Understanding Art Education by unknow

Author:unknow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Group
Published: 2010-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

By arranging 100 open cubes in a symmetrical configuration (ostensibly as a Minimalist sculpture), Araeen establishes a simple metaphor for mutual relations. However, the way in which he invites the audience to intervene within the work questions the seeming fixity of this metaphor by potentially altering the relations through asymmetrical reconfigurations. Araeen argues that symmetrical systems can be recognised as an equalising force both socially and economically, whereas asymmetrical systems indicate hierarchies. However, despite the seeming benevolence of symmetry within this equation, it can also oblige individuals to forfeit individuality: ‘everyone becomes the same with the same appearance, same haircuts, same housing, etc and is expected to express the same thing’ (Araeen 2005: in discussion with artist/teachers). This results in an unnecessary gap (or false binary opposition) between symmetry and asymmetry that ignores the dialectical relationships between the two. Deconstructions: Zero to Infinity attempts to bridge this gap: the basic symmetrical structure (equality) is maintained, it is the starting point for each day of its presentation, but it is allowed to manifest itself asymmetrically when transformed by groups and individuals in different social contexts.

After the event, artist/teachers were asked to consider how their experience as interlocutors had informed their work in education and how they might integrate the issues informing Araeen’s work into 14–19 teaching. Initially, they claimed that the issues informing Araeen’s work were out of line with their own practice. In their estimation, he was ‘of an earlier generation’ and, although they recognised how his work could usefully form part of an art history lesson or be integrated into a project on modernist building structures, most thought his political stance made it difficult to see how it could be included in their teaching.

It’s of another generation, not our concerns and there is a this a gap in understanding, I can’t see what it’s is trying to communicate that’s relevant today.

It still remains for me an historical re-enactment, I can’t see links with contemporary practice … there are lots of artists/curators working in this way in London at the moment … there’s a lot of interest in public collaboration so it makes comparison possible … but Rasheed doesn’t fit in with any of these really.

I don’t know … we certainly positioned it within an art history perhaps that’s the easy solution.

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