Woot Woot! City Arts and Tech Visual Arts teacher Matt Christenson was recently awarded a National Arts Teachers Fellowship, a grant award program sponsored by the Surdna Foundation and run by the Center for Arts in Education at Boston Arts Academy.

Matt used his fellowship award to create an incredible outdoor mural in San Francisco’s Excelsior neighborhood, a project that enriched the local community, allowed him to expand his own artistic range, and demonstrated to his students what is possible for working artists. CAT’s Advanced Digital Media Arts & Photojournalism teacher Paul Ferraris documented the project in an awesome video that tells the story of the mural; check it out here:

On October 4, 2013, Matt and CAT Principal David Allen traveled to Boston, courtesy of the NATF, for a special convening of award recipients from around the country. During the gathering, Matt gave a presentation about his mural and screened the video; it was a huge hit with the fellowship audience. The director of New York’s Professional Performing Arts School remarked that if all of the nation’s art schools could produce work like Matt and Paul’s, then we would have much greater success advocating for the arts in public schools.

Go CAT!