A visual artist shares how creation multiplies learning and community well-being.
In her workshop and in the classrooms of the National School of Visual Arts, which she now directs, Iris Pérez Romero has found a way to turn creation into shared learning. ‘I live and create in the Dominican Republic; everything I do comes from here,’ she says. With more than three decades of experience in drawing, painting, photography and ceramics, she combines artistic practice, teaching and cultural management. Her work engages with everyday life and the memory of communities, while her teaching serves as a bridge to new generations. Iris's vision is based on a conviction: art first transforms the creator and then society. Art is so extraordinary that it first “does something to you”, it transforms you, and after it transforms you, it reaches others and changes and transforms societies, entire societies; so it is very important that there are people who continue to make art. In the classroom and workshop, this transformation becomes shared learning: each work raises questions...