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Art Meets Reality TV

  • Posted on August 5, 2010 at 5:30 pm

You know that feeling you get when you meet someone and they seem really great, perfect in every way and then you find out that they have just been playing you?  Well, I’ve been there in real life much as poor Sarah Palin’s daughter, Bristol, has been when she found out Levi was just not that much into her.  No, I’m not going to pick on poor Bristol.  After all she is just a kid looking for love.  What I’m upset about is the creative programming of two shows that I was meant to fall in love with, HGTV’s “Design Star” and Bravo’s “Work Of Art.  Both of these shows have the makings and potential of something really creative and exciting to watch for people like me, creative types that don’t give a damn about reality TV!  I was in love at the opening credits only to discover that underneath that great façade was some stupid businessman running the show.

The shows both started out with great promise with an individual challenge where you could get a sense of each artist/designer’s concepts and thought process.  Ever since those first shows we have been “treated” to numerous group activities that are most artist’s “HELL”.  Each show has been more interested in personalities that don’t get along then in real design work.  It really is disappointing to watch these group challenges after group challenges with snarky comments from the judges week after week.  On HGTV why did they have to bring in Donald Trump’s son, Donnie Jr., to Design Star last week?

This year is so uninspiring.  In past years the designers were forced to be more creative.  This year I have yet to witness any real creativity on Design Star.  I think the fault has to do with the direction they have decided to take the show.  The three judges, Vern, Geniveve, and Candice are all very talented artists and designers.  They must be in hell themselves for having to judge this “crapfest”.  So what’s wrong with the show?  The “challenges” are so lame that the designers have not been able to show any real creativity.  I feel like they walk through a store and just pick out a bunch of stuff and put it in a room.  There is no thought or imagination!  There is no style.  It’s so boring.  There is nothing notable about any of the wall treatments.  Nothing wonderful is built because most are incompetent like the guy that stapled his art project to the floor.  I could go on and on.  I think they need to have a better art direction or director and fire the producer running it.

The new Bravo show, “Work of Art”, started out just great.  I was blown away and just loved the show.  It has steadily gone down hill since because the show continues to put these artists together on lame group projects, much like Design Star, that end up looking disastrous.  It too is more interested in showing us the “dynamics” behind the artist’s personalities then really letting us into their creative minds.  The show pushes the two “characters” Miles, the man that sleeps all the time and Jaclyn, the, oh so “modest” female that is constantly undressing for the camera in her artwork.  These two together won the last competition supposedly because it was so cerebral it was over most of our heads.  I laugh at the thought of that!  I know all of these artists are talented in their own way.  I think the show needs to allot a bit more time for the art challenges and it needs to let the artists do individual art challenges.  Last night they finally did an individual challenge that left me wondering what the judges were thinking when they kept Peregrine who created a work of art that had drawings that really had no artistic value whatsoever.  Well, I digress as judging art is so subjective that it isn’t fair for me to put my input on this part of the show.  We don’t all appreciate the same types of art.

I feel cheated as the show started out great.  The first couple of shows I just loved.  Since then the show has gone progressively down hill.  I’ll watch it until the end but right now I am disappointed as the bloom is off the rose and the petals are falling fast.

I really like artistic type shows.  HGTV is a great place to showcase this and Bravo as well.  However, there is not enough artistic programming.  Most of the reality TV shows are just awful.  I don’t watch them.  These artistic shows have the potential to educate people about art and design but instead they end up making a mockery of it.

The other show that I like to watch in this creative vein is “Project Runway”.  The new season just started.  This show has been over the top creative in the past even going so far as to make really interesting clothing out of newspapers.  It sounded awful but the designers were fantastic in that episode.  I hope they don’t mess up the show this year like HGTV did with “Design Star”.

In the future I can only hope that people like me are hired to come up with great challenges for these artistic type shows instead of boring producers that don’t know art or artists.  It’s a simple math problem as I was meant to fall in love with these artistic shows.  They had me at, “Hello!”  With knowledge like that most producers should be able to hold my attention by doing the proper math and giving me what I want….real art, so I can fall in “love.”

