Antoinette Badenhorst on fri 20 aug 04
Vince wrote:
"We need to work to make art as accessible as possible. The term
"artist" does not necessarily imply skill or training. It just refers
to someone who makes art. There is no qualitative judgement there. It
might be bad art, but the maker is still an artist."
I think I know what you mean Vince, but we need to be careful not to
make it sound like changing the meaning of what people in general call
art. It is true that there is good and bad art, but if someone refers to
someone as an artist, it generally means that there is some esthetic
value visible in the persons work. I do think we need to be careful to
simplify the term to a point where it has no specific meaning any more.
Vince also said:
"Like I said, we need to make art as accessible as possible, and we need
to get away from the concept of an exclusive, highly trained clique of
artists who have some higher level of understanding that the plebian
public cannot understand. If we make art more accessible, then it will
be easier for people to understand art."
I can not agree with you more Vince, but then the question comes up:
"Where should we start?" In my view it does not start with a student in
school or in college, it starts the very first time that a child ask an
adult to help them correct something that they creates. The big mistake
that adults make is to tell the child that there is nothing wrong with
their creation. Children are the big observers of the world and if you
as an adult tell them there is nothing wrong with what they've made and
they observe differently, you do not give them a message of " there is
nothing wrong" You give them a message of "you can not do that". In my
view that is where "highly trained clique of artists" start.....with a
lack in confidence in what they do/believe. Children with an interest in
expressing themselves through the arts will develop spontaneously if the
world out there gives them room to do so. They will gain the confidence
to get formal training and will not be threaten by the rules of arts
expression.
The same thing will happen with people that want to associate with art,
but who are not, or do not want to be artists. They will have the
confidence to be natural about it and will not be pretentious about art.
I am a typical prey of the theory above. My mother was an untrained
"artist" Everybody referred to her as an artist, but it was way above
me. I was never stimulated to express myself through the arts as a child
and I always thought it is something too exclusive for me to get
involved in. I was many years into pottery (which at the time seemed to
me as something "easy enough" for me to do), before I realized that I
want to express myself through my work, but I never had the confidence
to do so. Today I have 3 children that I've stimulated since they were
very young. One has the confidence to turn anything she lays her hands
on into gold.
The other 2 had no interest in expressing themselves though visual arts.
They express themselves in other fields.
Long stories; fact of the matter is to give children opportunities from
very young to discover their "preference of expression". Do we succeed
in that or do we fail? Do we succeed in some areas like music and
literature, but sadly fail with the visual arts with the poor excuse
that there is no money available for the visual arts?
Antoinette Badenhorst
105 Westwood Circle
Saltillo MS
38866
662 869 1651
www.clayandcanvas.com
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