A wide shot of a ceramics studio, featuring students working with pottery wheels and other tools.

Sam Jaffe

Associate Professor, Adjunct

Bio

Sam Jaffe (she/her) is an artist currently living and working in Chicago, IL. Characterized by wacky, toxic color and overstuffed, mutated forms, her recent work explores labor, folk and domestic art traditions, ornamentation, collecting behaviors, craftsmanship, and the grotesque fallibility of the human body. All art materials are recycled, reused, repurposed, dead-stock, vintage, or otherwise sustainably sourced. Sam received her BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2005 and her MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2009. She is represented by 65GRAND in Chicago and is an Associate Professor, Adj. in the Department of Painting and Drawing at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Sam is also a director of ADDS DONNA, an artist-run collective and exhibition space in Chicago.

Portfolio

Courses

Title Department Catalog Term

Description

This studio course will provide a hands-on introduction to the fundamental understanding and use of color. Students will gain practical experience working with material color in order to improve their understanding of how color works. Assignments will be introduced in class to help students develop a working knowledge of the basic concepts of hue, value, and chroma, and the relationship between these concepts and those of color harmony and organization. By working with color in context students will gain a practical understanding of color interaction and develop strategies for approaching color with greater sophistication and specificity in their own practice.

In addition to our investigations with color in the classroom, this course will examine the ways in which artists and scholars have worked with color art historically as a medium of expression, and thought about color scientifically as an index of an underlying natural order, as well as culturally as a system of signs reflecting our biases back to us to be interpreted. Reliable perceptual phenomena like simultaneous contrast and afterimages will be considered alongside more unstable notions like synesthesia and color music, as well as the complicated history of thinking about color as evidence of that which is ?other.?

Course work will include exercises to help students develop their approach to color, and a final project in which they put their understanding to work.

Class Number

1646

Credits

3

Description

This course investigates painting materials, application, color, form, and ideas through contemporary and traditional methodologies. Designed to accommodate many skill levels, students can explore various creative strategies through a skill-based curriculum as well as individual projects. This course serves as a requirement and preparation for topic-based Painting Studio Multi-Level B classes.

Class Number

1610

Credits

3

Description

Class Number

1580

Credits

3

Description

In ?I Made a Thing?,? a Professional Practice Experience course offering, you will engage in a wide variety of activities designed to help prepare you for life after SAIC. Course activities may include creating a website, preparing a CV, attending networking events with alumni, and writing of a project statement. The course emphasizes hands-on, real-world professional activities and opportunities for emerging studio artists.

This course will be broken into six units, each of which addresses a particular concern about what to do with studio work once it has been made. Each unit will typically contain a reading assignment, a writing assignment, and a project assignment. This course would be best suited for artists who are considering a career centered around an individually driven studio practice. Units include: I Made a Thing and I think I want to make more: how to develop a practical, long-term studio practice. I Made a Thing and I think it failed: how to embrace inevitable challenges and let your work be your teacher. I Made a Thing and I think I want people to look at it: how to cultivate a supportive creative community both physically and virtually. I Made a Thing and I think I want to use it to apply to/for stuff: how to get your work ?out there.? I Made a Thing and I think I want people to talk about it: how to engage your work with dialogue and criticism. I Made a Thing and I think I want someone to buy it: how to create your own art market.

Class Number

1856

Credits

3

Description

This studio explores specific problems in each student's area of concentration and interest. Students are expected to command familiarity with problems of color, composition, and basic materials.

Class Number

1621

Credits

9

Description

This studio explores specific problems in each student's area of concentration and interest. Students are expected to command familiarity with problems of color, composition, and basic materials.

Class Number

1909

Credits

9