Where do monsters come from? Where do they hide when we aren't looking? Apparently, the imagination of AS220 Youth and Roger Williams Park Zoo! Last weekend Fabratory students took our first field trip of the year to work on a "exquisite corpse scavenger hunt" project at our local zoo. Kanema miller, a ucap student in my graphic design class took reigns over the project and created our scavenger hunt and helped us by hooking us up with a UCAP bus! Thanks Kanema! We all woke up super early (9) and met up at the studio for a long (cold) morning of drawing zoo animals! Lucky for us it wasn't too cold for the animals to be out.

Kanema wanted us to work on creating a zoo monster based on different parts from animals at the zoo. She had created a vector like this for fun and thought it would be a great project for Fabratorians to work on. We would go, and draw the animals then return to the studio for a few hours of vector creating. For instance, the trunk of the elephant, legs of a giraffe, the body of a sloth, and the eyes of owl. CREEPY! We spent the day mostly alone at the zoo, which was great because we got to run wild. After spending a few hours together working at the zoo we returned to AS220 Youth for the vectorizing of our creatures. Check out this creepy creature from Berto!

Jen Leo put's it simply, "It was really fun, being out with so many friends, running around like children and drawing amazing animals."

Classical High student by day, artist in the evening, and State Senate page once a week, Eli is one of many new members at AS220 Youth that has already become a fixture in the studios. So far Eli has been working in the Visuals and Fabratory Programs, taking painting, drawing, and graphic design classes. Though he's only been around the Youth Studio for a month, he's already producing some great work, and he and Sharon Degadillo have booked the Youth Gallery for a two-person show during the month of September. From his new artist statement:

"I make art because I'd rather express myself visually than to put it into words. I usually draw realistically but sometimes I put my own twist on reality to show my true feelings about a subject. My ultimate goal is to move to New York and work for Marvel Comics."

Do you have East Coast Style or Dirty South Swagger? Come check out the East Coast VS Dirty South Battle at AS220 on February 23rd at 7PM. The winner will receive 3 hours of free studio time, a complementary photo shoot AND an interview that will be featured on the AS220 website. If your going to perform, make sure you come correct: All-original beats ONLY, keep the music tasteful and leave the beef at the meat market. Holla at Anjelly or Justin at AS220 Youth for more info!

Providence Style Week, this city's very own yearly celebration of fashion design is an incredible event, filled with beauty, fun and talent. This year Photo Mem intern Sashalee was able to attend and had this to say about her time backstage:

"Today, I went to a fashion show for the first time ever and loved it! It was also great because I got in for free, thanks to James! Fashion shows are great and it made me want to be on that runway. I saw how much work it took to get ready back stage with James and my mentor Miguel.

Being back Stage at my first fashion show was awesome! I enjoyed being back there with Miguel, though at first I was a little confused, thinking I couldn't go back there. But hey! My mentor is a photographer so of course he can go back there. I saw the make-up artists putting make-up on the models and I saw the hair-dressers doing the model's hair. It was such a great experience. I give thanks to James for inviting me Style Week, Fashion Show. If it wasn't for him, I would not have been able to experience a real live fashion show!"

Stay tuned to hear more from Sashalee!

This past Wednesday, Drawing class went on a brief field trip to take in some of the beauty of downtown Providence. We focused our sketches on the architecture around us using the principles of one- and two-point perspective, until it got too cold and dark.

We're looking forward to more excursions as the days get longer, and the weather gets warmer.?? ??

Last Wednesday, the AS220 Youth visited the Dunkin Donuts Centers to catch the Providence College Friars compete against the Rutgers University Scarlet Knights. With over 20 young basketball lovers in the building, the Friars had that spark to win! They defeated the Knights with a final score of 78-67!

"I loved the slam dunks! I'd never seen one in person before but there were at least 3!" youth Alex Ruiz expresses. Jen-Leo details their time on the big screen during the game, "We were on the jumbo screen so many times and we were so oblivious to it. We were dancing and everything. I liked that a lot."

The girls definitely had heir fun but the guys had their share as well laughing at the other team's expense. "We definitely heckled the other team's coach because he wasn't being a good sport about losing. His expression was priceless and he was real heated," Cyrus Bishop says as the AS220 Hustle Basketball team veteran laughs it off.

Check out this highlight reel from the game :

We were so excited about being able to check out this game and are looking forward to many more. Stay tuned to hear about our future fun times.

AS220 Youth members, do you want studio time? If so, you should definitely read this! The performance program is proud to introduce our new Studio Bucks program. It's simple, one hour of studio time at AS220 Youth will now cost $100 Studio Bucks. We have begun to implement this program to show the youth the value of studio time in the real world, which costs actual "bucks".

Not sure how to make Studio Bucks? That's ok! For every hour you spend in a performance class, you will earn $25 Studio Bucks! Confused? Okay, I will break it down. if you take a 3 hour MC Writing class, you will earn $75 studio bucks.

Talk to Anjel if you have any questions! Get earning!

Two Thursday's ago Davina Alejo & Mikaela Gonzaga had their very first gallery opening in the Youth Gallery! A bunch of incredible people came to their studio to see their artwork, both friends and family. It was a fantastic turnout and everyone enjoyed their body of work.They even sold some pieces and made some money! Check out some images from the event below!

THE LADIES OF THE HOUR :)

HERE ARE LINKS TO THEIR PORTFOLIOS

DAVINA

MIKAELA

Check out the awesome lineup in the Youth Gallery!

