A Small Gesture: Postcards from Buffalo

Artist/Instructor: Kathy Shiroki

Supplies included, participants are welcome to bring their favorite materials to work with. Parking is waived.

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A Small Gesture: Postcards from Buffalo invite participants to send a small but powerful gesture into the world. In this hands-on workshop, participants will create a series of postcards to mail to a loved one, a friend, or someone you’ve just met. Each postcard becomes both a message and an artwork designed to travel.

Inspired by the mail art movement of the 1970s, when artists pushed the boundaries of what the postal system would accept and deliver, this workshop explores the postcard as an art form, a story, and a gift. Participants will experiment with any media they choose, from drawing, painting, collage, and text to mixed materials, to create postcards that enhance someone’s day. Each postcard becomes an offering meant to arrive unexpectedly: curiosity, a connection, something to brighten a day, or to whisper I’m thinking of you.

Together, we’ll play with scale, surface, and messaging, and consider how meaning changes once an artwork leaves our hands. At the end of the workshop, participants will send their postcards out into the world. Please bring the addresses of those you plan to send your artwork to.

Kathy Gaye Shiroki

Kathy Shiroki’s innovative approach to engaging with art opens new conversations between artists, institutions, and audiences. She has worked in modern and contemporary art museums, creating interactive experiences that activate exhibitions and facilitate hands-on workshops. Kathy currently works in the Education Department at the Burchfield Penney Art Center, where she also serves as the liaison between the Art Center and Buffalo State University. In addition to her museum practice, Kathy is an Adjunct Professor in the Art and Design Department at SUNY Buffalo State, teaching courses ranging from Art Education to Themes and Issues in Contemporary Art. She contributed to the publication Academic Museums: Exhibitions and Education (Museums Etc.), writing on “Peer-to-Peer Tours”, SUNY Buffalo State student-led tours, at the Art Center. Her own installation work has been exhibited nationally, reviewed in The Los Angeles Times, and shown locally at Hallwalls and King Fish Gallery. Kathy Shiroki holds an MFA from the University of California, San Diego, a BFA from Tyler School of Art, and an associate degree from the Rochester Institute of Technology’s School of American Craftsmen.

For Further information, please contact Kathy Shiroki: shirokkg@buffalostate.edu