Artist and teacher. Teacher and artist. The literature on education in the arts has generally characterized the relationship between the role of artist and the role of art as one filled with contradictions, conflicts, and tensions (e.g., Ball, 1990). In general, career paths for artists and grade teachers are quite distinct. Teachers gain credentials with inservice credits. Artists (whether writers, musicians, dancers, or painters) establish their reputations through publishing, exhibiting, or performing (Lopate, 1978). The one career path involves creating art, the other involves teaching art. Anderson (1981) in an article focusing on some of the contradistinctions in the relationship between artists and teachers quoted Smith (1980): The distinctive problems of practice encountered by the artist are not those encountered by teachers. Aims and purposes, contexts and modes of working, and ultimate commitments are different in each case. The conceptual frameworks which inform the work of the professional artist and the professional of art are made of different items. (p. 10) And Szekely (1978) wrote: [Art teachers] come to view the teaching profession not as another area of creativity and fulfillment, but as a hindrance to personal ambitions. This serious problem seldom receives attention in art training or in-service education. How to maintain oneself as an artist while teaching, or more importantly, how to combine art and teaching during one's life needs a great deal of discussion and support. (p. 18) The arguments can be summarized as follows. Creative processes are understood to involve the need for singular aloneness and introspection (Ne vick, 1982), while teaching has been characterized as an outgoing and analytical process. The artist may not necessarily be able to communicate or to articulate verbally to others, the processes involved in creativity or this knowledge may be too idiosyncratic for use by others-especially school-age children (Ball, 1990; Smith, 1991). Further, ideas about artistic genius and self-expression, and autonomous acts of creation are part of an underlying cultural epistemology that espouses an individual-centered and thing-centered view of art (Bowers, 1990). Such arguments have contributed to certain assumptions about the nature of artistic creativity and the nature of teaching. Some researchers have understood that both teaching and making art involves creativity, skill, and grace. In other words, teaching itself can be understood as an art when teachers, as do dancers, musicians, or painters make judgments based largely on qualities that unfold during the course of action (Eisner, 1985, p. 176).1 Others have been careful to point out the need for art teachers to continue to be active in producing art themselves, in order not to become alienated from the very processes which they encourage their own students to explore (Thompson, 1986). All these perspectives have concentrated on the dynamic of the artist as teacher, not just teacher-generic, but as an art teacher. There is little written about the nature of the transitions for a person whose primary identity before becoming a was artist, and how that identity has taken on new dimensions as the identity of teacher has been assumed. In this article, I focus on the work of Martha Davis, a Toronto photographer, xerographer, independent video and filmmaker, and public school teacher. Martha Davis has received a number of grants in support of her professional work as a filmmaker from the Canada Council, the Ontario Arts Council, the Toronto Arts Council, and the National Film Board. Two of her 16mm films were nominated for Genie Awards: Elephant Dreams ( 1988) and Reading Between the Lines (1990). Since 1981, her films have been screened throughout Ontario, across Canada, and in New York City. Davis graduated from the University of Toronto with a double major in film and drama in 1981. …