Working for the Summertime Zoo

I've been a ZeumMaster for two years now, and I have truly enjoyed every day I have worked. The part of my job that I love the most is working with kids, helping them and teaching them how to make clay animation and how to perform.

There is one part of being a ZeumMaster that I don't like - I don't get to see the same kids everyday. A lot of the time, after helping a visitor with the clay animation process, I often feel like I'm a part of their experience, and I begin to miss some of the kids after they leave Zeum.

Throughout my two years as a ZeumMaster, I thought of learning to do other things at Zeum, such as learning how to work the store, but I never thought of working as an assistant at a Zeum Summer Camp. About a month ago, Christian, Raquel and I were talking about summer and Christian suggested that I work at the Zeum Camp. I was really excited because I remembered when I was at camp and how much I loved my counselors.

I really had no idea what to expect. All I knew about the camp was that I had to start earlier (which I hated at first), and get a longer break (which I loved of course).

Then I realized: Now I would be a counselor and kids would look up to me and love me, and I would get close to them and get to know them more than any typical visitor at Zeum.

On the first day of camp, I met all the kids and attempted to learn their names as quickly as I could, and on that first day I ALREADY grew attached to them.

Throughout the two weeks of camp, I used my ZeumMaster skills while also being a Camp Counselor, so I did what I always wanted to do with my job-work with the same kids everyday. I helped the campers with their animation, just like I do on the floor, helping them make their character and assisting them while they made their movie. But by the end of the two weeks, I felt like I was also a mentor to the campers, who at times would come to me with their problems, sometimes in tears. I felt like I had an impact, not only in their camp experience but in their daily lives.

Being a counselor for these two weeks has made me want to work at my summer camp that I went to when I was younger.

On the last day of camp, the campers put on a show for all their parents and friends, showing them their clay animation movies and sets.

I was so proud of my campers, and they were proud of their work too. All the pics in this post are of their creations in the session I helped with "Zeum Zoo".

To all Zeum Masters: I recommend working in at least one summer camp session at Zeum. It is a great experience.

On Performing, the Main Gallery and FINISHING a project

This morning at Zeum, I finished my final project: Fantasy Seder. I performed the one girl play I'd written about how I imagined my family members at a Passover Seder. I was really unsure as to how I was going to be able to act out my different family members and really show the audience different personalities that I was hoping to portray. Recording myself was a bit nerve- racking because I wanted the audience to see what I saw as I was writing the script.

I enjoyed recording myself because I was finally able to make a project that I help kids do everyday when I work at Zeum.

All the kids I work with take their performance so seriously and they really have a vision of how they want their performance to be. When I was recording myself at the production stage, I felt like a visitor, like I was new to the experience even though I've worked at the production stage so many times. I wanted my performance to be right what I wanted. I did a practice run-through, and then did another two more practice runs, until I was finally happy with it, and hopefully those who watch it will be happy with it too.

I've been working at Zeum for two years, and over this time, I've seen Zeum change. The production stage in the Main Gallery is one exhibit that has changed a lot, and where I have become a lot more comfortable working. When I first started working at Zeum, I hated working in the Main Gallery because I never felt like I was 100% prepared to help kids produce a performance.

With Zeum changing over these two years, I've changed a lot too.

These days, working at the production stage in the Main Gallery is never dull, helping kids make their own masterpieces. I have become much more confident, and I have much more to say to visitors and helping them make a great performance. Because I feel more confident working in the Main Gallery, I was able to make a great performance of my own, using the same skills I use to help visitors.

Watching my final project made me feel proud of performing something and I felt that I really portrayed what I wanted the audience to see.

Passover Story

I have a big family - we're all over the country and all over the world. My immediate family lives in San Francisco. But my aunts, uncles, and cousins on my mom's side live in New York. And most of my dad's family lives in Israel.

Because my family is so large and scattered about, I have decided, that for my end of the year project, I wanted to write a short play about my ENTIRE family at the Passover Seder dinner, and kind of make up how I think they would all interact with one another.

I'm planning on performing the whole play myself. A one girl show, reading the skit aloud, acting out everyone's part. Because my family who lives in Israel doesn't speak English, I'm going to perform some of it in Hebrew.

