Raclin School of the Arts

“…Puffs is full of heart. We set out to create a play, not just a parody. The characters are all fully realized. They go through difficult journeys. They deal with death, personal identity, relationships, and what it means to feel insignificant in the world at large. There may in fact be some tears in the end. Maybe. You don’t have to tell anyone if there are.” – Matt Cox, Playwright
By Natasha O’Hara

The Raclin School of Arts Theatre and Dance Company has brought an incredible world for wizards to campus! Now, as someone who grew up attending Harry Potter conventions but is not a fan of J.K. Rowling, Matt Cox’s 2015 play Puffs, or Seven Increasingly Eventful Years at a Certain School of Magic and Magic, resonates with me on a deeply personal level. Being that I am in the cast (as the Narrator), I am biased, however, the heart of this comedy captures the essence of fandom, friendship, and the magic of storytelling in a way that feels both nostalgic and exceptionally relatable.

Audience members are transported to the 1990s, a decade filled with, platform sneakers, boy bands, and the boom of the digital age. Something often overlooked about Harry Potter is how deeply rooted the series is into the last decade of the 20th century. Puffs joyfully celebrates the glory of the ’90s, from the infectious tunes of popular boy bands, to the heartwarming tale of friendship with Free Willy. It’s a nostalgic nod to a time when the biggest dilemma was choosing between VHS tapes or CDs. Puffs not only captures the essence of this iconic decade but also reminds us of the magic of our youth and the power of ’90s pop culture.

Rehearsal photo. Standing is Sophomore Lyla Beard, followed to the right by Junior Jordan Keen, Senior Shanya Osburn, Senior Aaron Smith, Junior Kelly Thomann, Freshman Abigail Moody, Sophomore Taavi Crumbley, and Freshman Mila Kaser.

When you step into Northside’s Upstage theatre, you are stepping into a world where magic meets the mundane. Directed by Justin Amellio-Ashbrook, Puffs follows Wayne Hopkins (played by Senior Bobby Simons), just your average adolescent boy—until he discovers… he’s a wizard! Join him on a hilarious journey to a school in England, where he befriends two companions, Oliver Rivers (played by Sophomore Taavi Crumbley) and Megan Jones (played by senior Shanya Osburn), and embarks on adventures that will have the crowd laughing and cheering along. But here’s the twist: Wayne is no Brave or Smart or Snake; he’s a Puff!

Rehearsal Photo. L-R: Freshmen Abigail Moody and Mila Kaser, Junior Kelly Thomann, Sophomore Taavi Crumbley, Senior Shanya Osburn, Junior Jordan Keen, and Senior Bobby Simons.

Come along with Wayne and his fellow Puffs as they navigate the ups and downs of wizarding school and the challenges of growing up, all while trying to steer clear of evil wizards and their dastardly schemes. It’s a tale of friendship, bravery, and finding the magic within yourself, even if you’re just a regular kid from small town USA.

Early Rehearsal Photo. L-R: Sophomore Lila Beard, Junior Kelly Thomann, Senior Shanya Osburn, and Junior Jordan Keen.

PUFFS opens Friday, April 12th at 7:30 pm, then runs for the next two weekends. April 12th, 13th, 19th, and Saturday April 20th all start at 7:30 pm. The Sunday matinees on April 14th and 21st start at 2pm. Puffs is for MATURE AUDIENCES ONLY!!! Admission is free, but we highly encourage those who can to donate a non-perishable food item per person to help support the IUSB Titans Feeding Titans Food Pantry.

