Responses - Brief Article

I am writing in response to your issue addressing studio art education and practice (vol. 58, no. 1, Spring 1999); my apologies for the belatedness of this response, but I hope that this might provide a few final thoughts on a lively topic and important issue of Art Journal.

The topic of art education and the impact it has on our culture has interested me for quite some time; I have been working with Lucio Pozzi for a number of years on a history of art education in the twentieth (now, of course, also twenty-first century). I hope that those working in the field of teaching do not limit their work to only what happens in the classroom, or the impact they might have on the small portion of graduates who "become artists" at the expense of reaching art to folks as a major component of everyday life.

While many people are enrolled, attend, and even graduate from art schools, colleges, and university programs in the fine arts, only a small percentage of these students will go on to pursue careers m the arts as painters, sculptors, actors, and writers. Of those who do graduate and practice their art (and there are a lot out there: 300,000 people put "artist" as their occupation on their New York State tax returns), a small percentage will exhibit in a gallery; of those who are currently exhibiting, a small percent will be active in five years.

Many of the others will be the very people who become museum patrons, theater attendees, movie-goers, and so on. The inevitable attrition creates an art-aware population, an educated audience, engaged alongside practicing artists who will share their ideas and value their contributions. Emile Zola wrote, "the artist must choose to be of his time"; this implies, however, that that time will pass, and those timely artists will be largely relegated to footnotes in history. Being of one's tine means being in the moment, engaging in the world of art in a multitude of ways.

We have to come to understand the unique place the arts have in the educational and social process--not only as the fountainhead of creativity and inspiration but also as an essential means of communication. Equally important, however, is recognizing that teaching involves the whole person--whose interest in art is just one facet of an individual. In the classroom students and instructors alike should be actively involved in thinking about and developing a lifelong interest in art. Joseph Beuys said: "I am pleading for a gradual realization that there is no other way except that people should be artistically educated. This artistic education alone provides a sound base for an efficient society. The achievements of our society are channeled and determined by power relationships. But it is not just a few who are called to determine how the world will be changed--but everyone. In a true democracy, there are no other differences than capability; democracy can only develop freely when all restrictive mechanisms a re gone.... The future social order will take its shape from compatibility with the theoretical principles of art."

Expanding beyond the traditional letter to the editor, we invite readers to offer substantive commentary on material presented in previously published articles. Our goal is to create an open space for a vital exchange of ideas among our readers about the art of our time by stimulating dialogue and debate about significant issues raised by our authors.

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