Announcement: 

Details now available for current MAANZ Mentorship opportunity. CLICK HERE

The MAANZ Mentorship Program is about providing opportunity in mosaic education to members who wish to broaden their knowledge and experience. And what better way to achieve this other than by working intensely with an experienced, creative and professional mosaic artist.

Our inaugural Mentorship Program began with Scott Harrower who offered a one-week learning experience in April 2005. And most recently Nola Diamantopoulos has offered two mentorship opportunities for August/September 2005.

The Mentorship Program is by application only and the mentor will make final selection.Neither the mentor nor the mentoree receive any payment.At the end of the program both the mentor and the mentoree will be required to respond to a MAANZ questionnaire.

Message from our Education Officer, Scott Harrower:

The Mentor Relationship - a Value adding career move

After the successful Mentorships facilitated by our inspirational and energetic President, Nola and myself, “ the time has come, the walrus said to speak of many things…. its Mentorship time again.

Sandy Robertson has agreed to take on a Mentoree through the MAANZ Mentorship program. I am developing a new format, with Sandy for this Mentorship, one based on a flexible working relationship between the Mentor and Mentoree, rather than being Public Art project based. This will give members a new way of accessing professional development opportunities with the Associations professional members. DETAILS on HOW TO APPLY are available by clicking here.

As the Education Officer of the Association, I can’t recommend highly enough the notion of having a Mentor to help with the development of your mosaic practice, whether it be professional development or as a hobbyist. Mentoring is an age-old practice in all fields not just the Creative Industries. It is about having a wise and trusted advisor…. your own private educator who can assist you to find new creative pathways of thinking.  A Mentorship may support the development of studio skills, new work, a new product range or the initial establishment of a practice or a new mosaic style that is inherent of your character and helps you to expresses your self more fully in Mosaics.

The need for professional development opportunities in our industry presented itself clearly recently, when I received feedback from a potential student who chose to do a beginner mosaic workshop with some-one else. The expressed concern was towards the teaching experience and knowledge of the tutor facilitating the workshop.  It concerns to me, as an educator, to hear that people left this workshop with the belief, taught to them, that there are no rules in mosaic. I had a laugh to myself at this comment but also I felt for the participants who had paid good money and left feeling dissatisfied that they had not learnt any correct technique. (And felt the need to do another mosaic workshop to salvage their faith in the medium.)  It is true that mosaic can be very free form in style but there are always guidelines to follow that help us to achieve a better result in our work. As a society and as individuals, we want to grow and extend ourselves, seeking to reach higher goals and objectives. We want a path to follow that will take us from simple beginnings to greater ends….or simply to realize that we are “going along just fine, thank you”.  Having a valued and trusted Mentor can helps us achieve our goals as creative individuals and can be a value adding career move for ourselves and those that we share mosaic with.

If you are thinking of applying for the Mentorship, consider the following:

A check list for Mentorees
1. Is it time for me in my career to develop a relationship with a mentor?
2. Do I have the ability and desire to discover new things about myself and my pratice ?
3. What do I need a mentor to guide me in doing ?
4. Do I need a sounding board for my ideas or do I want to learn more about the mosaic industry
5. Do I want a formal or informal structure to my new learning?
6. What could I try to do with my mentor that I can not already do in my practice? Is there a joint initiative that could be set as an outcome for our mentorship?
7. What are my main objectives for the partnership? What benefits can I offer the Mentor?
8. Can a mentorship help me to be a better mosaic educator?

Perhaps you can ask yourself even more questions to find out if it is time for you to apply for a Mentorship with MAANZ. If there is a Professional Mosaicist in our membership that you find particularly inspirational and would like to develop a mentor/mentoree relationship with, please contact me to discuss the potential of helping to build a bridge to meeting your objectives.

Cheers, Scott
scott@shmosaic.com