The links between Contemporary Art and Learning

I found Atkinson’s discussion of Contemporary Art and Art in Education (2012) very interesting. In particular he made some interesting assertions regarding the links between the nature of contemporary arts practice and the nature of true learning itself. He describes the general focus of contemporary art as being “a constant interrogation of established ideas of artist, object, performance, spectator, skill, technique and media. It is an art that attempts to break new ground and to push our boundaries of understanding […] The key point to make is that it is through the temporality of the art event and its consequences that new directions and reconfigurations begin to appear” (Atkinson, 2012, p. 8). He goes on to further discuss the possibility of transformation contained within participation in contemporary art and how this reflects the learning process. The way in which contemporary art pushes the boundaries of art and redefines it is similar to the way in which deep learning, as “a movement into a new ontological state” (Atkinson, 2012, p. 8), pushes forward the boundaries of an individual’s understanding and redefines it.

REFERENCE

Atkinson, D., 2012. Contemporary Art and Art in Education: The New, Emancipation and Truth. International Journal of Art and Design Education. 31 (1), pp. 5 - 18.