FEBRUARY: Davina Alejo & Mikaela Gonzaga

MARCH : AS220 Youth Group Show

APRIL: Kanema Miller & Roberto Perez

MAY: Kenneth Norman & Eugene Petty

JUNE: Group Show

JULY: Photo Mem Presents

AUGUST: Fabratory Presents

If you are between the ages of 14-21 and want to have an exhibition of your artwork in the AS220 Yotuh Gallery, email nick@as220.org or gianna@as220.org and include a brief description of yourself and your artwork along with at least two images. If you do not have digital images of your work you can schedule a meeting to present your artwork!

*The AS220 Youth gallery is uncensored and unjuried. *

*Gallery Hours * M-F (11-7)

SATURDAY (12-5)

MVC 3 is a FAST pased fighting game published and developed by Capcom. It was realeased February 15, 2011. The game is rated T for everyone HAHAHA. It is based on Marvel and Capcom universes; When you fire up the game you'll be able to choose from a variety of your favorite characters from both realms including Spider-man, Wolverine, Chris Redfeild and many others. Each Character packs their own special moves and "Hyper Combos" which allow you to unleash devestating damage on your oponints. Players are able to choose up to 3 characters which will be displayed on a stylish comic book roster, each match lasts 1 round making the the urgency of victory all the more important. One of the coolest new editions is the implementation of the X-factor mechanic which allows your character to boost his strength, speed and overall ability and you are also able to switch characters mid-combo even in air.

Mike: Besides losing horribly both times I played last week, some of my favorite characters are Magneto, Chris Redfeild, and Wesker.

Ray: I got to play MVC 3 for the second time in my whole life last week and i thought it was awsome. I only won one match but its all good. Id have to say my favorite charectors in the game were Dante, Spider-man, and Zero preferably all dressed in black lol.

Overall Impressions: The game definatly translated well at game night, everyone enjoyed jumping in and beating the crud out of each other with epic super-cool characters. Jordan writes, "This game is fast, awesome, and old school". "Tremell" writes, "I liked this game because it clashes two of my favorite companies". If you like fighting games, this game is for you if not then it's probably a pass. Next week we will be reviewing either Mortal Kombat or Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition so stay tuned.

Witten by: Mike Viera and Ray Min

I think all AS220 Youth Staff would agree that working with Berto (in the blue shirt) for the last several years as a student has been a pleasure. Now working with him on Saturdays it is also tasty! When Berto recently started as co-teacher of the Saturday Cooking class at the AS220 Youth studio he wanted to explore his own culinary ethnic background in addition to those of our students. Since he came on board we have prepared the root vegetable cassava/yucca in both Dominican and Liberian dishes, South East Asian Nime Chow spring rolls and Carribean Pastelito meat pies to mention a few. With a shout out to his partial Japanese heritage last Saturday we made sushi for the first time. Judging by the speed with which it was consumed it can only be said that it was another tasty cooking class success.

At last week's community meeting, Libby Kimzey from Capital Good Fund visited the studio to discuss tax preparation with our older youth who worked in the year 2011 and are not being claimed by their parents.

She answered some questions about personal and specific situations as well as detailed what documents are necessary for tax filing.

Libby also added that there are a variety of tax credits that youth may be eligible for related to education and parenting. Young people will be able to sign up for individual meetings with Libby on February 11 or April 7. They will need to bring the following:

W2s

Medical expenses

Tuition

Rent, Room/Board (receipts or written letters from room mate/landlord)

W9s/1099

Bank Statements (checking account/savings account)

When I first came to AS220 at the beginning of 2011, I was new to art and did not know where to start. I always appreciated photography so i decided to enroll in some photo classes with Scott and Miguel. I started to learn about traditional black and white film photography, how to use a camera and how to develop and print the photos in the darkroom at AS220. Over time I became more experienced at using the darkroom and working the camera and applied for the summer work program and to work on the Kennedy Plaza Portrait Project with the AS220 photo team. I helped photograph and interview people for a big project that was shown in a few galleries. Through this job I gained a lot of professional photography experience. During the next term I got even more experience doing professional shoots with Scott and Miguel as we did shoots for the upcoming Providence Daily Deal and Local Mixtape websites. I even got to lead a professional shoot of musician Steve Allain whose photos were displayed on indowncity.com, a local Providence site. I have also started to shoot photos of cyclists around the city as a possible future gallery show. I now feel completely comfortable and at home behind a camera, where as one year ago it could not be more bizarre.

Last year, AS220 Youth began to offer week-long intensives so youth could get their computer skills up quickly, Building on that idea, we will be offering 4 week-long intensives during the week of February school vacation (Feb. 20-24).

Visuals will offer screenprinting at the RITS.

Performance will be training youth on Studio Engineering.

The Fabratory will put youth through the paces so they can get the IC3 computer certification.

And Photo will be traveling around Rhode Island creating camera obscuras.

*For more info on the intensives, email studio director, Anne at anne@as220.org *

Recently our students in the Training School have explored the use of photography and collage to create crazy self portraits........that look nothing like them. Inspired by the rich history of artists creating interpretive self portraits that do not reflect their physical image each student used photos of themselves, images of animals and comic book characters to create these multilayered images. Currently nine of these images are gracing the cafeteria gallery at the training school, and we will be excited to show them in a location near you soon, enjoy!