Edgewise Art is the shared identity of Lynne Scott Constantine and Suzanne Scott Constantine, who in addition to their individual interdisciplinary arts practices have been making art and performances together since January 2000. 

Art as a Practice of Provoking Questions

As interdisciplinary artists, their collaborations draw upon multiple traditions and genres in the visual arts as well as on their training in writing, theater arts, and humanities research. The goal of their artwork is to stimulate conversation about the most important questions we face:

• • • What does it mean to be a good human being today?
    • How do we care for each other in community?
    • How do those of us who have privilege and security respond to those who are struggling against oppression that is built into our very way of life?
    • In a time of rampant lying, greed, and callousness, how do we know the truth and choose what’s right? In a time of turmoil and crisis, what must we do to help bend the arc of history toward justice?

Creating a Workplace to Fit Our Values

The collaborative practices central to Edgewise Art grew in part out of Lynne and Suzanne’s experiences and observations in the work world. Prior to 2000, they co-founded and directed a communications consulting firm called Community Scribes (later Intellectual Capital, Inc.), which provided a broad range of services to the health care, computer technology and telecommunications industries as well as to start-up women-owned businesses. Their goal in striking out on their own was to create a work environment that would grow and support talent, offer fair pay and benefits, and promote a healthy work/life balance.

Writing to Inform: Collaborative Journalism and Health Information 

As collaborating writers, Lynne and Suzanne have published hundreds of articles and book reviews on subjects as diverse as federal computer procurement, health care innovations, pharmaceuticals for farm and domestic animals, women’s and LGBT issues, and twentieth-century art. In 1994, Random House published their patient education handbook, Migraine: The Complete Guide, which aimed to help migraineurs find the right health care and cope with the medical, personal and social complexities of the painful, disruptive and much-misunderstood condition.

The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning

During their nearly two decades as faculty members at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA, Lynne and Suzanne collaborated on numerous academic and artistic presentations both in the classroom and at academic conferences, mostly on the subject of teaching creativity and the arts to promote social justice. Among these collaborations are the following:

“Telling Stories, Making Arguments: Responding to Personal Experience in Classroom Discussions of Social Justice Issues,” Innovations in Teaching and Learning 2014, George Mason University, September 2014

“Pedagogies of Social Change: New Models of Teaching, Learning and Knowing,” Making, Meaning, and Context: A Radical Reconsideration of Art’s Work, Goddard College, Plainfield, Vermont, October 2011

“Creating a Democratic Dialogue: Fostering an Equitable and Balanced Conversation about Politics, Art, and Education,” National Art Education Association Annual Meeting, Seattle, Washington March 2011

“Gender Rebels: Activism in the Second Wave,” NCLC 304, George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia, November 2010

“Problem-Based Learning as a Practice of Freedom,” Innovations in Teaching and Learning 2010, George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia, October 2010

 “Teaching for Social Justice,” Innovations in Teaching and Learning 2009, George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia, October 2009

“Teaching Sustainability Across the Curriculum: Syllabi for Art as Social Action and The Sustainability Project,” Center for Teaching Excellence workshop on Teaching Sustainability Across the Curriculum, George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia, February 2008

“Social Justice and Civic Engagement through Study of the Arts,” Civic Learning at the Intersections: U.S. Diversity, Global Education, and Democracy’s Unfinished Work, Conference of the American Association of Colleges and Universities, Denver, Colorado, October 2007

“Toward an Interdisciplinary Pedagogy of Social Justice,” Interdisciplinarity at the Border:Creating, Thinking, and Living New Knowledge, 29th Annual Association for Integrative Studies Conference, Tempe, Arizona, October 2007

“Teaching Controversial Images: Activist Art and Inquiry-Based Undergraduate Research,” América Aquí: Transhemispheric Visions and Community Connections, American Studies Association Annual Meeting, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, September 2007

“Democratic Dialogue in a Diverse Classroom,” Bridge-Building: Connecting Hearts and Minds, Arts and Sciences, Teaching and Research, Academy and Community, 28th Annual Association for Integrative Studies Conference, Atlanta, Georgia, October 2006

“Teaching Art with a Socially Engaged Perspective: A Roundtable Discussion,” College Art Association 94th Annual Conference,Boston Massachusetts, February 2006

“Teaching the Value of Social Activism in an Era of Political Polarization,” Integrations: Liberal Learning in a Diverse World, 2005 AGLS AIS Joint National Conference, Association for General and Liberal Studies and the Association for Integrative Studies, Fairfax, Virginia, October 2005

“Guerrilla Pedagogy: Liberating Student Feminism and Social Activism in the Traditional College Classroom,” Feminism and Social Action Conference, SUNY, New Paltz,  October 2003