Art Is Messy

This morning David and I discussed a very interesting article that he had just read the night before. He gave me a copy of Olivia Gude’s, January 2004 Art Education article, Postmodern Principles: In Search of a 21st Century Art Education. It was just the kick in the seat of my pants that I’ve been needing.

In the article, the author makes the argument for teaching Postmodern Art concepts such as appropriation, recontextualization, hybridity, juxtaposition, gaze, layering, interaction of text and image, and “representin’” instead of focusing solely the elements of art and principles of design. These ideas are not foreign to me. Along with a social justice curriculum, they were a main focus of my art education training at NYU. When I entered the teaching world I was all prepared and excited to deal with these issues in my classroom.

Something happened though between that time and now. Perhaps it was the pressure of seeing other more experienced teachers covering the elements and principles and feeling like I was denying my kids something or doing something wrong? Or maybe it happened when I went from teaching high school to elementary school? Maybe I thought “How is a 1st grader going to understand the idea of recontextualition when they can barely write their own name?” Whatever the reason, I am now feeling inspired and ready to tackle some of these issues (at a very elementary appropriate level) in my classroom.

Two of my favorite resources that deal with these types of ideas are the Getty’s Sprial Art and PBS’s Art 21 series. If you are unfamiliar with these wonderful resources, I highly suggest taking the time to become familiar with them.

In my next life, or maybe even later on on this life, I would love to become an illustator. While surfing around the web for inspiration, I came across Signature Illustration. What’s nice about this site is how its creator posts lots of thumbnail images of different illustrators’ artwork. This format really helps to give a complete picture of different illustration styles.

If you’re not familiar with Craig Roland’s site The Art Teacher’s Guide to the Internet, you should be. His most recent post showcases 10 art advocacy videos. It’s unfortunate that art teachers have to sell the importance of Art. How many CEOs or engineers make videos about the importance of business or Science? In the current economic climate of budget cuts and job losses, it’s even more critical to make the value of the Arts known.

I wold love to hear about examples of how you all are taking a stand for art in your community.

Living and teaching in Asia painfully reminds me of how inadequate my knowledge of non-western art is. I can rattle off movements and artists from Europe and the Americas without blinking an eye, but given the same challenge with non-Western art, nothing but the sound of silence would fill the air.

While it is impossible for art teachers to cover art created by all the peoples of the world over thousands of years in their classrooms, I do think it is our responsibility to make more of an effort. Often times, art from places such as Africa, Asia, and the Middle East are included in the curriculum as “special multicultural units.” While this is a noble attempt to expand our students’ knowledge of art, it simply doesn’t cut it. Art from areas such as the ones mentioned above should be incorporated into all lessons done throughout the year. Wouldn’t a lesson on landscape painting be more effective if students compared and contrasted  European and Asia images of nature? How might a student’s understanding of pattern might change after looking at textiles from America and Africa?

In order to start filling in the holes of my own art knowledge, I am starting to compile a list of online resources. Seeing I live in China, my stop is Asian art. I came across a link to San Francisco’s Asian Art Museum on the Asian Region Art Educators website and thought this was a great site to share. The museum’s education section has a series of very informative and very free PDFs on art from all over Asia. They are worth checking out.

If anyone has other good Asian art resources, please send me the link and I will post it to this site for others to see.

I came across this art history site today as I was clicking around the internet. It is a collection of different art history links, as well as lesson plans. It’s one to add to your bookmarks.

If you’re looking for a new creative way to pass the time, Bomomo is the online application for you!

My new favorite way to pass time….Street Art Locator

Julie over at Miss Julie’s Art School listed me under her “Wonderful Blogger” list. I am very flattered! As part of accepting this acknowledgment, I am supposed to list my top 15 blogs. I hate to say it, but I’m breaking the rules a bit. (That’s my job. I’m an art teacher!)

Below is my list of 12, not 15, blogs and wikis.

The Carrot Revolution
Drawn
The Art Teacher’s Guide to the Internet
Art Ed 2.0
Asian Regional Art Educators
Art Inspired
Learning IT
Art 21
Boing Boing
Daily Dose of Imagery
Urban Sketchers
AestheTECH

Although, I love teaching in China and wouldn’t want to be doing anything else at this point, at times I really miss teaching in New York. One of the things that I loved about being in New York was the tremendous amount of cultural resources that my students and I had at our finger tips. NYCkidsARTS summarizes all the great instutions that NYC has to offer. I wish there was a resource like this for Shanghai.

A co-worker sent the link the Earth Album around school today. At this point in time I’m kind of wishing he didn’t. I can tell by the amazing, high quality photos that can be found on this site that I will be spending a good chunk of time browsing this site instead of attending to the large amount of work that has managed to pile up on my desk.