Children on art and artists

They had been asked by to draw their family, their pet, an endangered species, a war, a politician, a scientists, their solution to save the planet, and much more. Two Polish researchers asked them to draw artists, and they did not like what they saw.

Małgorzata Karczmarzyk is assistant professor at the Faculty of Social Science, University of Gdańsk (Poland). Dominika Szelągowska teaches visual arts at a high school in the same city. They are both practicing visual artists and art educators.

Their article Artists in the Eyes of Children – Semiotic Analysis of the Meanings about Artists Constructed by Children was published in Kultura i Edukacja in 2018 (No.2, pp. 131-141). The study was very small in scope with only 13 seven year old students taking part, from a few Polish towns. Favorably, each drawing was accompanied by an individual interview with the child. It would be nice to see all the drawings, and not only two.

What is so interesting about this endeavor are the questions it investigates:

  • What meanings do seven-year-old children give to the term “artist”?
  • What distinguishing features, according to children, should an artist have?
  • How can the media influence the shaping of the meanings of children about the artist?
  • How can the aestheticization influence the shaping of the meanings of children about the artist?

Not many researchers have asked children how they see art and artists. It is surprising considering that we keep hearing the carelessly overused phrase “every child is an artist.” So, this article is a precious addition to the literature.

It turns out though that the authors seem less interested in seeing and hearing what the children have to show and say, than blaming educators for children’s narrow views on art. It is as if the participants were used, rather than engaged, as to make a point about the deplorable state of art education in their schools. The beret a boy drew on the head of a painter is received as stereotypical. So is the easel a girl provides the painter she drew. They tell us that “the poor visual art awareness of tutors is to blame, no knowledge of art, their own prejudices and limitations in its reception, their own negative educational experiences.”

The authors are on a mission when they say “the ultimate purpose of the research is to obtain knowledge which will allow effective changes in education, in this case, in art education.”

The article could have been written a century ago, so much it transpires the ever-lasting tension between teaching art techniques versus free expression, the classics versus the moderns and, artists as educators versus teachers as art educators. When it comes to liking or not their answers, it begs the question, who is asking the children?

Below, a drawing found in our collection. Made by Rishi, it depicts the various formal element of drawing. As a school assignment, I would assume that the authors cited in this blog would say this type of exercise contribute to transmitting a detrimental and narrow notion of art to children.

The elements of art. By Rishi, 2020. Source: CDIC-CIDE.

Research interviews for Canadians

Calling all Canadian residents. Take part in an interview that will help uncover new knowledge about children’s art conservation. A research team at McMaster University Research Shop is looking for parents and grand parents who will give an hour of their time before April 1st, 2024. Scan the QR code below or use this link to request an interview. 

The interview will be conducted individually on Zoom, and will be about art and children’s art. Participants will receive a $25 gift card for their participation. Please note that interview spots are limited. Participants will be selected to interview such that various backgrounds and perspectives are represented. People not selected for a live interview will have the opportunity to fill out a questionnaire if they wish to share their input.

For further information, contact project lead Syed Mahamad (mahamads@mcmaster.ca, 905-525-9140 ext. 26804).

If you have a virtual or wall bulletin board, by all means post and share this PDF poster and spread the word for us.

Research Shop at McMaster University is a co-curricular program that works with public, non-profit, and community organizations in Hamilton. It supports students with research opportunities in the community.

We would like to thank the Office of Community Engagement at McMaster University for facilitating this partnership.

ERIC inspires us

We collect and preserve cultural objects made by children, and we make those objects available for research purposes and for public interest. We believe it is important that children take part in the conversation about what they create, what they value, and whether they want to preserve or share memories or not.

For this reason, the CDIC’s board of directors has recently decided to publicly commit to upholding and promoting the principles laid out in the Ethical Research Involving Children (ERIC) Charter. The statements included in the Charter were collectively developed by the Centre for Children and Young People at Southern Cross University, Australia, and UNICEF’s Office of Research, Innocenti. It took several years of discussions and hundreds of researchers participated in the consultations that resulted in a compendium now available online in several languages.

Academic research in the humanities has increasingly used participatory methods, and the movement for open sciences has gained momentum in recent years. Meanwhile, children’s human rights have yet to become common knowledge and universally acknowledged. At CDIC, we believe it is important that collection contributors and collection users know that we care about children’s agency and well-being above all.

ERIC Charter cover image. Source: UNICEF Office of Research, 2023.
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