Parking to the Upstage Theatre is located in the lower parking lot on the east side of campus, on the corner of Northside Blvd and 20th street. If you have any questions please contact the IUSB Box Office at 574-520-4203

Jeff Horwat is an artist, teacher, and scholar who taught in the public school system for five years before teaching at IUSB. He obtained his PhD in art education from the University of Illinois in 2016 and his Master’s in art education from Massachusetts College of Art & Design in 2007. Currently, he is the director of the art education program. Most of his work involves wordless narratives. If want to learn more about his upcoming presentation at IUSB and the projects he is working on, keeping reading.
INTERVIEWED BY EVA MONHAUT

How do you see your work changing overtime; what themes, ideas, and styles have really stuck with you and what has shifted? My early work has always been somewhat therapeutic, involving a visual exploration of personal problems or traumatic experiences. A common theme in my work has always been anxiety. I’ve created a lot of narrative images that visually tried to understand anxiety and dis-empower it as well as grow from it and share that wisdom with others who also suffered from it. My early work is autobiographical but leaning towards something more ethnographic—in that I am exploring how my personal experiences, my subjectivity, can speak to other contexts and reveal truths for others.

Graduate school really informed this shift—I had amazing training from brilliant minds. Training to do qualitative social science research in art education gave me the conceptual tools to think about how my work could be used to make broader contributions beyond my lived experiences. Early in my career as a professor, I (re)discovered arts-based research and have been using that as a framework to inform how my art making can be used as a research method to understand broader social phenomenon. As a result, I’m more interested in politics and ethics–questioning power, authority, and understanding structural barriers that oppress people and their imaginations. I would also argue that my work shifted because the early work I created actually helped me to grow past personal trauma that held me back.

Why do you find wordless narratives so powerful? What has inspired your work with these narratives?
I’ve always been interested in children’s books and how complex ideas could be taught through allegories that used elaborate visuals and minimal text. Dr. Seuss’s Butter Battle Book, the Lorax, and Horton Hears a Who are books I thought were brilliant. An early goal of mine was to create something comparable.

In graduate school, I was at an Art Education conference in Texas where I went to an art museum and saw an exhibition on Lynd Ward who is considered the “father” of the wordless book / graphic novel–even though Frans Masereel published the first contemporary wordless book ten years earlier. There were some prints of Ward’s on display. The show resonated with me deeply. At the time, I was writing my dissertation and had a love-hate (mostly hate) relationship with writing. As a visual artist, writing is not always my best form of communication; I always struggled with trying to communicate with words when I would rather create a picture. Seeing Ward’s work was inspiring and showed what was possible: It gave me permission to explore the power of wordless narratives as an expressive narrative form. Wordless book’s are significant as political objects that challenge conventional texts as carriers of knowledge.

Do you find that inspiration/ideas come to you or do you more actively explore concepts until a new project begins to form?
I have to actively seek out things that inspire me. While sometimes I’m hit with something, its rare, and usually the result of something I am doing to set myself up to receive the thought or inspiration. I look at the work of other artists. I tend to enjoy everything, but I tend to be drawn towards works that tell a story or are surreal and imaginative. I listen to a lot of music and connect with lyrics and stories of musicians I like.

I try to read a lot. I read graphic novels and some fiction. Mostly I read a lot of contemporary social theory and psychoanalytic theory which informs
the philosophical lens I have been using to think about the research questions I am asking in my work. I’ll read and take notes on what I’ve read, then draw and visually play with ideas generated from the readings while also thinking about how those ideas resonate with personal experiences. It’s a messy but really fun process.

Furthermore, I am fortunate in that I married a brilliant person who has expertise in different critical theories and understands my work in a way no one else does. My partner, Stephanie, has been amazing person to bounce ideas off of and our conversations have been invaluable in that they help to verbally think through difficult ideas.

Do you see your scholarly work as a continual of your more creative work or belonging to an entirely different realm?
When I started out as an academic, my intention was to publish from my dissertation which was a conventional research study that explored art teachers who identified as artists. I thought was going to do conventional research and writing, because that was what I learned to do in graduate school. However, it was combination of rejected manuscripts and a desire to make art when I am not teaching or being a husband and father. I committed pretty early into my tenure at IU South Bend to do arts-based research. Specifically, I am interested in how wordless narratives can be
used as an arts-based research method to understand social phenomenon too subtle for words. I’ve written and presented on this topic quite a bit, coining Wordless Narrative Research as an arts-based research method itself. This method is something I developed while creating my first wordless narrative, There is No (W)hole and is I am continuing to theorize about its uses while working on my next major project, Another Possibility. (Work from both of these projects shown below).

