Visual & Performing Arts, by Mr Jon Curtain
Every artist gets asked the question, “Where do you get your ideas?” The honest artist answers, “I steal them.”
A few years ago, I came across a TED Talk* by writer and artist, Austin Kleon. In it, he proposes that nothing is original and that every new idea is just a remix of previous ideas. The notion that students need to be aware of what else is out there is the prominent takeaway here; the belief that it is alright to stand on the shoulders of giants and to then look at the world with your own eyes. As Kleon states, “you are a mashup of what you choose to let into your life. You are the sum of your influences.” The German writer Goethe said, “we are shaped and fashioned by what we love.”
How many lines are there in this drawing? There’s the first line, the second line, but then there’s a line of negative space that runs between them. 1 + 1 = 3. The same is true of our students. They become more than the sum of their creative experiences. They take these on board and produce something else, something more.
In the Visual and Performing Arts Department at Braemar, our biggest challenge is to help inspire students to find that elusive and somewhat intangible word, creativity. Our Year 12 visual artists are nearing the end of their creative journey at the College, having put in huge amounts of time and effort over the year to produce their folios of work, demonstrative of the creativity learnt through their years at Braemar. If you were to ask them where their creativity came from, as the examinations will do in November, they would give you an answer that covers a myriad of sources; from other artists and the environment around them, to their life outside College, their family, friends and their favourite TV show.
As teachers of the Arts, we try to offer students exposure to a broad range of source material, but there are only so many periods in the week. If the opportunity arises to take your child to an exhibition, a performance, or a concert, I encourage you do so. It could just be the creative spark they’ve been waiting for!
Speaking of exhibitions, 2019’s end-of-year VCE Visual Arts Show opens in Jackson Hall on the evening of Monday 18 November. Entitled, The Tip of the Iceberg, it will primarily show the final artworks of our Year 12 VCE Studio Arts, Media and Visual Communication students, but, as the title suggests, the final works only account for a small proportion of the artistic explorations that have occurred during the year. I am sure that the culmination of all that artistic theft, will make every artwork on display, like our students, totally unique.
More information about the Art Show will be made available via the Braemar Blog and Braemar Buzz closer to the occasion.
Mr Jon Curtain
Instructional Leader, Visual and Performing Arts
*This talk has since been published as the bitesize book, Steal Like an Artist, (Workman Publishing).