teaching art as if the world mattered || it's catch-up time for aesthetics

National Art Education Association

It's Catch-Up Time for AestheticsAuthor(s): John HicksSource: Art Education, Vol. 52, No. 4, Teaching Art as if the World Mattered (Jul., 1999), pp.42-46Published by: National Art Education AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3193773 .

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v BY JOHN HICKS

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he aesthetic. Aesthetic education. What are they? Should they fit into an art classroom, and if so how?

The answer to "should they fit" has been a resounding "yes" for over 30 years, but the impact in the classroom and with a suspicious public has been negligible. The purpose of this article is help clarify and refocus the role of aesthetic education for art teachers and to help justify and promote art to a public that has never absorbed the idea that art is a basic content area in

schools. Leaders in art education have been wrestling with these questions for years but no one has formed an answer that attacks the misinformation and stereotypes about art and art education which are so pervasive in the public domain.

One limitation for overcoming the lack of status in art education is based on the perpetuation of the Aesthetic Movement of the 1880s that focused on "art for art's sake."' The art for art's sake philosophy is still a primary mission in many art classrooms, and the public most often considers art as either elitist, i.e., in art museums or for

rich collectors, or only fit for the crafts room at the local community center.

A second limitation is how we define aesthetic. The age-old definition used in journals and research studies, and with which most art teachers operate, is more geared to the 19th century than it is to the postmodern, late 20th century. Traditionally, aesthetic is defined as being concerned with beauty or the appreciation of beauty. It is thought of as the philosophy of the beautiful, especially in art (Oxford Dictionary, 1991). However, Feldman (1987) stated

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,i



that aesthetic needs are not limited to artists or the elite: "Most of us are interested in harmonious forms wherever they can be found-in people, in nature, and in objects of daily use" (p. 36).

Moore (1994) expressed that the art in question, including the aesthetic, is the art of the living no less than art of the gallery (p. 6). Eaton (1994) reinforced Moore's point of view by stating that the context of the aesthetic experience includes the society in which art is located as well as the art world (p. 21). Ross (1984) acknowledged that "aesthetic knowing" provides legitimacy for art in the school and that aesthetic education should not be restricted to or identified only with the arts (p. 31). Smith (1986) stated "that a feeling of active discovery and exploration" can be a feature of aesthetic experience (p. 22). And Dobbs (1998) referred to aesthetic as a kind of experience one can have with any phenomenon (p. 46).

The broad sense of these points includes the multiplicity and complexity of social options and choices we face every day. Those options and choices force decisions; decisions increasingly are based on the aesthetic, along with convenience, economics, and entertainment (Gabler, 1998). Smith (1986) centers attention and importance not only on the uniqueness of art but also on art's "relation to life" (p. 24). The failure to recognize the relations of art to life and to current social change has been a major omission in the evolution of art education, a void we must fill if the public is to accept art as basic to education.

The focus of art education by experts for the past 100 years has been

placed on the art object. This emphasis remains important but, ironically, is hindering the field. What we see in the art world and society is a need to consider not only objects, but images, environments, scale, contexts, and the proliferation of categories of objects as well as increasing numbers of objects within these categories. The proliferation of objects, images, categories, and diverse environments can be frustrating for viewers and users of them, but the growing range of diverse items that surround us has increased the importance of the aesthetic and, as a result, art education.

A philosophical or pedagogical definition of aesthetics is as impossible to determine as a single definition of art. There are as many definitions of aesthetics as there are essays written by the experts. Of the four discipline- based content areas, aesthetics is the least understood, the most difficult to define, and "the most difficult art- related discipline to teach" (Stokrocki, 1998, p. 1). Art teachers are comfortable with studio processes and outcomes. They have become much more comfortable teaching art history since the 1960s, but knowledge of art criticism and aesthetics still create a sense of anxiety for most art teachers.

There are answers that can be helpful, however. Geahigan (1998) provided the context of confronting contrary opinions, comparing, and selecting. White (1998) created charts or "aesthetigrams" which include various aspects of learning about aesthetics. Battin (1994) included puzzles, dilemmas, and problems, and Stewart (1994) mentioned "meaningful engagement" as necessary for students to learn about aesthetics. This

nomenclature and these contexts are positive directions meant to get students involved directly with art criticism and aesthetics; however, a refocusing of education in aesthetics based on current social trends rather than historic context could be most helpful. Art teachers should learn to take advantage of the support for art education taking place in our society.

