.
Maggie reports: “Close to 100 paintings of marine life by Maui High School students are on display at the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary in Kihei, Maui. Students worked as both scientists and artists to communicate the value of Hawaiʻi’s ocean ecosystem. For the exhibit, “Our Ocean, Close-Up,” students chose a species found in Hawaiʻi’s waters and sourced a high-resolution image of it. They then zoomed into the images to choose a composition that highlights details both beautiful and important to the species. After practicing color mixing with acrylic paint, students created their paintings. Students talked about how we care about what we know, and hopefully these paintings will help more people see and appreciate the wonder of our ocean species. Come see how many species you can recognize from the close-up paintings!
This project culminated a series of experiences where students used art as a way to more deeply connect to and communicate their marine science understandings throughout the school year. Students used art to visualize the first cellular life in the ocean, as well as to study the early complex organisms of the Cambrian Explosion 530 million years ago. They also studied the fossils of extinct ancestors of whales and used this information to draw what they envisioned they looked like. The whale ancestor art, as well, is on display in the Maui High School Library.
In reflecting on the projects, teacher Lacey Brandt said, “The teaching knowledge that Maggie brought to the classroom was powerful for the students. As the students were exposed to new art mediums, they learned and grew so much in detail and technique because of all the knowledge the teaching artist poured into them and the effort she took to worth with so many students through their entire process. One student for example kept thinking he was done but she would keep giving him more ideas and point out details and make suggestions. In the end he was blown away by his final piece and realized he had really not been done all of those times he thought he was. Additionally, Maggie truly linked the learning and the art, almost making both something fluid in our science class. Our learning and our artistic expression became meshed together as an entire experience. A student came up to show me his orange lined triggerfish art and shared that he was ‘pretty proud of how it turned out,’ with a satisfied smile. I’m so thankful that my science students have this amazing opportunity.”
About Artists in the Schools
SFCA Artists in the Schools (AITS) arts residency grants provide engaging, creative, and fun learning experiences based on the Fine Arts standards for all grade levels, through residencies with qualified, trained teaching artists from the Artistic Teaching Partners (ATP) Roster. Many of these teaching artists integrate their art form with other core curriculum areas, such as language arts, math, social studies, and science, meeting both Fine Arts and other core standards.
Artists in the Schools is funded with state appropriations from the State of Hawai‘i Legislature, federal funds from the National Endowment for the Arts, and private matching funds from the Hawai‘i Community Foundation. All public and charter schools in the state are eligible to apply for Artists in the Schools for classrooms pre-K through 12. In the 2023-2024 school year, 125 schools received funds to conduct their arts residencies.
- Learn more about Artists in the Schools: sfca.hawaii.gov/aits.
- Additional Artists in the Schools spotlight posts: sfca.hawaii.gov/category/arts-education/artists-in-the-schools.