Education Through Participation: The Contemporary Terrain of Socio-pedagogic Art (original) (raw)

2019, Shapes of Knowledge

What does it mean for art to be pedagogical? Since the early 2000s, a number of terms such as ‘artist educator’, ‘artist activist’, ‘socially engaged artist’, ‘artist researcher’ and ‘curator artist’ have emerged to signal a shift in the direction of critical art practice, revolving around the common question: ‘How are we shaped by what we know?’ This turn towards what I will call ‘socio-pedagogic art’ is the focus of Shapes of Knowledge, an exhibition that reflects on, and stages, the various ways in which artists around the globe produce and impart knowledge. What this exhibition ultimately showcases is the ambitious deployment of hybrid methodologies in art today, involving artists and cultural producers more interested in education than transgression, in productive dialogue rather than denunciation.

A Politics of Knowledge in Contemporary Art?, in Performance Research 21/6, 2016

The picture of contemporary art's teleology amounting to its frictionless circulation as knowledge commodity might prove exaggerated, yet it does provoke the question as to where art's potential role as a critical agent across the networked spaces of knowledge capitalism is to be located. The article aims at charting some of the current predicaments of contemporary art's entanglement with a global knowledge economy and the ensuing politics of knowledge. The issue of contemporary art's organization in institutions of education and knowledge production is being raised and later exemplified in a brief recapitulation of the conceptual framing of artist Fernando García-Dory's ‘para-institutional’ INLAND project.

Art, Artists and Pedagogy

Art, Artists and Pedagogy, 2017

This volume has been brought together to generate new ideas and provoke discussion about what constitutes arts education in the 21st century, both within the institution and beyond. Art, Artists and Pedagogy is intended for educators who teach the arts from early childhood to tertiary level, artists working in the community, or those studying arts in education from undergraduate to Masters or PhD level. From the outset, this book is not only about arts in practice but also about what distinguishes the ‘arts’ in education. Exploring two different philosophies of education, the book asks what the purpose of the arts is in education in the 21st century. With specific reference to the work of Gert Biesta, questions are asked as to the relation of the arts to the world and what kind of society we may wish to envisage. The second philosophical set of ideas comes from Deleuze and Guattari, looking in more depth at how we configure art, the artist, and the role played by the state and global capital in deciding on what art education has become. This book provides educators with new ways to engage with arts, focusing specifically on art, music, dance, drama and film studies. At a time when many teachers are looking for a means to re-assert the role of the arts in education this text provides many answers with reference to case studies and in-depth arguments from some of the world’s leading academics in the arts, philosophy and education.

Hidden agendas and utopian wanderings: Trying to be conscious of epistemological challenges and errors in doing research in art education

arted.uiah.fi

Through my doctoral research at the University of Art and Design in Helsinki I aim to get a better insight in the epistemological foundations of arts-based environmental education. I have termed my research an “ethnographically informed inquiry,” as I want to both make use of my academic background as cultural anthropologist and to employ typical ethnographic methods such as action research and participant observation. In the context of this bundle – provocatively entitled “Let’s get confused” – authors discuss the prevailing paradigm (or lack of a paradigm) of research in art education at our university. In my contribution I want to analyze and discuss some features of my study which I view as being challenging and possibly point at paradigmatic tensions. Perhaps the issues raised in this paper, which pertain to my own particular research, have – mutatis mutandis – also something to say for the field as a whole.

Loading...

Loading Preview

Sorry, preview is currently unavailable. You can download the paper by clicking the button above.