Learning

LearningCP

#academic, #un-learning, #awareness, #constellation

‘Learning’ is defined as the process of acquiring knowledge or skills through study, experience, or being taught.

As James Elkins exposes in his book Why art cannot be taught (2001), such an educational process is not as straightforward in the context of art academies. Being himself a professor of art history, theory, and criticism, at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Elkins voices criticism from within. He reveals the tension between the art institution—which claims to be capable of teaching art—and the difficulty teachers and students face when attempting to pinpoint exactly what it is that is taught to produce ‘good’ art/artists.

Amidst Elkins’ institutional critique and his attempts to analyse rationally what is taking place in art classes, he concludes that what happens in the teaching of art is irrational and that it therefore can’t be rationalised in order to ‘improve it’. He describes his own position as skeptic and pessimistic, not believing that what we know about art teaching is a good base to decide on any course of action regarding changes in the curriculum, as well as believing that any course of action will just make it worse.

If, as described in the Master Artistic Research’s reading document, one parts from the understanding that ‘artworks and artists often get credited as ‘good’ when they are about liminality, interstices, ambiguity, deviancy, or non-normativity’, which is something I personally agree with, then it would not be surprising that a big part of what plays a role in the production of ‘good art’ is not under the control of academies

Maxim coming from Vladimir Bartol’s book Alamut, Slovenia: Scala House Press, 1938.

1 (the institution). From that perspective one could even propose that ‘not being fully determined by institutional education’ is an inherent precondition of ‘good art’. Therefore, any attempt to analyse rationally or quantify the effect of art learning on ‘good art’ would be by nature impossible, considering the artist/student would be submitted to other meaningful influences that can’t be overseen by teachers or institutions, at any given point. It is because of this that one would have to agree with Elkins, that the process of art learning is an obscure one.

In order to defend this, I would emphasise my own experience. Despite the fact that in art academies one is able to access specialised knowledge, critical thinking, and share reflections with colleagues that deal with similar experiences and vocabulary, learning takes place outside of the art academy as much as it does within it. Being observant to the dynamics that occur in daily situations, conversations, politics, discussions, experiences, which sets one to think, feel, imagine, and process information, can be as urging and enriching as the experience within the institution. I believe the dynamics that occur within and outside of the academy are inseparable and interdependent, as they feed each other in complex ways that are not easily discernible.

Despite this it seems to me that Elkins is trying to understand or analyse art learning in a rather linear way, where the idea of constellations and dialectics would be more suitable. Understanding those—as Bishop pinpoints in her book Radical Museology: Or What’s Contemporary in Museums of Contemporary Art?—as an amalgamation of many factors that continuously relate to each other and interact with each other, be it power structures, educational traditions, or histories, both the personal and collective ones.

There is one aspect that I consider essential in art learning within academies. Namely, acquiring awareness of the underlying forces, motivations, limitations, and impositions in one’s artistic practice that allow the artist to act responsibly, according to her/his position, and respectfully towards oneself and others.

Another aspect that seems key to me in art learning is the process of unlearning. Societies stand on narratives that we construct and believe in collectively throughout the years, which is also the case for the arts. Keeping this is mind can only empower and encourage us to un-narrate and stop believing when necessary, and create space (if used responsibly) for the axiom: ‘Nothing is absolute reality; everything is permitted’1 .