Page 21 - Studio International - September 1967

The case for of the art school can be adequately met. the conditions necessary for widespread art experi-
Even so we still want a cultural education sufficient
ence.'
unto the students and the artists themselves. A Essentially we see the University and the Polytech-
Polytechnics Polytechnic situation can provide further opportunity nic with very different concerns. Certainly we do not
if the positive work already achieved is recognized and see one either superior or inferior to the other.
The 'Polytechnic future' facing many then developed with understanding. Certainly they are different, and both are necessary.
British art colleges and schools, has Arnold Hauser has written: 'In a system of universal We believe that the art schools have provided the
planning and in the midst of struggle for mere best general education in the country in the post-war
recently been attacked by a number of
leading teachers and artists, partly on existence, art cannot be left to work out its own period, a fact not sufficiently recognized.
salvation'. Since the real capital of the future is knowledge and
the score that it will lead to a loss of
Present fears for a Polytechnic are coloured by the understanding; the creative in education has a key
autonomy. Here two teachers and artists unhappy histories of art schools in technical colleges role to play where its form is audio-visual and based
put the case for the other point of view. -Iittle autonomy, prescribed policies, whittled finances on the well-defined principle that progress can take
and wide philosophical cleavage. It was a mess in the place only where 'being' and 'doing' keep pace with
Elma Askham and 1930s when the art school lacked both the teeth and knowledge.
the oats to hold any realistic position. Educationally the Polytechnic idea is inescapable
Harry Thubron Certainly the art school could be vulnerable in a for the art school, but it is also educationally the right
game of catch-as-catch-can against the stoicism of step.
the technical colleges grown fat-fat on the 'bread and
butter' certainty given them by their real and imagined * A Plan for Polytechnics and Other Colleges
relationship with commercial and industrial life. A statement by the Secretary of State for Education and
We have for a long time striven for a closer relation-
Perhaps, in the pre-planning stage of the Polytech- Science (April 5, 1967) said, inter alia: 'The system of
ship between art and other disciplines, and only by
nic, the biggest single fear is that the Local Education government must be suitable for institutions offering
such a leavening can we see the emergence of a more
Authorities solve it all by means of political and eco- course of higher education in a wide range of disciplines
complete art school, educationally and otherwise.
nomic expediencies, on an insufficiency of know- and serving national as well as regional and local needs.
A student, if he is going to evolve at all, will only do
ledge and understanding of what a Polytechnic can It must be such as to attract into the service of the
so by his own efforts. All educational establishments
be-a form of happening all too frequent when official Polytechnics the highly qualified academic staff who
provide at best the milieu wherein the student can do
bodies are confronted with both the qualitative and will be essential and to enable them to share fully in
this. Much that is at present being essayed in the art
quantitative demands of post-war education. The their government and management as academic com-
school is of an experimental order and we have to
Polytechnic must get off the ground right. A regional munities. Where a Polytechnic is formed from one or
learn as we go along, but the richer the milieu, the
planner who is also a scholar has expressed his more colleges, conditions must be provided under
better the opportunity for a student to 'learn how to
anxieties concerning the Polytechnic: his fears are which it will be possible to build on the traditions of the
learn' for himself in what is fundamentally a new sort
that at best they might become second- and third- existing colleges while at the same time creating as
of evolutionary striving in the educational sense.
rate 'universities'. This can only be so if the Art quickly as possible strong and unified communities in
At this time with Polytechnics in mind we do possess
School/Technical situation emerges without clear which the whole of the staff work together to foster
a degree of self determination and we can move
educational aims and planned objectives. inter-disciplinary co-operation in the common interests
towards a situation of our making-after all, the White
Francis T. Villemain, an American professor, has of all.... These objectives can only be achieved by dele-
Paper* provides only the barest of structures to which
written : 'If one sees art and science as interdependent gating the main responsibilities...to suitably consti-
we must give form. In these matters we feel for
and continuous spheres rather than enemies, then tuted governing bodies with a large measure of auto-
Professor Coldstream, chairman of the National
the problem has shifted. It becomes one of infusing nomy, and, under the general direction of the governing
Advisory Council of Art Education, regarding the
all types of education and society with adequate art body, to the Director and academic board. Under the
establishment or non-establishment of Polytechnics.
experience, while at the same time making use of the academic board, academic and administrative matters
It is not that we believe he is against the idea, but that
assistance that only science and technology can give. primarily affecting particular disciplines or groups of
he is caring that the art school is not 'sold short' for
The problem is not to curtail the obvious resource of disciplines should be delegated as far as practicable to
reasons of expediency of one kind or another. His
science and technology but to enlarge and redirect the staff directly concerned.... Most of the Polytechnics
caring is that the art school enters (or does not enter)
their problems so that it may more effectively provide will be formed from more than one college.'
the proposed situation with the right attitudes and for
the right reasons. The best and only safeguard is
clarity of intention.
Over the last ten years art schools have been requir-
ing machinery for wider usage, together with atten- Correspondence It should be capable of interpretation to a greater or
dant skills, and have given more thought and care to lesser degree by everyone, regardless of educational
what is called 'liberal studies' and means of communi- or social background.
Trends in modern art
cation: in this sense they have sought knowledge and The majority of paintings being produced today fall
practice in wider and richer terms. So art schools Dear Sir, into neither of these categories. They are generally
themselves have moved towards what can only be As an intelligent observer of the current art scene the preserve of a very limited class of people, who, in
called a pre-Polytechnic or pre-university situation. who regards art as an integral part of the world in their own minds at least, would regard themselves as
The proposed Polytechnic plan is but a step in the which we live, I would like to express some concern having very little in common with people outside their
logical and evolutionary development of the art at the trends which modern art has assumed during own social class or general educational sphere. In
schools in the way they themselves have indicated. the 1960s. I did broach this topic in a rather general- May's 'Encounter', Diana Trilling writes of 'Our
Overall in the schools there is still a great shortage ized way in a recent college-paper article. The re- present-day assumption that the new and dissident
of money-some areas are developed at the expense marks on the subject of examples of modern so-called are good in themselves, no matter what their form....'
of others. Never in any situation in which I have art displayed in the Union building came in for violent How accurately this would describe the underlying
been have finances been sufficient to keep all areas criticism from the professional artists on the campus assumption of many modern artists, who seem to
of the college at the 'cutting edge' of either ideas or but met with considerable approval from other imagine that 'originality' is all that matters' Their
possibilities. It would be illuminating to compare the students. These remarks are equally applicable to products are neither universally intelligible nor com-
yearly expenditures of the Royal College, Leicester, the bulk of artistic effort in the field of painting, with municative in any sense whatever, yet our gullible
Leeds and, say, Falmouth. which we have been deluged in the last few years. 'enlightened' societies on both sides of the Atlantic
Money, we know, is not the measure of quality in It is my contention that art in all forms, whether accept them as 'art'.-So much so that individuals can
this instance. But it would be true to say that certain painting, literature, sculpture, drama or even cooking, argue quite seriously about 'artistic chauvinism'.
colleges cannot even vaguely undertake to provide is basically concerned with communication. Whether Just what is there in the contemporary art world to be
for specialized staffing or for the development of a work of art is good or bad depends upon the effec- chauvinistic about?
particular aspects of work which they know to be tiveness with which it communicates something It is a great pity that so many of our so-called artists
essential. It is only by closely integrated working with about its subject to the onlooker, reader or consumer. have prostituted what talents they may once have
universities and/or technical colleges that the needs Secondly, good art should be universally intelligible. had to appease the chronic bad taste of wealthy
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