Imagine you’re a child again. You’re not thinking about what you’ll do when you grow up, about the job you’ll one day have to find. You probably prefer to spend your time skateboarding, or drawing pictures or playing video games with your friends. And then one day somebody walks into your world at school and tells you, “All those things you love to do now – you can find a way to do them the rest of your life! You’re creative, you’re full of ideas and you can do anything you want to do.” Many of us didn’t hear that message a lot when we were growing up, and a lot of students don’t hear it enough today, either.

That’s the reason Darden created the Be An Artist Program. He developed an approach to use songwriting to help students realize their innate creativity — and to use that creativity to do whatever they love to do. We’re all born artists, he believes, and we don’t need to follow any special route to become artists. We just need to pay attention, and discover what it is we truly enjoy doing.

The Be An Artist Program is simple: Darden, a lifelong musician and songwriter, brings his guitar into the classroom and talks with students about creativity. No chalkboards, no lofty presentations, no gimmicks. He engages with students not as a teacher, or a performer or an entertainer, but as an enthusiastic artist who loves his craft. He helps individual students recognize what they love to do and encourages them to try things they may have never done before — like writing a spur-of-the-moment song together.

“The Be An Artist Program seeks to encourage and explore the untapped inner artist in all of us. By guiding people to recognize their innate creative abilities, it inspires the pursuit of an enriched, productive life. Through songwriting, it champions the belief that happiness at any age comes from doing what you love.”
The Be An Artist Program
mission statementDarden Smith

The “artistry” of the Be An Artist Program is beyond music or painting or drawing or sculpture — what we usually think of as “art.” In Darden’s mind, “to be an artist” is to be creative, passionate and broad thinking in whatever your pursuit, from playing soccer to choosing a shirt to wear to school to enjoying a slice of pizza. Or from developing an advertising campaign to managing a production line to starting your own business.

At its heart, the Be An Artist Program exists to encourage — and inspire — students of all ages to pursue what they love to do. It’s to nudge us to reflect on the importance of recognizing our innate skills and interests. To assure us that there is a path to enjoy a creative, productive life — even when that path may not be obvious. It’s to challenge us all to pay attention to the things we love to do and to commit to doing them every day.

The Be An Artist Program is a reminder of the influence we have in shaping a student’s course, and our own. Both in doing what we love to do — and the importance in encouraging others to do the same.

How a Be An Artist Program session works.