Descartes and Sartre

New York is a humbling experience

John Wertschek, BArch, MBA

Associate Professor, ECIVancouver, BC

AICAD 2007 SYMPOSIUMRETHINKING THE CORPS

October 25-27, 2007New York City

TEACHING TO THE IMAGINATION and

LEADERSHIP FOR YOUNG ADULTS

EMILY CARR INSTITUTE

2007 FOUNDATION CLASS

• 1562 unique head counts• Foundation 25% of enrolment• Trends last 3 years:

Under 22 – Institute 25% 42% 53%– Foundation 57% 74% 81%

Part !: The Challenge

Part 2: The Opportunity

Part 3: Gifts– The moon is made of green cheese

Masochist

Someone who likes to take cold showers so they take warm ones instead

The Harvard Business Review of February 2004, in an article entitled

“Breakthrough Ideas of 2004” declared that

“The MFA is the new MBA”.

Daniel Pink

Robert Lutz, Chairman of General Motors :

“I see us as being in the art business. Art, entertainment, and mobile sculpture, which, coincidentally also happens to provide transportation.”

“Desire, want and need, identity, community and spiritual fulfillment

are necessary, attainable and deliverable in today’s business

plans.”

…and it is those trained in the art rather than business schools that have that capability.”

Daniel Pink “Breakthrough Ideas of 2004”

September 2007 issue of Modern Painters article “School is Out (Rethinking Art

Education Today)”

John Baldessari and Michael Craig-Martinbemoan the change of the role of the artist in art

education•“…you can’t teach art, but it might be a good idea to have artists teaching..”

•“…this thing you can’t teach, you’re teaching by example.”

•“the moment an artist feels constraint by an institution, if they have an option at all, they’re out”

WHAT IS IT THAT ART EDUCATION SAY IT DOES?

• Observational skills: Develop and demonstrate• Criticism: Identify and demonstrate strengths and weaknesses

of their work publicly through critiques• Values: Identify their own values (in art making)• Appropriateness of medium: Medium/message• Social Interaction: Develop abilities, habits, values and skills of

interacting within the art/design culture• Cross-disciplinarity: Develop beginning skills in a wide variety of

art making practices• Context: timing, location, intent, audience Problem-solving skills:

ideas to material or conceptual realization

WHAT WE ALSO DO• Refuge during individual development• Role models, sponsors or patrons to protect individual from

peers (and themselves) long enough for risk• Help for individuals to understand divergence• Public opportunity to communicate ideas• Recognition for work and talent• Help others understand the creative person• Help whole person for whole world • Help individual become less obnoxious without sacrificing

creativityadapted from E.P.Torrance Guiding Creative Talent

PART !The Challenge

You cannot imagine the world the way it is

The Sadist and the Masochist

The masochist says hurt me and the sadist says no

The Student

• My mother used to say…if you were teaching at a medical or law school, the students would think of themselves as medical or law students… your problem is that once accepted, they already think of themselves as artists. Their values are already formed, but not articulate or made public.

The Student

• Faculty and administration used to state that perhaps 5-10% of the graduates would go on to become artists and designers

• I wondered would are we doing with the other 95%? What do they become?

Who is the student?• Age• Gender• Culture • Language• Educational and experiential background• Learning Disabilities• Declared ambition • Economic background and ability• Peer group values• Problems, joys and desires

STUDENTS• Unprepared by regular schooling, maturity, peer and culture

group for what happens at art school• Paradox of confidence and insecurity• Perceive themselves to be “artists” already because they were

accepted to Art School• They believe they are already doing what they believe artists do

do and are behaving as artists behave• Focused on “their own “ myth or fantasy • Resistant to new or change to their practice• Believe in what they are imitating

STUDENTSConvenient traditional Misfits/Rebel stereotype or by example::• Disguises or imitates feelings and hope that through creative

pursuit they will connect to the world • Hinders ability to discover, uncover or establish meaning in the

world around them and find their place in that meaning• Focuses on “star-system” rather than manipulate that

understanding through materials (mediums) into new ideas objects, actions that lead to meaning for others

What do we control?

• Class size• Co-hort • Curriculum• Example by leadership: what they imitate• Strategies for community and leadership

We were so poor...

We lived in constant fear

TEACHING TO THE CORE?

