Youth-Art and Peace

Are 6933: 166D: Artistic Development. Study of Youth-Created Art

By Ana C. Robles, Fall 2013.

YOUTH-ART AND PEACE • Ana R., Mix Media.

Youth-Art and Peace A curated collection of art pieces created from children all over the world to send a message of peace and love. All of these artists participated in the United Nation Art for Peace Contest, organized by United Nation Office for Disarmament Affair and the Harmony for Peace Foundation in 2012. For more info: http://www.unartforpeace.org

I based my youth art study in twenty-four images taken from The Art For Peace Contest in 2012, sponsored

by United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs and The Harmony for Peace Foundation. Their website, shows an online gallery with thousands of art pieces from children from all over the world. Their selection included boys and girls from ages 5 to 17 years old, where artists used a variety of techniques such as drawing, paint, sketch, pencils, crayon, charcoal, oil, acrylic or watercolor. Although the range in culture, age and technique is wide, one thing unified this contest, the idea of recreating a world free of nuclear weapons, bombs, wars and fears. Is there anything I can learn through this study of youth art and peace? I guess more that I could imagine.

According to Karen Hamblen (1984), artistic perception involves articulation of visual forms by an artist and reactions from the viewer of those forms. For today’s purpose, I will act as the viewer and those children who participated in the contest will be the artists that

express their fears and wishes. To curate these twenty-four pieces, I relied on my aesthetic literacy and experience to make a fair judge of their art expression.

Michael Parsons once quoted, “We have to learn…that artworks can be expressive of states of mind, that the detailed handling of the medium and the form can be significant, that artworks can reflect something of their time, that their meaning is affected by their place in their tradition and culture, that we can look at them as aesthetic objects…(1990, p.137)”.

With his thought, Parson made a call to viewers to understand artworks as a whole, not only as an aesthetic piece but also to consider their cultural and sub-cultural, international, social, political, and psychological context. The Art for Peace artworks I chose, as part of my own study

of youth-created art, are an outstanding way of seeing the world unify through art and peace. Many of those works are expressive forms of art, reach in content, color, originality, and quality.

While analyzing my collection, I noticed a few similarities in the pieces that I chose. The first thing I noticed is that most of them show and compare the contrast between peace and war. The areas were colored according to each theme; the peaceful or happy areas were full of color while the war ones where scattered on color. Moreover, most of the drawings showed unity among people around the world and a good amount of

WORLD PEACE • Алина Н., Russia, 16.

WE HAVE NO NUCLEAR WEAPONS • Karyna, Belarus, 16.

detail. These pieces lean towards the figurative expressionist and their composition marked a statement of involvement with the subject. I was amazed that even when these artists came from such different cultures, backgrounds and ages, their art pieces showed so many similarities. World itself, according to Eisner (1978), can be regarded as a source of aesthetic experience and as a pool of expressive form, he wrote, “Paint is a way of looking at life” (p. 10) and what a better example than this art pieces. These kids indeed depicted the world around them.

On the other hand, these art pieces show

differences in cultural art influences, concepts and technique performance.

Amazingly, gender speaking did not show too much difference, not in subject matter, realism level, expressiveness, or drawing skills. Actually, many of the pieces that seemed to have been made by a boy, were actually designed by girls and vise versa. Culturally speaking there were three pieces that showed a distinct artistic cultural influence from Ukraine, Russia and Colombia. Definitely most of the older children demonstrated a more advanced technique performance than the younger ones, but some of the young ones had amazing drawing and technique skills–as in the case of Zhihan L. from china who used oil pastels in an amazing way in his picture We Love Peace, or the case of the girl Olha from Ukraine, a six year old, who depicted a detailed piece called Not Burn My World with such expressiveness that makes you check her age twice.

cached my attention, either for their developed and powerful meaning or for the media and aesthetic performance. A Belarus girl creates the first one, almost an advertisement poster, effective, powerful in meaning and yet to the point.

This sixteen year old limited her palette to reds, oranges and purple on black paper.

Her hands are burning and printed in red, and under her design she wrote the tittle, We have no nuclear weapons.

I also liked Gears of Piece, for the complexity of the content. A twelve-yearold boy from United States created this piece, the drawing was very well done, the color palette well chosen and the meaning is well depicted. I got

I wish I could talk about each of the twentyfour pieces but here I chose six of them that really GEARS OF PEACE • Xiaofei., USA, 12.

hooked by Kerem’s picture, a boy from Turkey that created a black and white image made out of ink and sharpies, were he represented freedom. What I liked about Kerem’s picture is that he depicted a stylish kind of zebra-horse running free through the black and white woods. It is so expressive and abstract at the same time that definitely needed to be part of my collection. The next picture is called Destroy Nuclear Arms, created by an American fourteen year old boy that literally represented two pairs of arms, the good, represented in green, and the evil, represented in black, wrestling; but of course the good arms won over the mean ones. He demonstrated an excellent use of colored pencil technique and complexity of meaning. I have two more pieces to discuss, The Tree of Life by

and almost tells a whole story with each and every element she used.

This piece is colorful and rich in a mixture of techniques like watercolor, ink and colored pencil. She used FREEDOM • Kerem S., Turkey, 12. several elements in a well-balanced fifteen year old Ivan, and composition and she Defense Cooperation by a explained how people from sixteen-year-old girl named different cultures can, Sutatip from Thailand, who together, protect the world actually won third place in from nuclear arms. I am her category. Ivan’s piece absolutely amazed by how was simple in color and much talent a child can have design but fused complexity and how complex their in meaning and performance. design thinking strategies He placed a figure in the could be. I wish I could middle of the paper, know more about how their depicting half tree and half mentors motivate this nuclear bomb on a deserted creative process. field. Meanwhile, Sutatip’s piece is extremely detailed To conclude, what I liked about this project was not only to learn about the artistic child development but the fact of creating my own collection of Youth art to inspire my students and myself. As DESTROY NUCLEAR ARMS • Sebastian Z., USA, 14.

Thompson quoted, “The practice of documentation suggested that teaching and research are inseparable, that to teach is to be in “a state of permanent research” (Gambetti, 2001, p. 118 as quoted in Thompson 2005, p.22).

My original artwork is a mix media based in my thoughs out of this project. I used color pencil, marker and sharpie in a 6”x7” piece that was inspired by my collection of art pieces from

the United Nations Art for Peace Contest. In this picture I represent myself culturally and my view of peace as a child over the world. I illustrated my hands forming and reflecting the shadow of a dove, as in the shadow game for children. My dove became alive, ready to fly.

Pinterest Link: http://www.pinterest.com/acr oblescam/youth-art-andpeace/

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Flannery, K. A., & Watson, M. W. (1995). Sex differences and gender-role differences in children's drawings. Studies in Art Education, 36(2), 114-122.

Fogarty, R. (1999).

Architects of the intellect.

THE TREE OF LIFE • IVAN D., USA, 15.

Educational Leadership, 57(3), 76-78.

Gardner, H. (2004). What we do & don't know about learning. Daedalus, 133(1), 5-12.

Hamblen, K. A. (1984).

Artistic perception as a function of learned expectations. Art Education, 37(3), 20-25.

Parsons, M. (1990).

Aesthetic literacy: The psychological context.

Journal of Aesthetic Education, 24(1), 135-146.

Parsons, M. (2002).

Aesthetic experience and the construction of meanings.

Journal of Aesthetic Education, 36(2), 24-37.

Thompson, C. M. (2005).

Under construction: Images of the child in art teacher education. Art Education, 58(2), 18-23.

DEFENSE COOPERATION • Sutatip, Thailand, 16.