#art4me: A Student-Created Twitter Hashtag in Response to a Times Article

Last week, in our Common Core Practice feature, the ninth-grade class with which we collaborate issued a challenge to students everywhere to participate in a viral art campaign using Twitter.

These ninth graders were so inspired by an article in The Times about “Floating Echo,”  an installation by the artist Chang-Jin Lee at the Socrates Sculpture Park in Queens, that they wanted to take their response beyond a classroom exercise.

So, they invited people to answer the question “What is art, for you?” by posting photos under the Twitter hashtag #art4me .


People from around the world have joined in. Messages from Germany, the United Arab Emirates, England and dozens of American states have appeared under #art4me so far, and author Neil Gaiman  helped out by reposting these students’ call to arms.

Though the artist herself is not on Twitter, she e-mailed her support to Jonathan Olsen, one of the teachers behind this project. Here is his Twitter message about what she said:

-  http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com