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SKETCHES
- The WhyART Newsletter |
| Welcome to SKETCHES, Michael Gerrish's WhyART.com newsletter. I offer thoughts to stretch your mind and spur your actions to produce positives for you and those you touch. Author Daniel Pinkwater said, "I believe it is impossible to make sense of life in this world except through art." Artist Francis Bacon said, "The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery." This "talking head" sees truth in both statements; let's start making sense by exploring and expanding the mysteries which surround us! | |
| Whys
Beget Wisdom... "Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all the others." Cicero "How many legs does a dog have if you call the tail a leg? Four; calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg." Abraham Lincoln "We feed the earth, and the earth feeds us." Louis Weeks For the past month, I've been introducing my students to aphorisms. I offered them 3 pages of phrases meant to be more than the bon mots they receive from music and video entertainment, and assigned them the task of illuminating an aphorism (one of mine or theirs) with an original design. There was, of course, some grumbling...<G>. Why torture my students with the wisdom of the ages? Well, when they study an aphorism, they get a glimpse of cultural wisdom that is fresh, short, and often abstract. "No sleep, no dream" is not only literally, but metaphorically, true. This glimpse will open their minds to new ways of considering the world around them, and foster new expressions in paint, pencil and ink. At least, that's my hope...and you know what they say about hope, right? Part Two...Choosing Wisely One of the challenges I face on a regular basis is
choosing an artist for the Artist Surf, since many artists' work will have
content which may be problematic for elementary art teachers. My solution
is to offer a "content warning" and advise viewers to be aware
of their own audiences. I can't imagine hiding the work of Keith
Haring or even Henri
Cartier-Bresson from young audiences because some of their imagery may
be for a mature audience! I've encountered many students who became
excited by an art activity when they were introduced to Keith Haring's
work. Choosing wisely means more than showing established masterworks to
your audience; it means challenging them to think about art from their
current point of view...and beyond. After all, if we don't understand
where they are coming from, we'll never be able to direct them to some of the
places they might go. "Do
you know why language manifests itself the way it does in my work? It's
because I understand short attention spans." Barbara
Kruger | |
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Sketches
is a free newsletter of WhyART.com and is available by subscription.
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at any time. I appreciate your thoughtful comments.
Michael Gerrish • 159 1st Street • Troy, NY 12180 •
(518)266-0304 • mrg@whyart.com | |