• Teaching to the core (curriculum)• Teaching to the core (the individual”s desire)• Teaching to the corps (the collection of individuals)

FEAR

• Fear of being found out (public/private)• Fear of not knowing what to do • Fear that the real world is not fair

EXISTING PARADIGM

• Creativity is taught as mystery• Mystery comes from Greek word mustērion related to

mustēs: initiated person …• An initiate is not allowed to speak about the

knowledge, so sometimes defined as that which cannot be spoken about

• The initiate and the group control the knowledge• Teacher is in role of authority to be imitated or defied

MYSTERY • Art attracts many who find their experiences so

profound or overwhelming, they are unable to speak about them. (ie that which cannot be spoken about). They seek strategies and skills for understanding their differences. They don’t necessarily become practicing artists or designers and their potential is not usually addressed.

• Education in Studio Art and Design and Academics is generally practiced as initiation to a paradigm since other models for imparting tacit knowledge and experience are not available nor desired

WHAT IS MISSING

• Teaching “Creativity” essentially deals with recognized variations of the known driven by individual faculty style, educational curriculum and cultural fantasy or desire

• “learning” restricted to styles• “pattern which connects” remains limited to art culture and

aesthetic• leadership training remains imitation• Baldessari does not celebrate the student but rues the loss of

the pupil, the initiate

PART 2 The Opportunity

”When you get to the fork in the road, take it.” - Yogi Berra

Draw a line

Label one end B and the other D

B D

This map represents your life from birth to death. Place yourself now, on this line

B DX

Most students will place themselves ratio-nally

B DX

BD

infinity= O

The line segment is really part of an infinite continuum. The formula of ones life = “zero”,

Or you can consider the zero a circle which is a different shape to represent the same event. To see the circle requires a change of perception. To live them simultaneously requires a change of paradigm and behaviour.

The Class I always wanted to take

The Class I always wanted to take

• “Romance is the pursuit of the ideal that all locations are equi-valent.”

• “Romance is that paradigm which gives us permission to pursue the paradox of paradise.”

• “Passion is the experience that all events are simultaneous.”

• “Magic is anything created or grown, which attracts people and their wonder of how it could have been made, of or in these parts.”

JWertschek (1992)

NEED TO CONNECT• PERSONAL AGENCY - individual to have an effect, to

contribute, to make a positive difference• AUTHORITY - orientation and reassurance in times of

stress and fear (social group)• COMPLEXITY - dealing with the intensification

emerging from cybernetic, economic, political and ecological realities

• CHANGE - dealing with the depth, scope and pace• MORALITY - imagination and courage

Sharon Dolez Parks “Leadership can be Taught”

OPPORTUNITY TO CONNECT

• Leadership for today’s world requires enlarging one’s

capacity to see the whole

Donald Schon..Educating the Reflective Practioner

LEADERSHIP

Ronald Heifetz at Harvard Business School puts into active practice the tacit actions of a teacher

• skillfully allowing enough disequilibrium (confusion, frustration, disappointment, conflict, stress) to

• help the group move from unexamined assumptions about the practice of leadership to

• seeing, understanding, and acting in tune with what the art and practice of leadership may actually require.

Sharon Dolez Parks “Leadership can be Taught”

• “The teacher remains the authority in the classroom … (providing orientation and equilibrium in the group)…but the teacher is also practicing leadership.”

• The work is to create a live encounter between the experience of the learner and the idea.”

Sharon Dolez Parks Leadership can be Taught

LEADERSHIP

IMAGINATION AND REALITY

• Are congruent and whole• Imagination is not fantasy, pretend or make-believe• Addressing imagination addresses the whole person

“If we hope to live not just from moment to moment, but in true consciousness of our existence, then our greatest need and most difficult achievement is to find meaning in our lives.”

- Bruno Bettleheim

Teaching to CREATIVITYestablishes

• Marketing, positioning and political• Solutions• Makes abstract demands and abstracts

connection to reality• Emphasis on the individual• Stereotype• Rivalrous

Teaching to IMAGINATION

• Evocative and invocative (big idea)• Makes abstract & emotional demands• Requires whole person to connect with whole world• Visceral• Archetype• Non-rivalrous

Exercise 2

Draw a line

REALITY

REALITY

OBJECTIVE

SUBJECTIVE

TEACHING: ASSIGNMENTS

CREATIVITY

IMAGINATION

TEACHING: ASSIGNMENTS

CREATIVITY

IMAGINATION

Convergent, Rules, Ordered, Known, Named, SafeCosmetic, VALUES, Useful, Pleasant, Rational,

Objective, Mature, Solutions, Public, Stereotypes, Possibilities

Makes abstract demands and abstracts realityEmphasis on the individual and existing paradigm