NEW REAL-WORLD SUPPORT FOR AESTHETIC EDUCATION

T. Irene Sanders. T. Irene Sanders, Sanders & Company, has worked with Fortune 500 companies, international groups and nonprofit organizations, and provided consulting service to foreign governments and members and committees of the United States Congress. She has written a book (1998) that provides outstanding advocacy for art education. The book is intended to help corporate executives with future planning using her strategic thinking model and consulting expertise. Of possible interest to art teachers is the major focus on the process of visual thinking.2

It should be more than a passing interest for art teachers to know that Sanders believes we are a visual society. In her quest for answers about what prevents the public from seeing the importance of the visual world she said: "I believe the primary reason is that we don't know how to see or visualize the multiple complexities- relationships, connections, patterns of interaction, and subtle changes-that are creating the dynamics of the real world" (p. 85). Obviously, art teachers teach students how to see. The problem lies with a public that cannot understand or absorb the current visual paradigm or the pervasiveness of a visual and increasingly aesthetic culture. The public likes its visual and

JULY 1999 / ART EDUCATION



aesthetic world but cannot accept it as an important element of education.

Sanders has made a major case for art as a content area in the schools when she said: "Visualization is the key to insight and foresight-and the next revolution in strategic thinking and planning" (p. 84). One interpretation of that comment would be that every high school and college or university business department or major should include at least one art component as part of their academic program. If this were to occur, one might expect the status of art education to improve. One of her comments made in a letter to me after her book was published should give art educators pause: "I have to say that over the years as I worked to develop my own thinking about the value of art in consulting...I have not found many who expressed the business reasons for arts education...and have wondered, why not?"3 I have wondered "why not?" also, since the early part of the 1980s. The bottom line is that Sanders is a supporter of art education and she has a world of advocacy material to offer.

Bernd Schmitt andAlex Simonson. "Value is provided only by satisfying needs. In a world in which most consumers have their basic needs satisfied, value is easily provided by satisfying customers' experiential needs-their aesthetic needs" (Schmitt & Simonson, 1997, p. 3). Schmitt and Simonson refer to aesthetics as the new marketing paradigm in the business world. Traditional organizations provide products but today's cutting-edge organizations focus on the aesthetic experience because the product is a "given," that is, the expected. Selling the sizzle has become more important than selling the steak (p. 15).

The branding phase of marketing is being replaced by marketing aesthetics (Schmitt & Simonson, 1997, p. 18). "Marketing aesthetics draws from three disparate areas: (a) product design, (b) communications research, and (c) spatial design" (p. 19). Gelernter (1997) expressed that the ultimate defense against complexity is beauty. The authors reinforce this viewpoint by saying that aesthetic understanding is needed in order to cut through information clutter (p. 21). Everyone in an organization (business or agency) must be aware of-taught to speak the language of-aesthetics (Schmitt & Simonson, 1997, p. 41).4 The importance of a variety of experts who are needed to create aesthetic spaces and identities are mentioned. Included are artists, graphic designers, architects, interior designers, landscape architects, copywriters, and art directors.

Here is an example of the growing connections between art and other content areas in an Information Age. Art, visual imagery, visual literacy, aesthetics, and art education are becoming more important as survival elements in our post-modem society, but the public has not been taught to absorb these changes. And, I am sorry to say, it seems that not enough art teachers are absorbing these changes either. Traditional attitudes or historic paradigms continue to rule. The following section provides ammunition for aesthetic education, based on a look at aesthetics in the "real world" of the 1990s.

REAL-WORLD AESTHETICS IN THE 1990S

Aesthetics, or consideration of the beautiful, has been an inherent part of our lives for at least 30,000 years. In the United States, however, the frontier

and Puritan ethics relegated aesthetics to the back burner, and because of our necessary attention to survival, sometimes it was not even placed on the stove. When living on a survival level, our thoughts and energies were expended on such basics as food, shelter, and clothing. Once survival was assured, or at least had gone beyond immediate concern, our attention focused on the aesthetic. Bateson (1979) indicated that the two great untouched questions involve consciousness and aesthetics. Consciousness may still be an untouched question, but such is not the case for aesthetics.

The common phrase, "form follows function" is now called into question. It has become obsolete, and should read instead "function follows form." The reason for this is that product function has become a "given," that is, it is no longer of primary concern. We rarely kick tires anymore nor do we turn a chair upside down to check quality or craftsmanship. Cars work, CD players work, TVs work, kitchen stoves work, digital watches with seven modes work, and telephones work (most of the time).

In 1986, columnist George Will chided General Motors for making the mistake of thinking that Americans regard cars as mere objects of transportation. He said that cars are instruments of self-expression, just as are sexual fantasies. For a conservative columnist to speak that way was startling, and of course, GM soon caught up with the fantasies of other auto makers. With the advent of the Information Age, the aesthetic has increasingly encompassed every facet




of our lives and not just those in an academic, "high brow" context. Individual identity and personalization has moved the average person, as well as the artist, into the realm of aesthetics. The aesthete has become you and your neighbor as well as the curator of an art museum.