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Bravo’s Work of Art

  • Posted on May 22, 2010 at 8:11 pm

As if we needed another reality show!  Okay, so we might, if it involves art.  I love the concept of an art contest in the manner of “Project Runway”.  I don’t know what the artist wins exactly, maybe a special exhibit somewhere.  As an art teacher I know it is hard to tame the creative mind and lump it into a time frame for anything.  Creativity isn’t something that switches on necessarily at will.  I have a student right now in my advanced 8th grade class that is super talented.  She probably wouldn’t do well under this kind of pressure as she has a hard time meeting deadlines with her artwork.  How will these artists be challenged to create art and who will be judging the criteria for great art?  Those are the two questions that I have in my mind.  Don’t worry as I’ll be tuning in to see what happens with this show.  I hope it truly is creative and not some “staged” creativity that feeds the masses what they think art is all about.  Today art can be almost anything from realism to true fantasy to the fatally ugly.  Making a statement in art isn’t always beautiful and sometimes is political and at others it merely mocks reality.  I haven’t a clue what kind of art this show will have produced for it.  I find it mildly interesting that it is being produced by Sarah Jessica Parker.  I haven’t a clue what qualifies her for this.  Is she an art lover?  Is painting her secret passion?  I know she’s been featured lately on some shows like that ancestors, genealogy thing.  I really don’t care why she’s involved but I’m wondering why it’s being played at eleven at night.  I’ll still have one more day of school but knowing me, I’ll probably watch it and suffer through that last day!  I’m going to get my art on and have my art fix.  I hope this show pumps up the volume and pushes the envelope on creativity.

http://www.bravotv.com/work-of-art

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Kalamazoo Art Institue, West Michigan Show and 8th Grade Art Students, What a Thrill!

  • Posted on May 2, 2010 at 12:13 pm

The artwork above received the Grand Prize.  It is Michele Shelton, A Moment to Remember, paper, fabric, metal, beads.  This picture is credited to the Kalamazoo Institute of Art website.

I am inspired.  Thursday I took my advanced eighth grade art class to the Kalamazoo Institute of Art.  None of my students had ever been there before.  We had a great time.  On exhibit was the “West Michigan Area Show”.  It is what inspired me and my students.  We were all blown away by the diverse collection of art in the show.  http://www.kiarts.org/page.php?page_id=104

The exhibit was selected by Chicago artist Gladys Nilsson.  Her selection showed much diversity from realism to abstraction.  Many pieces were an explosion of color but all seemed so unique and able to stand on their own let alone be part of this wonderful exhibit.  Many pieces begged discussion and wonderment as to what drove the artist.  Gladys Nilsson’s art really explains how she was able to select such a wonderful show.  Her artwork is full of color and while it is representational in its subject matter it is full of elongated shapes, disproportions that create whimsy and a sense of borderline abstraction.  Her work reminds me of Marc Chagall although there really isn’t a connection.  I love the rhythmic way her work is full of movement.  She uses color to saturate ones mind as though one is standing outside in a warm mist of color filled rain.

It is no wonder that this talented artist was able to select such an interesting exhibit for the West Michigan Show.

When I went home I marveled at the awesome ability of these west Michigan artists.  I thought that many of them probably benefited from a great public school education.  It is this creativity that has to be nurtured in our schools today.  In out effort to become the best we can be in our schools with test scores we sometimes lose sight of this much needed creativity.  It is the creativity in our country that develops new products that forces us to think outside of our limited boxes that we put ourselves in.  We must nurture this creativity through the arts.  Whether it be the visual arts, music or drama all of the arts nurture that creativity that is so necessary to the continuation of our own humanity.  It is this spirit of creation that drives us all to be unique enough to not blend into the sea of humanity that just goes with the flow.  These are the people that just continue to follow whatever they are told to do like mindless sheep.  The spirit of creativity makes us stop and think about what we are doing and how we can make improvements to our lives.  It is this spirit that I believe built our country and made it strong.

I enjoyed this show even more than some of the exhibits I’ve seen of famous artists.  This exhibit inspired me and my students to come back and make art.  I know my students are now anxious to get to their final painting that they will do this year.  Many found inspiration in the colors and shapes and subject matter they saw in the show.  The hour of our tour zoomed by and the students were very curious and inquisitive.  When I talked with them individually I know they were excited about what they saw.  This was a visual treat for all them and myself.  I hope anyone that reads this that has an opportunity to see this exhibit will attend the show.  It is well worth the drive.  You will be inspired and you will go away feeling like you participated in something special.  I say, “Kudos” to the Kalamazoo Institute of Art for bringing such a wonderful exhibit to the public and finding sponsors to make it free to the public.