Divergent, No rules, Chaotic, Unknown, Unnamed, Scary, Overwhelming, NO VALUES, Uncertainty, Yucky,Sudden, Irrational, Subjective, Personal,Archetypes, Dark, Dank ,

Fecund, Feral, Fetid and …FertileNothing is Impossible

Evokes possibilities, makes abstract and emotional demands,visceral, invokes whole person to connect with whole world

TEACHING: ASSIGNMENTS

CREATIVITY

FANTASY

IMAGINATION

REAL WORLD /PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION:

PROBLEM SOLVING

TEACHING: ASSIGNMENTS

CREATIVITY

FANTASY

IMAGINATION

VISUAL ARTS EDUCATION:

PROBLEM SOLVING

When I ask my students who has more imagination, a 5-year old child or a 40 year adult, they always say that the child does.

Imagination is based on experience.They confuse access with potential.

Access to Imagination is not taught at art schools.Heuristics are prophylactic exercises.

There are no guide books to appropriate use, but guides are needed.

EDUCATION

• From “educere” : to bring out

• “ex-” out + “ducere” to lead (to pull, drag)

THE IMAGINATIONRole of the Teacher

• The teacher is critical to the development of a student’s imagination.

• Students confuse their fantasy with their identity• They position themselves against reality and mediate

by probing and provoking rather than leading• Students rely on existing models or stereotypes

reinforced by traditional teaching methods• The teacher challenges the student to use both

objective and subjective research and review work in a public experience.

ETHICS OF THE IMAGINATIONRole of the Teacher

• There are no ethics in the imagination• If anything is possible in the imagination, horror and

grace are equal• Horror and grace both exist in the real world• The teacher must disconnect the student from

stereotype, demonstrate alternatives and assist the student in discovering an appropriate realization in the real world.

PART 3GIFTS

The Moon is made of green cheese

STRATEGY

• Significance of the residue/artifact• Risky, fear of unknown ...Alexandra’s story • Based on Territory, not map• Educate: concepts - draw out - not imitate• Deal with boredom - re-invent interest• Visceral: connect experience, action and emotional

residue• Process & Craftsmanship: connect desire with reality• Self-assessment: path/Hero’s journey

VISCERAL CONNECTION

• No rules• No right or wrong• No assumptions• Similes & metaphors are only first steps of

connection• No proscribed mediums or material • Consideration and appropriateness

CREATIVE PROCESS

• One of 5 core courses in first semester:• English(academic), Visual Culture (academic),

Drawing, (either Design 1 or Sculpture1) and CP• No other courses offered in years 2-4• Works as part of a program strategy• Works stand alone

• Every faculty teaching brings individual interest

VISCERAL CONNECTION

• Fantasy, Imagination and Creativity are all useful aspects of reality

• Misappropriate timing can produce visceral response that fractures connection

• Over-exertion creates imbalance and segmentation

NO HOMEWORK

• Talent is a gift• To be a gift it must be given away• A gift received requires a gift to be given• A gift is given without expectation of return• A gift ceases to be a gift if it stops moving• Gifts maintain essence not appearance

• “Assignments” are GIFTS• Students must bring GIFTS to class in return

GIFTS

Designed to address:

• Individual - Group• Research - Spontaneous• Permanent - Ephemeral• Crushing - Bursting• Public - Personal

GIFTS

• Connect imagination with reality• Connect individual to other• Subjective to objective• Visceral

• Measurement of success is immediate and

requires response

FIRST FOUR GIFTS

• Moon– Rock Game

• 20 words• Sausage• Dragon

MOON

E-mailed to all students in my sections prior to first class

Consider Moon

Let Moon Consider You

Bring Moon to Class

ROCK GAME A game with no rules

• Played at end of first class• Students are instructed to bring 5 rocks to class after

break• Room is transformed• Playing territory is central• Rules/no rules addressed• Students place 5 rocks, remove 2, replace 2• Last rock placed ends game

“20 WORDS” in NOTEBOOK

Verbal and Non-verbal equivalents of profound personal experiences. Semester long

•Students are asked to consider their experiences guided by a list of 20 words, such as meal, poem, colour, ceremony, etc.

•For each word, they are asked to select the one with the most meaning and relate the meaning of the event in both words and with no words

THE NOTEBOOK

•Students are required to keep a notebook for the class to promote active listening, documentation of process and reflection • I call the Notebook

– A sausage: a strategy for preserving scarce and precious resources– A gift from the you that is now to the you that you hope to become

DEVISE AND CONSTRUCT A DEVICE

WITH WHICH TO WEIGH A DRAGON.

IT MUST WORK.

Thank You