Joseph Kern

2/26/18

Joseph Kern grew up across various towns in various states, including New York, Ohio, and

Florida. He moved during key points in his life during these times, which has exposed him to

various kinds of peoples and has given him various types of experiences. He has also studied

abroad where he lived for ten weeks in Croatia and visited Bosnia-Herzegovina. All of these

experiences have influenced the purpose and philosophy behind his art. Joseph makes art to

depict his world how he sees it. Sometimes this is strictly representational, sometimes it comes

with representations of the world as interpreted by the artist himself. As an artist Joseph invites

the viewer to look upon and step into his world, taking some of his viewpoint in and bringing

their viewpoint to his art. Because of his time living in places for a limited amount of time he

has learned to take in the moments and attempts to portray them in his artwork. He attended

college both at the Rochester Institute of Technology for his BFA in Illustration and is currently

attending the Ohio State University for his licensure in Art Education (K-12). He has chosen to

follow the path of being an art teacher because he himself was inspired by his art teachers

throughout his life. His teachers throughout both High School and College have showed him not

only how to create works of art but how he can use art to express himself, and he hopes to pass

on his passion and love of art to his students. During his high school career his teachers focused

on developing his skills while focusing on preparing him for college level work and beyond, the

kind of scaffolding he hopes to provide for his future students. In college it was more about the

rapport and trust that he built with his professors which lead him to fully understand and

appreciate the role an art teacher has emotionally and developmentally in their students lives.
Even though he doesn’t plan on teaching college, Joseph hopes to build this same kind of

rapport, trust, and understanding with his future students. He came upon The Ohio State

University because he had spent the majority of his adult life in Ohio and came to think of Ohio

when he thought of “home”. When it came time to look into colleges the majority were within

Ohio, and the first one he looked into was The Ohio State University. Upon reviewing the

licensure only program and seeing the trajectory it would put him on as well as the experiences

it would give him he realized that this was the right path for him. Their focus not only on

support in being prepared for any classroom environment but on placing students in classroom

observation’s early on was just what he expected and needed. He feels the program has

prepared him thoroughly to pursue his career as an art educator. Joseph firmly believes that

every student can be successful in art if given the proper opportunities and encouragement and

hopes to do so for his students. He plans to hold his students to a high yet achievable standard

regardless of their perceived skills in art and will scaffold and guide them to success just as his

many teachers before him did for himself.