Posso Provare / May I Try

Professor Ann Johns and Beili Liu
Teaching Assistant Bryan Martello

A group exhibition surveying works by students from the Learning Tuscany Study Abroad 2015 studio course: Spatial Exploration of Culture and Site

For the Learning Tuscany 2015 studio course, Spatial Exploration of Culture and Site, students explore their rich experiences while traveling in central Italy in order to inform material and process based studio work. Through discussions, field sketches, ideation and daily studio practice, students collect, transform, and create a series of site-responsive sculptural works with sensitive consideration to the influence of travel and cultural specificity of the materials and site.

Learning Tuscany Study Abroad Program

The Learning Tuscany Study Abroad summer program exposes deserving students to art and culture first-hand. Students are given the opportunity to be ambassadors from the United States and Texas, sharing their experiences with students and citizens of Italy. The program focuses on the art and architecture of Tuscany and central Italy. Students live and work at Santa Chiara, a restored convent that now hosts students from across the United States. The facility is located in the heart of Castiglion Fiorentino, a picturesque Tuscan town that is located along the main train line between Rome and Florence. For Summer 2015, Students enrolled in two concurrent courses, Art and the Spectator in Medieval and Renaissance Italy, an art history course taught by Professor and Program Director Ann Johns and Spatial Exploration of Culture and Site, a studio course taught by Professor Beili Liu, both from The University of Texas at Austin Department of Art and Art History. The integrated approach of the program balances carefully designed trips with individual and small group projects, in order to explore the forces that shaped Italian cities and landscapes.