Rodriguez, Kathy

Since 2008, Kathy Rodriguez has served as an instructor at the University of New Orleans, teaching courses in art history and studio art. From 2011-2018, she additionally served as Director of the UNO-St. Claude Gallery, curating exhibitions and scheduling programming for the off-campus presence of visual arts at UNO in the greater New Orleans community.  She now serves in a similar capacity for the on-campus UNO Fine Arts Gallery. She has taught on UNO’s study abroad programs in Innsbruck, Austria, and Rome, Italy.  Rodriguez currently writes art criticism for New Orleans Art Review, and has published with Pelican Bomb, NOLA Defender, and museum catalogs. She is a founding member of TEN artists’ collective. A native of Metairie, Rodriguez is delighted to live and work in New Orleans with students, artists, and others in the wide swath of the city and beyond.

Teaching Philosophy
I regard teaching as a service. I tell my students on the first day and throughout the semester that I am present to serve their educations, not dictate their progress. I see my role as a facilitator of knowledge and a participant in students’ evolutions as practicing artists. I also view the educational experience is a type of ongoing narrative. The story of an education evolves from conversation between instructor and student, providing the basis of the narrative. Clarity, understanding, and respect in that conversation provide the learning environment – the framework in which the story develops. As an instructor, I want to ensure foundational skills, giving students a solid baseline from which to vault their imaginations. Invention happens by a thorough understanding of basic principles. I want to encourage that invention and foster and facilitate a learning environment that helps students to be self-aware, to question, to learn from choices, to grow, and to continue to learn beyond the denouement at the end of a class period, project, semester, or commencement.