By Patrick Sochacki
UNIVERSITY CENTER – On this episode of Instructed: Fine Arts adjunct instructor Bonnie Lalley and her student Cody Maereck.
These two share wonderful comments and stories about each other, art, graphic design, the future of student artists and where art as a whole is headed as the world becomes more visually oriented.
Lalley has been a teacher for 30 years, with a primary focus on drawing instruction. She has also taught a semester of art history and 2D design. Her degree is a Masters of Fine Arts from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
Cody Maereck is a student at Delta College who is pursuing a degree in Fine Arts. He has been a student of Bonnie’s, taking part in her drawing class and forging a bond he sees lasting for a long time. Maereck, like many who dive into art for a career, faced criticism about his choice.
“I had considered myself an artist in high school,” says Maereck. “Then after high school, I basically fell into the trap of listening to people tell me ‘oh art isn’t gonna pay the bills’ and ‘you’ll be a starving artist’ and all that bullcrap.”
As many professors we’ve had on the show tend to do, Lalley was there to help Maereck through his dilemma.
“I don’t even think class had started yet, and I had talked to Bonnie for a little bit,” remarked Maereck. “Within like 10 minutes of talking to her, she reassured me that art was a totally viable path to go down and immediately took away all the stress I had about going to school [for it.]”
When asking Lalley about why she chose to be a teacher, she is very succinct.
“Undergrad professors directed me into teaching,” says Lalley. “This was in the early 80’s, [they said] ‘this is all you can do for bread and butter as an artist’ […] Many of us went into teaching for bread and butter, but having done it now for a couple of decades I just really love it, I get as much out of it as I think I give […] I wouldn’t have chosen a different field.”
Lalley truly loves the give and take that comes from the daily life of instructing students in the art department, Maereck being a specific example.
“Cody was such a joy as a student,” says Lalley. “Every drawing challenge I gave my students, and it was a great class, real thinkers, his take on it was always totally original. A totally original point of view, every single time, and I felt like when I was in that class I couldn’t wait to get home to my studio to try out some new stuff.”
Tune in to Instructed on Stitcher and Apple Podcasts to catch the whole show, and make sure to subscribe to get updated when new episodes come out every month!
Do you have a professor, one that has influenced or helped shape your future, that’d be good for Instructed? If so, please email me at patricksochacki@delta.edu and we can set something up!