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We’ve Gotta Have Art

  • Posted on April 2, 2010 at 11:11 am

Teaching middle school art today is very different from when I was young and just out of college.  I remember the enthusiasm I had for teaching my first class in Fowler, Michigan.  It was so exciting to be out of school and to finally get a job.  I graduated in December of 1977.  It was in the middle of the school year and there weren’t any jobs really available.  I started working at Sugar Loaf Mountain resort as a hostess for the restaurant.  It didn’t pay very much and I didn’t stay long after they wanted me to design wine labels for the same pay as the hostess job.  I also found it very elitist in their attitude.  As an employee we were not supposed to fraternize with the tourists coming to ski the mountain.  I didn’t have a problem with that but they really didn’t want us to even go to the bar or restaurant.  It felt more like the hired help wasn’t good enough to sit next to the wealthy establishment.  I found the place rather stifling with their rules and expectations for the “hired help”.  They found out I had an art background so they wanted to use that.  Regardless of their motives I soon found employment at Kmart in the camera department.  I really enjoyed working at Kmart as they put me in an area where I had a lot of expertise and they respected my intelligence.  In the summer when I was interviewing for a teaching position the management was overwhelmingly supportive.  I was given the time I needed to interview and people were very happy when I snagged my first teaching job.  It felt like a family at Kmart as everyone was very encouraging of the young people that had gone to college and were looking for jobs in their fields.

When I arrived at Fowler I got right to work on working with the young students to create art.  We had so much fun together.  At the end of the school year I organized an art show while the gym teacher organized a dance and the music teacher had a concert.  We had a great turn out from the community and this was established for each year until I left a few years later.  I did manage to paint an eagle with two boys, with scaffolding, on the gym wall.  What an experience that was for someone who is afraid of heights!  I took a break from teaching and devoted myself to my art, making pottery and traveling to different art shows in Oklahoma and Michigan.  For many years I was happy doing this but when my son started kindergarten I volunteered to bring in my pottery wheel and demonstrate for the students.  I fired pottery pieces the students made and fell in love with the idea of teaching again.  I decided to update my teaching credentials.

A lot had happened in my years away from teaching.  Something called D.B.A.E (Disciplined Based Art Education) happened.  I was out of the loop but I easily got back into the loop.  However, teaching art has to be more about art production than anything else.  The art history, aesthetics and art criticism are all important but working with young people today it is so important to actually get their hands on the art materials and help them experience what it feels like to produce art.  In this age of text messaging and quick technology fixes I think it is more important than ever to develop creativity within my students.  So many students don’t have a clue how things are really made and why we buy the things that we do.  While art is all around them in designs that they purchase from their shoes, totes, mp3 players and phones so many of them are clueless about the thought that these items are purchased because of their interesting design concepts.  Some of them think that a computer spits out the design.  They don’t think about what person may have put the idea into the computer.  I try to point this out to my students because there is vast ignorance from most people about these issues.  Art is so important in all of our lives today whether we are aware of it or not.  We are surrounded by art in many forms and we make decisions about art on a daily basis whether it is decorating our homes or buying a car.  Art surrounds us in ways we don’t even think about!

I had an opportunity to review my art curriculum this year.  I was able to add a document camera and a projector to my teaching tool box.  This has resulted in a major change in my instruction delivery.  When I would show students how to do things in the past they would have to look at a mirror placed strategically over my head.  Now it’s projected.  If I’m doing something very detailed I can even zoom in for the students.  That student sitting in the very back of the room can now actually see what I’m trying to show them.  I marvel at this new technology and how computers have snuck their way into the art classroom through art programs and even online galleries.  Some people might think art is a thing of the past but art really is evolving and is the future.  We, as consumers, will always be drawn to beauty and grace.  Art will be in our future designs and really the creativity of our nation is dependent on the continued exposure to all the arts in their many forms.  Without art we become a mass produced society, plastic in many ways, without a heart.  It is art that nourishes our souls and completes our craving to be unique, to know that we are original beings and that we aren’t just one of many but one in a million!

When I was young and a beginning teacher I never thought about how teaching art might change.  It was all pretty basic in my mind.  You draw, paint, and sculpt; whatever medium you use art remains fairly unchangeable in its end result.  However, now I realize that art and its medium is constantly changing.  Today we have artists creating art through recyclables, computers, videos and much more.  Art is never stagnant and never stays the same.  Art is truly the most original thing that one can do.  Art continues to allow our imaginations to soar and our creativity to flourish.  Today there is more to art than ever as we search for new ways to express ourselves.  The importance of art in this rigid testing structure of education cannot be overly emphasized.  If we are to truly think, dream and imagine we must have art in our lives and we must nourish our souls with the making of art.

