Moira Craig

ARTE 302
Writing Response One

Brent Wilson, Child Art After Modernism: Visual Culture and New Narratives

In Brent Wilson’s article he covers many interesting areas in children’s art

patterns. However, there were a select few that stood out to me.
Within the first paragraph Wilson informs us that he found many similarities in
children’s work that span from hundreds of years apart. He writes about the influences
that cultures, parents, times, and places all have on children’s art work. Wilson states
that modernists led other to believe only the similarities in children’s work and not the
differences. In 1983 Jonathan Miller stated
“Now you say in Art and Illusion that we can learn a lot about the use of schemata
by looking at the way in which the child draws. This has changed very little in
500 years, even 2000 years, and I’m sure that the pictures by Egyptian children
were exactly the same [as today].”
Gombrich replied:
“Yes, I think that’s roughly true. Though our children are influenced nowadays
by picture books they see or the shows they watch they are pretty much
impermeable to these influences.”
I find these comments very interesting because as I first began to read the article I
though there was no way there were similarities in children’s art work from now to 2000
years ago. As I continued to read the article I learned that Wilson proved me wrong. He
stated that children look up to their elders and how they shape things and then turned
them into their own child like art work.
Another aspect that I enjoyed from Wilson’s article is when he talks about the
drawing of Lomazzo’s Art Academy. From the picture we can get an idea of how
children were taught by masters the works of art. The children studied skill, symbolisms
of wisdom, and were taught liberal arts. During this period, art was seen as an activity of
the hand and the brain. I was also intrigued by Wilson’s comment that “These prints
reveal one thing: Becoming an artist meant acquiring skills and following rules. This
statement struck a nerve for me because I agree with it. It was not until this year that the
idea of only making art to provoke a meaning or feeling was brought to my mind. I was
always concerned with getting techniques down and perfecting them. I never really
thought of the word “rule” when creating art, but I guess that’s what techniques,
concepts, and skills really are. By mastering these skills, I used to think that is what
made the art work “good.” However, thinking about it now, what is good art work?
People are drawn to certain styles and images and as artists we have no way of knowing
what that is. We can only create something that represents what we believe is interesting.
In relation to the article, I believe what we find interesting is found in things around us.
It’s important to pay attention to what you pay attention to because essentially that is
what you’re interested…..obviously. To come full circle with this, it’s our surroundings
and time that do impact our art work and how it is unique. We may have similar events
and beliefs, everyone’s work is different in it’s own way.