Valuing the arts

I feel conflicted in the classroom at times when I talk to students about career paths in the creative sector. The arts — especially visual arts is not often seen as a viable career and so I feel I have duty to my subject to counter that notion and show the various avenues one could take, whether its curatorial, public programming, arts writing, creative directing and more — but the recent Creative New Zealand report on creative professionals in 2019 paints a dire picture. The median wage in Aotearoa for people earring a wage or salary is $51,800 however the median creative income for creative professionals is $15,000 (creative professionals supplement their income by working outside of the creative sector). In a recent press release PM Jacinda Adern spoke about Arts and Culture in NZ:

“Arts and culture are not a ‘nice to have’. They are an essential part of our individual, community and national identity. For too long they have been treated differently when it comes to sustainable growth, career paths and economic benefits,” (Adern, 2018).

I agree, Arts and Culture is important to us as individuals and to our communities and so its always disappointing to see the negative attitudes towards visual art that we see in the world reflected in our school communities. Unfortunately I’ve seen many instances when visual arts is not supported by the school and families. An example of that is just recently there was an exhibition to showcase all completed work done by year 11 students — only two teachers showed up, another was a question was asked about a promising students going to arts school and the response was “there’s no way he would be allowed”. Too often I hear both students and teachers talk about the arts as the ‘easy’ and ‘fun’ subject dismissing the complex thinking that goes alongside both making and interpreting works. 

With that being said I have seen some incredible projects from schools that see the value in the arts and the positive influences it has on their school community. A favourite that I have seen is collaboration that artist Edith Amituani has with Kimi Ora School in the Hawkes Bay. Over five weeks Edith taught the students about photography and created conversations with them about what it meant to take photos of people. She then gave the students her camera where they documented their lives at school and at home. The result was an incredible art making journey that ignited the curiosity and visual literacy of the students and the work then shown at the Hastings Art Gallery.

In all the art departments I’ve been in this year, the love and passion for the arts I see in the teachers I’ve spent time with has been inspiring. I see the drive to create worthwhile experiences for learners so that they are able to make work that starts with thinking about the self before developing and thinking of ideas and concerns that they would never have thought about before their art making process. 

The New Zealand curriculum states that in visual arts education: 

“Students develop visual literacy and aesthetic awareness as they manipulate and transform visual, tactile and spacial ideas to solve problems.. As they develop their visual literacy, students are able to engage with a wider range of art experiences in increasingly complex and conscious ways” — I just wish others saw it like that too. 

References 

Adern, J. (n.d.). Recognising the importance of our arts, culture and heritage. Retrieved from https://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/recognising-importance-our-arts-culture-and-heritage.

Published for the Ministry of Education by Learning Media. (2007). The New Zealand curriculum. Wellington, N.Z.