In an effort to challenge the limiting, dismissive cliché, “boys will be boys,” we invited Collegiate School students to explore and expand the possibilities of all that boys can be and become. What better place to rethink that idea than Collegiate School, a day school for boys and the oldest independent school in the United States.
We printed T-shirts that read, “boys will” and encouraged students to finish the sentence. There were no rules; students could write on, draw on, rip, cross-out words or otherwise alter their shirts. Their collective responses create a meaningful and ever-expanding view of the ways that boys can express themselves.
The project is a collaboration with artist and Collegiate Visual Arts Department Head Lisa Jacobson; we created the project while I was a visiting artist at Collegiate School.