Eye Glasses. Perhaps one of the most obvious examples of the evolution from function to form can be "seen" through our glasses. At one time, wearing glasses was not highly popular. "Four eyes" was a term used by children and it signified weakness. Now, nearly everyone wears glasses at one time or another, and often for different reasons. Movie stars and others in the entertainment business wear glasses for self-image or ego to set them apart, in order to abstract themselves from the masses. Now many youngsters, adolescents, and yuppies are doing the same thing.

Today there is little concern about prescription accuracy and frame functionality. They are automatic and workable. The point is, we don't select glasses for survival. We select them for identity, feeling good about self, and for aesthetic reasons. Advertisements on television indicate that fitting glasses includes a recognition of style, identity, and personality.

To help fulfill our aesthetic desires, we can purchase dark glasses, non- reflective lenses, lenses which change from dark to light or from one color to another, bifocals, trifocals, bifocals or trifocals which progressively flow from one vision field to the next without "lines," contact lenses, contact lenses which you use once and throw away, and different colored contact lenses you can wear for different occasions and with different clothing. You can even buy contact lenses which make

your eyes look like a tiger or a snake. To further satisfy discriminating egos, Gucci frames are available.

Bathrooms. Few people of our day remember the wooden frame privy. Dark scary nights, spiders, and extra cold winter trips were the rule. There were plenty of flies in the summer and an occasional blacksnake. Sears and Roebuck catalogs were not the rule as the stereotype sometimes indicates. Such was rural, Midwestern life in the early 1930s. But things have changed.

Today the interior designer often attempts to bring the outdoor environment into the bathroom, and vice versa, without the inconvenience of flies and spiders. In some cases, spas or pools are connected inside as well as outside with the bathroom. The indoor- outdoor concept integrates the desire for natural beauty with the convenience and inclusion of high-tech equipment. Natural sounds and visual scenes may emanate from sophisticated equipment. Communication to other rooms is a possibility. A telephone is a must for many. "His and her" baths are fairly common and hot tubs or whirlpools may exist as well. Murals are increasing in number as is the likelihood of exercise equipment. The size of bathrooms keeps growing. There were houses in rural Kansas during the Depression years that were smaller than some of the bathrooms being built today.

The desire to create a relaxing, convenient environment is matched by the desire to create one that is beautiful. If one wants to create a personal statement in the form of a bathroom-entertainment- recreation center, then the sharing must include aesthetics. Our bathrooms have

become art installations. With rare exceptions, we no longer choose to freeze in the winter and fight spiders in the summer.

CONCLUSION We continue to be inundated by

examples of "real world" aesthetics. At one time, nice lawns with plenty of green grass was the goal of most homeowners. Now, our yards have become sculpture parks. Home owners tend to be much more individual and creative as they attend to rock gardens, Japanese gardens, ornamental grasses, fountains, pools, shade gardens, and wildflower meadows. Beauty has taken center stage. Rocks are in, but not for survival.

The ambiance of restaurants often is more important than the quality of the food. Dining out has become an art or theater performance within an architectural setting. Grocery stores have moved beyond just selling a few survival items, such as in a "wild west" general store of the 1880s.5 New mega- stores of the 1990s display products from around the world as well as many sections of the United States. Fresh vegetables and fruits are " in season" every day. Over 1,000 new grocery products can be seen on shelves every year. This inundation of choices creates the necessity to make decisions, and decision making means more involvement with aesthetics. The result is that products have to be well designed or they do not sell. Even new grocery stores must be well designed today. Algebra remains important in most of our lives only indirectly; the aesthetic has taken center stage. The public loves the options and aesthetic opportunities presented in today's world, yet cannot make the cognitive or emotional leap into accepting art and art education as important.

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Two recent books from the business community have been cited previously as being excellent support for art education. This commendation by the business world is not new. Books by Tom Peters, John Naisbitt, and many others, including Bill Gates, have provided material that supports art teachers.6 An example of business support would be the small furniture company in the mid-1980s, with which I am familiar, that hired eight new staff members. Prior to that time the company had had no artists on staff, but seven of the new employees were artists. How could such a thing happen? The company went from selling furniture to selling aesthetic environments. Art had been "nice but not essential," art is now seen as necessary for competing with other companies; it became a survival component for the company. The old stereotype that artists and business people live in different worlds had become obsolete.7

The viewpoint that art is not basic to our society has become obsolete as well. Aesthetics defined as "beautiful art object" is thought of by the public as nice but not essential. As a consequence, art teachers are thought of as nice but not essential. Aesthetics defined as social need, social requirement, and even social survival might be thought of by the public as essential and nice. Just maybe, as a result, art teachers could be thought of as essential. "Art education must help the public realize how art and visual imagery are affecting all our lives and how increasing aesthetic decision making throughout our culture provides an ever stronger case for art" (Rufer, Lake, Robinson, & Hicks, 1998, p. 51).