A video from our high school art teachers and the 2010 Scholastic Art Awards

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Teaching in a Disconnected World

  • Posted on January 9, 2010 at 12:59 am
Global Children

Let's Embrace the Creativity in our Children

The word we always hear about today is “global”.  We are either “going global” or we’re standing still.  However in the American classroom my life as a middle school art teacher has probably helped to make me a bit skeptical of new government educational plans.  We seem to be pressured to make our children “global” beings that will “beat” all the other “global village” people as the government keeps telling us our children are not quite up to par.  The arts are always the first to be cut because greater minds than mine have decided that they must be a “frill”.  I always think those people simply must have absolutely no talent and imagination.  The arts are far more than a “frill” and serve a far greater good than most people can even imagine.  If you are wearing beautiful clothes, driving a highly designed vehicle or live in a fabulous home thank the artist that brought the design to fruition.  I know that many people have absolutely no idea of how most items are created and even brought to market.  If it wasn’t for the very artists that create the cool designs that make us all want to buy the next great thing, we’d all be driving around in box shaped cars and still be computing on the old box shaped computers.

Artists have been treated poorly in this old educational process of teaching for a “test”.  I think picking a, b, c, or d on a test is basically pointless.   The truth is no one will really know the end result of all this testing until these test takers become productive tax paying citizens that the government and business clearly want to be the next little worker bees.   I, on the other hand, believe that a true education will encompass all aspects of our intelligence.  This fight for the “core” subjects is disheartening to those of us that are on the cutting edge of embracing our creativity.  It is through real creativity that we all can find our true purpose in life.  Creativity allows you to learn how to think and make decisions based on realizing that there might be more than one answer to a problem.  Test taking makes us believe there can only be one answer and it is the “right” answer.

In life we all know that sometimes things aren’t easy for us.  Sometimes we actually have to think our way out of problems.  The answer isn’t covered on a test.  I think it’s time that we taught students how to think and make creative decisions.  Many children are lost in this test taking mold.  Many have shut down because their exuberance is not appreciated.  Sometimes teachers are so busy teaching for the test that they can’t see the marvelous gifted mind of the student that may be simply struggling with the test taking process.  I don’t blame the teachers or even the administration.  I blame a society that allows arbitrary politicians that promote programs that are just a boon for the test taking industry and a peril for the poor student confronted with all of the tests they have to take.

I think students need to spend much more time using their hands and brains in the classroom whether it be a core subject or my art class.  Students today are spoon fed information and then given countless hours on the computer where things are really quite pointless in many ways.  It’s just a click here and a click there browsing through things but usually not really reading them all that clearly.  We are in such a hurry today that I think we have forgotten the true wonder of education.  It is a joy in my art classroom when I watch a student that didn’t think he or she could draw figure out the drawing process.

Education used to be a wonderful thing to embrace.  Students need to feel that thrill that comes with the discovery of new intelligence.  If we want students to be excited about learning then we have to embrace the creativity that the arts empower in individuals.  The true joy of learning comes through self expression.  While the arts are a power onto themselves they can also enhance the learning in the core classes as well.  It is the individual we need to embrace and cultivate to be the creative adult they are meant to be.  It is not the test taking process that is going to build the next “greatest” generation.  It is the almost innate creativity we all have within us when we are a child that has been suppressed through years of “drill” type instruction that needs to be embraced and nurtured.  If the government wants us to be a “global village” then we should empower our children through creativity in all of their classrooms.

Below I have included an excerpt from Eliot Eisner that I think needs to be examined further.  The truth is number 10 is what I have really been talking about.

10 Lessons the Arts Teach

1. The arts teach children to make good judgments about qualitative relationships.
Unlike much of the curriculum in which correct answers and rules prevail, in the arts, it
is judgment rather than rules that prevail.

2. The arts teach children that problems can have more than one solution
and that questions can have more than one answer.

3. The arts celebrate multiple perspectives.
One of their large lessons is that there are many ways to see and interpret the world.

4. The arts teach children that in complex forms of problem solving
purposes are seldom fixed, but change with circumstance and opportunity. Learning in the arts requires the ability and a willingness to surrender to the unanticipated possibilities of the work as it unfolds.

5. The arts make vivid the fact that neither words in their literal form nor numbers exhaust what we can know. The limits of our language do not define the limits of our cognition.

6. The arts teach students that small differences can have large effects.
The arts traffic in subtleties.

7. The arts teach students to think through and within a material.
All art forms employ some means through which images become real.

8. The arts help children learn to say what cannot be said.
When children are invited to disclose what a work of art helps them feel, they must reach into their poetic capacities to find the words that will do the job.

9. The arts enable us to have experience we can have from no other source
and through such experience to discover the range and variety of what we are capable of feeling.

10. The arts’ position in the school curriculum symbolizes to the young
what adults believe is important.
SOURCE: Eisner, E. (2002). The Arts and the Creation of Mind, In Chapter 4, What the Arts Teach and How It Shows. (pp. 70-92). Yale University Press. Available from NAEA Publications. NAEA grants reprint permission for this excerpt from Ten Lessons with proper acknowledgment of its source and NAEA.

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