Undergraduate Course: Radical Art Schools: Experiment and Activism in Art Education after the Academy (HIAR10214)
Course Outline
| School | Edinburgh College of Art |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 10 (Year 3 Undergraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | This course examines radical forms of art education after the Academy, focusing on the twentieth-century art school as a site of creative experimentation. Art education is subject to often conflicting principles of freedom and control, and of tradition and progress. Focusing on some of the most experimental moments in modern art education, the course will consider the theories, ideas and practices that have shaped artists over the last century. |
| Course description |
This course takes the decline of the Academic model of art education as a starting point, first by examining its material remains. We start with ECA, its cast collection and the changing use of various studios and spaces. Students will then examine one experimental model of art education per week during seminars that begin with a short lecture. Case studies include some recognised models of western art education such as the Bauhaus in Germany, Black Mountain College or the Generative Systems course in the United States, or in the British context, Basic Design in Newcastle and Leeds, Central Saint Martins 'Locked Room'in London, Rita Donagh's 'White Room' at Reading and the cybernetic 'Groundcourse' at Ealing and Ipswich. We will consider art school protests of 1968, like the Hornsey Sit-In. Visual material will consist of works of art by students and staff, photographs, curriculum documents, studio plans and other archival material.
During ten two-hour seminars, students will confront wider cultural, social and economic contexts that shaped western art education in the twentieth century, and in particular the power struggle, imbalances and discord that took place as it evolved into an academic subject over the course of the century. Through preparatory reading, we will draw throughout on the theories of learning and creativity that educators drew upon, and those they produced themselves. We will think critically about the power dynamics of creative learning, as well as the power of these communities of creative production, using the seminars for discussion and debate. There will also be opportunities to test some of the creative learning methods used in our case studies during seminars. Through experiencing them directly, we can build a better understanding of the learning processes we will be studying.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
| Additional Costs | This Course does not require any additional costs to be met by the Student.
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Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | Visiting students should have completed at least 3 History of Art courses at grade B or above, and we will only consider University/College level courses. **Please note that 3rd year History of Art courses are high-demand, meaning that they have a very high number of students wishing to enrol in a very limited number of spaces. These enrolments are managed strictly by the Visiting Student Office, in line with the quotas allocated by the department, and all enquiries to enrol in these courses must be made through the CAHSS Visiting Student Office. |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
| Not being delivered |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Demonstrate verbally and in writing, knowledge and understanding of models of art school learning in the twentieth century as well as the agents of change behind radical pedagogy.
- Critique the design of art school education in relation to modernism and broader social contexts.
- Utilise primary and secondary scholarship to build a sound understanding of twentieth-century art education.
- Present arguments relating to art and education persuasively, verbally and in writing.
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Reading List
Ascott, Roy. 'The Construction of Change.' In The Telematic Embrace: Visionary Theories of Art, Technology and Consciousness, edited by Roy Ascott and Edward Shanken. University of California Press, 2003.
Butt, Gavin. No Machos or Pop Stars: When the Leeds Art Experiment went Punk. Duke University Press, 2022.
Díaz, Eva. The Experimenters: Chance and Design at Black Mountain College. University of Chicago Press, 2014.
Keshvani, Rozemin, ed. The Locked Room: Four Years that Shook Art Education 1969-73. The MIT Press, 2020.
Sloan, Kate. Art, Cybernetics and Pedagogy in Post-War Britain: Roy Ascott's Groundcourse. Routledge, 2019.
Tickner, Lisa. Hornsey 1968: The Art School Revolution. Frances Lincoln, 2008. |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Skilled Communication: Through discussion, presentation and focused group work about creative learning models, you will extend your own abilities as an effective and confident communicator.
Aspiration and personal development: In researching and testing models of pedagogy in relation to art history, you will develop your critical awareness of learning processes and your own agency within them.
Personal and intellectual autonomy: Through completing two assessment tasks, you will develop your intellectual autonomy whilst having the freedom to pursue personal interests. The course themes will support the development of a curious, questioning approach to the design of education over time.
Research and enquiry: By extending your specialist knowledge of modern art schools, you will develop your ability to critically evaluate the ways in which artists learn and develop. You will learn from, and apply, cross-disciplinary research approaches to art history as relating to social history and educational policy. |
| Keywords | Art pedagogy,protest,creativity,modern art |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Kate Sloan
Tel:
Email: Kate.Sloan@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | |
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