John M. Hicks is ProfessorEmeritus at Drake University, Des Moines, IA.

REFERENCES Amheim, R (1969). Visual thinking. Berkeley,

CA: University of California Press. Bateson, G. (1979). Mind and nature: A

necessary unity. Toronto: Bantam Books. Battin, M. (1994). Cases for kids: Using

puzzles to teach aesthetics to children, The Journal ofAesthetic Education, 28 (3), 89- 104, Champaign, IL: The University of Illinois Press.

Dobbs, S. (1998). Learning in and through art: A guide to discipline-based art education, Los Angeles: The Getty Education Institute for the Arts.

Eaton, M. (1994). Philosophical aesthetics: A way of knowing and its limits, The Journal ofAesthetic Education, 28(3), 19-31.

Feldman, E. (1987). Varieties ofvisual experience (3rd ed.)Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc.

Gabler, N (1998). Life the movie: How entertainment conquered reality. New York: Knopf.

Geahigan, G. (1998). From procedures, to principles, and beyond: Implementing critical inquiry in the classroom, Studies in Art Education, 39 (4), 293-308.

Gelemter, D. (1997, September). Truth, beauty, and the virtual machine. Discover, 18 (9), 72-77.

Moore, R (1994). Aesthetics for young people: Problems and prospects,Journal of Aesthetic Education, 28 (3), 5-18.

Oxford encyclopedic English dictionary (1991). NewYork: Oxford University Press.

Ross, M. (1984), The aesthetic impulse, Elmsford, NY: Pergamon Press.

Rufer, L, Lake, B., Robinson, E., & Hicks, J. (1998). Stretching our boundaries and breaking barriers to the public mind. Art Education, 51(3), 43-51.

Sanders, T. (1998). Strategic thinking and the new science: Planning in the midst of chaos, complexity, and change. New York: The Free Press.

Schmitt, B., & Simonson, A. (1997). Marketing aesthetics: The strategic management of brands, identity, and image. New York: The Free Press.

Smith, R (1986). Excellence in art education: Ideas and initiatives. Reston, VA: National Art Education Association.

Stewart, M. (fall 1994). Aesthetics and the art curriculum.Journal ofAesthetic Education, 28 (3), 77-88.

Stokrocki, M. (Spring 1998), Introduction to aesthetics: A strategy for helping students determine "What is a work of art?," Part I, NAEA Advisory, Reston, VA: National Art Education Association.

White, B. (Summer 1998). Aesthetigrams: Mapping aesthetic experiences, Studies in Art Education, 39 (4), 321-335.

NOTES "Sentimental archaism as the ideal of beauty

was carried to extravagant lengths", (1991). The Oxford Encyclopedic English Dictionary, p. 21, New York, Oxford University Press.

2The author, T. Irene Sanders, lists Rudolf Arnheim's classic book, Visual Thinking (1969) in the bibliography but his name or work is not mentioned anywhere else. Her reasoning is that his work is not directly relevant to the business context which she provided for readers (personal letter, May 20, 1998).

3Personal letter, T. Irene Sanders, May 20, 1998.

4The original source cited by Schmitt and Simonson was: 'Trends around the World," Design Management Journal, Spring 1996.

'In the movie Shane, Grafton's general store had very few grocery items. One could buy salt, hard candy for children, maybe sugar and coffee. Local produce was available sometimes on a seasonal basis only.

'Gates, B. (1995). The road ahead. New York: Penquin Books; Naisbitt, J., and Aburdene, P. (1990) Megatrends 2000: Ten new directions for the 1990's. New York: Avon Books; and Peters, T. (1992). Liberation management: Necessary disorganization for the nanosecond nineties. New York: Knopf.

7Hicks, J. (1993). Technology and aesthetic education: A crucial synthesis. Art Education 19, (6).

-(1987). Missed trends by the futurists: Socio-aesthetic connections. Das bild der welt in der welt der bilder. Hamburg, West Germany. International Society for Education Through Art (INSEA).

This idea of "mapping" or visualizing thoughts, ideas and experiences is used by T. Irene Sanders in her strategic management sessions.




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