Are you able to talk a little about your project with Wolfson Press?
Wolfson Press is graciously working with me to publish my first book, There is No (W)hole. The book is tentatively scheduled be released either the end of 2020 or early 2021. I am currently writing an introduction and finding galleries and art spaces around the country to present that actual drawings as a way to promote the book. I’m working with the press to discuss clever ways to present the project in book stores—playing around with what a wordless book reading would look like. I imagine it being very quiet and awkward, which supports the theme.

How do you think the public school system views art and art education?
I think art is mostly respected in public schools. Most communities understand its importance and its benefits to students. People will defend it and support it when times get tough. I’m not concerned about art being cut from the school budget as much as I was ten or fifteen years ago. That being stated, I don’t always think the public accurately understands the importance of art education. People commonly think art is a relaxed subject where students can express themselves through experiential forms of learning. It was a dumping ground for students who couldn’t hack it in more challenging academic subjects, and viewed as a subject to repair
damaged GPAs. This view is reductive in the sense that is dismisses how at
intellectually rigorous the study of art. It’s a rich discipline with its own philosophy, practices, language, and traditions. Art is not just painting self-portraits or drawing still lives, but it is very much about the ability to think visually, critically, reflectively. It’s about questioning the world around us through alternative ways of knowing—something that challenges a common conception about the role of art in society probably dating back to Decartes and his Mind-Body Dualism thing. I would argue further that the amazing but nuanced cognitive processes acquired through an art education get undermined by administrators limited understanding of art and art teacher’s lack of empowerment to prove them wrong. In short, the status of art education is safe but problematic.

How does teaching college level art compare to teaching younger audiences about art?
For me, it’s easier in the sense I’m not using instructional time to discipline students and get them to behave enough to do this thing they might or might not want to do. At the university level, I’m able to focus on the content and work with adults who have some internal motivation and desire to learn. It’s still difficult. I’ve got to know my stuff really well, be super organized, and be mindful of students’ individual needs. I’m better at discussing aesthetics with students than reprimanding them for destroying erasers or drawing penises on their friend’s drawings (yes, this is a thing I had to do).

What courses have you taught at IUSB that you enjoy them most? Why?
I teach a visual literacy course, two-dimensional design, and all of the art education courses. I enjoy teaching all of them respectfully. There is something valuable in each class that I teach that either challenges me to think about something differently or allows me to think through my scholarly work. If I had to pick, I would say teaching two-dimensional design is my favorite because it’s a studio class where students make things and learn about the thinking behind their making. Furthermore, I get to mentor them and work with their ideas and thoughts in a more personal way as opposed to conventional forms of teaching that involve presenting power-points, lecturing, and grading papers.

What do you hope people understand about art after studying it?
I want students to understand that art is not just about studying and making beautiful and expressive cultural objects. I want students to know that art is a way to communicate with empathy towards people, sharing perspectives, experiences, thoughts, and provocations that are too nuanced for words. I want students know that art can be valuable tool to understand the world, a way to generate new forms of understanding that are valid, significant, and intellectually comparable to what is done in the hard sciences. Lastly, I want student to know that art is inherently political, and that the role of the artists is to be provocateurs that use their creative practices to speak truth to power and promote social change.

Regarding your upcoming talk on campus, what will be your focus? I am going to present an autobiographical narrative about the development of my work doing arts-based research. I will address some of the challenges and learning that occurred through the process of developing Wordless Narrative Research, There is No (W)hole, and Another Possibility.

Aside from sharing my work and talk about how I created those things, the hidden message or subtext of my talk is that hardship, failure, uncertainty, and fear are normal parts of the process of doing something meaningful and creative—that setbacks are invitations to grow and learn. I hope to normalize the ugly parts of the creative process because I see tremendous value in learning to be productive with the anxiety of knowing that the things we make as artists could be total garbage and that its okay to be okay with the possibility of failing. If anything, its liberating and exciting.