STEMarts started in 2009 as a pilot STEAM program at Taos Academy with a small grant from Los Alamos National Laboratory. In 2012 STEMarts was contracted by 516 Arts to design and coordinate the Education Program Director for the ISEA2012 Machine Wilderness event in Albuquerque. Through this project STEMarts expanded to develop the ISEA2012 STEMArts Curriculum platform. In 2013 STEMarts was contracted by Los Alamos National Laboratory to apply the STEMarts approach to a STEM competition for their 70th anniversary and designed the Los Alamos STEM Challenge. These tools are still available online for free access. From 2014-2019 STEMarts Lab designed and implemented the STEMarts@PASEO Youth Program for The PASEO Festival.
About the Founder
STEMarts LAB was founded by new media artist Agnes Chavez as a Research and Innovation platform for sci-art explorations applied to art and education. Agnes Chavez is an interdisciplinary artist, educator, and social entrepreneur. She is the founder and developer of the Sube Teach language thru Art, Music and Games program, which she started in 1996, serving over half a million children.
In 2009 she founded the STEMArts Lab which partners with new media artists and schools to research and develop 21st century tools and learning opportunities as part of new media art festivals, school programs and community events. She has developed art-based curricula and STEAM programs for Scholastic, 516 Arts and Los Alamos National Laboratory. She collaborated with Anita McKeown in 2012 to create an online curriculum tool around the ISEA2012 electronic arts festival in 2012. She is co-founder of The PASEO outdoor participatory art festival in Taos New Mexico since 2014, and designed the STEMarts youth program for the festival. She has won numerous awards for her sci-art projects including the renowned “Educational Innovation in the Americas” (INELAM) award in 2006, and the New Mexico Women in Technology Award in 2011.
In her art, Chavez experiments with data visualization, sound and projection art to create participatory experiences that explore our relationship with nature and technology. In 2015 she was invited to the Havana Biennial to present the installation Origination Point, along with the STEMarts youth workshop, Projecting Particles. The opening was attended by Senator Tom Udall and a delegation of five US senators to support the US-Cuba relations. Her services include participatory art installations, program design and coordination, consulting and lectures to inspire and inform on sci-art and STEAM initiatives. For her latest work visit www.agneschavez.com
