Art for Art’s Sake
From my early experiences in school, I had an innate connection to visual lessons, illustrations in books, and discussions of art. My kindergarten teachers often framed art and mindfulness together in order to ground me back in the classroom and help me re-engage with the lessons at hand through drawing or other art expressions. These early foundations with art gave me insight into how art could be a tool to empower my learning. Whether that be a self-soothing grounding activity, a way to build confidence through my work that I could carry into the general classroom, or as an expression of what I didn’t yet have the literary tools to verbalize.
I first experienced art education as an exploration and ‘tasting’ through different mediums and techniques, and distinctly remember the encouragement and support from my elementary art teacher that inspired me to continue pursuing painting and guided me into middle school art education.
I experienced art education quite differently in middle school and high school. Art became a ‘narrowing in’ on the skills I had most refined, and I had amazing educators that guided me along that journey. In ninth grade, I was introduced to oil paint, and my incredible art teacher at the time gave me an insight into the creative process that changed the way I viewed art. With a uniquely temperamental medium in my hands, my teacher briefly overviewed the basics, told me to explore the material, and use what I knew to learn the process, she told me she was behind me if I had questions. I thought that asking questions in any capacity, in the art room or in other disciplines, was a form of defeat, but after this lesson, my mind was completely changed. Somewhere into trying to wash oil paint with sink water, my teacher stopped me, and reminded me it is okay to not know.
Not knowing in art was scary, but from that point forward I didn’t hesitate to ask when I was unsure, and art provided me with another tool for my tool kit, and I carried this throughout the entirety of my education.
I believe art should be taught for art’s sake because it provides an understanding of the creative process that is applicable across disciplines and life. My experience with art is often focused on the materiality of the process and feeling lost in the material and process of making. These tangible experiences are necessary for unlocking some of the many tools for mindfulness that art can provide students with. Teaching art in terms of the materiality, technique, history, and process of art offers a direct path into the creative process, and the power that is given when students are able to experience and accept iteration and unexpected outcomes in art is invaluable. Additionally, art for art’s sake allows for skills and habits of mind that often become more inflexible in later years of education to be malleable and experimented with because of the expression and flexibility of creative media. In my experience, in middle and high school, experimentation and risk-taking slowly becomes less routine as the curriculum intensifies, and playfulness is not as prominent in school spaces. I believe in art for art’s sake because it creates a space where experimentation is necessary, and habits of mind that may have felt solidified can once again become malleable and evolve.