I always wanted to gather my whole entire family together for Passover because it would be so amazing for me to see everyone at once for such a special holiday.

With this project I'm creating my wish that someday, this gathering of my family could happen, and I would really see how they would get along.

Because of the differences between some of my family members, i wrote it so that an argument arises between my cousin (who lives in NY), my Uncle (who lives in Israel), and my mom.

The argument finally ceases when my dad says "OK, let's eat and sing songs." And I bring up the Passover song that is my all time favorite - Echad, Me Yodea?" (One, who knows one?"). Suddenly everyone in my family is talking about the song and how special and meaningful it is to every one of them. The lyrics to the song are so powerful and are strong enough to bring everyone together. And the fighting stops.

Who knows three? I know three!
Three are the mothers and two are the tablets that Moshe brought, and one is Hashem...
Who knows four? I know four!
Four are the fathers and three are the mothers and two are the tablets that Moshe brought and one is Hashem...

The song continues in this fashion of counting up until the number thirteen, and it has a lot of meaning because the song is very biblical and mentions important biblical figures. The melody is also beautiful, especially when sang in Hebrew.

When my family was all singing together, I realized that the holiday of Passover and the songs are a "common denominator" in my family and it's what brings everyone together. In spite of their differences, we all share the love for the holidays, and this, in turn, brings the family together and erases any tension.

SF MoMA Matches!

This is our first real blog post and boy are we excited. We thought we'd inaugurate this thing with a post about our collaborative activity with one of the other local teen programs.

The San Francisco fog was still thick at 8:30 this morning when SF MoMA came to visit, bringing teens from their "Matches" mentoring program with them.

Before coming, they'd chosen paintings from the current Brice Marden Exhibition, written poems based on those paintings and were prepared to take the transformation one step further by making clay interpretations of those poems and learning animation (from us). Art to poetry to art again. Our much missed educator Bernadette organized this event and the educators and zeum masters ran it with expertise and enthusiasm.

Samantha reflects....

Their task was to visually interpret a poem previously written by the group during another activity. Our job was to help out with the creative process and give them access to the tools we have at zeum. We aided in their brainstorming and fed them ideas to help with their animations. They created visuals to go with their poems and we helped them keep in mind that they'd be animating these creations.

It was interesting to see that until the activity actually started these teens barely spoke to their mentors. As the activity progressed, communication increased between the different age groups. It was nice to see them break out of their shells and realize that although their mentors are older than them, they're still people.

Once they were done with the activity one of our awesome educators Matthew, with a little of my help, led the group in an another activity using stop motion animation - this time with bodies instead of clay. They were also each given clippings from a newspaper. The task: cut words out from the clipping and put them together to create a topic for a short animation that they then created with their own bodies.

It was not only a fun experience for the SFMOMA group and for myself, it was also a chance for us to realize what we can actually do with technology. Coming to Zeum helps people realize just how much can be done with the technology that we all posses in our own homes. It's amazing to think that the same thing these people just did with their bodies, a camera, and a computer is actually done in professional hollywood films. It almost makes me want to go home and make my own movie.

Avia...My role today was explaining how to make a clay animation movie. The teens and adults had to interpret a poem that they wrote and visually make what they saw into a clay movie. I really enjoyed working with the teens from SF MOMA and they made really interesting movies. One that i really loved was a set that looked like a highway and the visitors made cacti out of clay and put it on the highway to make it look 3D. It was really cool! I also thought it was interesting how they wrote a poem and kind of brought it to life.

Bernadette sent us a full report, noting that in fact, we were able to talk to a few of MoMA's teens after the project was said and done and they all said it was their favorite event out of all the stuff they've done in the Matches program.

"Most of our Matches participants had never been to Zeum before and they were excited to have had this opportunity. I just wanted to thank all of the awesome ZeumMasters and Educators that came very early this Saturday morning to help facilitate this wonderful interaction. So, big shout out to Gaby , Sam, Lilian, Avia, Monique and educators Raquel, Ari, Perry, Matthew and Jordan for helping making this a completely awesome experience!! "

And of course, thank you Bernadette.