go back to art school

[Alabama Jama]

would you benefit? or not?

 

[Hermes2020]

I was never a student at any art school, so cannot go back. Had I been at art school instead of studying chemistry, my going back would depend on who was teaching there currently.

 

[Enyaw]

Two seeds fall by the wayside and one grows while the other one dies. No one can answer that.

 

[Artyczar]

I never went, so I can't go "back." I have no idea if I would benefit, but I often wonder if I would have thrived, or died. But who can afford it?

 

[Enyaw]

but I often wonder if I would have thrived, or died.

Exactly.

 

[16ga]

I never went. I hated school and I hated the art class in my high school so I don't think I would have done very well anyway.
I tend to not do well and lose interest when I have people telling me what to do.

 

[laika]

Many years ago, I went to few classes held by a very gifted individual (not a school), and I loved it. Sigh... my no-nonsense Russian taskmaster... I would go back to her in a heartbeat if I could.

As to enrolling in a school and coming out with a diploma, I don't know. Getting a general education and majoring in art sounds like fun, but there's the expense, plus I don't know what is taught in an art school. I know a metal worker who loved her time at Montevallo (AL, USA) as far as getting an education, but a lot of what she knows about casting and pouring iron and welding, she learned working at Sloss Furnace (Birmingham, AL).

 

[CaliAnn]

I never went. I hated school and I hated the art class in my high school so I don't think I would have done very well anyway.
I tend to not do well and lose interest when I have people telling me what to do.

This

 

[Terri]

I've enjoyed the few art-related classes/workshops I've taken, but never took actual drawing or painting classes, and certainly never attended an art school. I think I'd still enjoy generic, adult art classes on the fly if they came my way.

There's always something to learn, that's for sure. I remain forever open to that.

 

[bethany]

I didn't go to art school. I didn't even take art at high school as I didn't like the art history part (love art history now!) I have attended many workshops over the years with painting teachers I admire. I never stop learning.

 

[Artyczar]

I also love art history nowadays. I don't think I would have been able to sit through too much of it at a younger age, but I'm not sure. At least not early art history.

I took a ceramic class in the mid-thirties, but I really hated it. It was interesting to learn the process, however, I was not allowed on the wheel.

 

[amo]

I also never went to art school. Had art in high school, with a decidedly mixed experience. Learned from trial and error, books, and online. I think art school would have forced me to make a lot more work a lot earlier, and I would have learned more simply with more "mileage," but I'm not sure what other benefit I would have gotten. I didn't do very well in school, anyway - not temperamentally suited.

I've had some art peers with mutual critique relationships over the years. That's been very helpful.

 

[Triduana]

I never went either. If I'd gone to uni straight from school I probably would have done art, but my parents wouldn't let me as they didn't think it would lead anywhere! Plus my experience with art in school wasn't that great: I had 2 teachers plus my dad all telling me to do things in different ways, and because I had zero confidence back then I tried to please all of them instead of doing my own thing. The result being I was put off art for years.

I've done a short weekend course at college and a few life drawing classes over the past few years; it's been informal and fun and I think that's the best way of learning.

I was very close to signing up for a diploma in botanical illustration five years ago but put the money towards buying a house instead. I'm now in a situation where I could maybe think about it again - but I'm enjoying sketching plants in my own style at the moment and I don't want to lose that.

 

[Scamall]

I think I might enjoy it, but I don’t feel compelled to do so. I am also old enough to take classes for free, not degreed, but I have enough of those expensive pieces of paper 🤣🤣🤣🤣

 

[bendykowski]

Hello everyone. Interesting to hear your thoughts. I am a retired art professor and even while I was teaching I never recommended anyone go to art school unless the 'art degree' was required for a job they desired. When Renoir was asked the best way to learn to paint he said "It is in the museum that one learns to paint... it is in the museum that one gets this feeling for painting that nature alone can not give". To our contemporary ears we might think he meant you go to the museum, get inspired with a feeling then paint. But this is NOT what he meant. He meant you go to the museum, sit down and COPY a painting as accurately as possible. The artist has already translated a 3D object into paint, and that is how you get the feeling for painting, and that is the best way to learn. To try to paint from nature (or a photo of nature) will not teach you how to manipulate paint.

 

[Artyczar]

Hello everyone. Interesting to hear your thoughts. I am a retired art professor and even while I was teaching I never recommended anyone go to art school unless the 'art degree' was required for a job they desired. When Renoir was asked the best way to learn to paint he said "It is in the museum that one learns to paint... it is in the museum that one gets this feeling for painting that nature alone can not give". To our contemporary ears we might think he meant you go to the museum, get inspired with a feeling then paint. But this is NOT what he meant. He meant you go to the museum, sit down and COPY a painting as accurately as possible. The artist has already translated a 3D object into paint, and that is how you get the feeling for painting, and that is the best way to learn. To try to paint from nature (or a photo of nature) will not teach you how to manipulate paint.

Love this Steve. Thanks for your insights as a teacher.

 

[Bartc]

Never went. Art class in HS, but grew up in a family of many amateur artists and professional master finishers. Took only one studio workshop in my entire life and that was well worth the two Saturdays. One art history class in college (odd that a "university" had no art department!) taught by a miserable ancient English professor (history worth it, professor was a shit). So I learned and still do learn via viewing and personally analyzing art (books, museums, galleries, pictures on walls and TV, friends painting, etc.) Self-taught fits my billing, and that's fine with me.

Though I'm a very disciplined learner, I'm not a disciplined "student". Learn too fast for most classes and find that group "education" actually is too slow for me. End up tutoring others, and that isn't the point of going to a class, IME. Ironically, I have been an educator all my life peripherally, in that it was never my full time profession. Taught part time at every level literally from preschool to grad school. Yet I have always observed and believe that old saw that "you don't get a real education by degrees." For some classes and structure are a boon, for others a necessity, but not for me.

So, no, going to an art school would be a waste of time for me, but I totally admit to learning a great deal from videos or zooms by some artist-instructors. I adore David Dunlop's videos and did one of his live zoom classes. He's unusual in that in a half hour or so you get art history/biography, the psychology of perception, composition and painting techniques with a live demo to boot. So many others I've learned from on YT in quick bursts of less than an hour.

Why then would I want to burden myself with the structure of a school when all this is available at my convenience? I mean no offense to art teachers, many of whom I love, nor to students who find school structure is their cup of tea. Just not my own.

 

[Artyczar]

Hey Bart, is IME: in my experience? I have a hard time guessing what some of your abbreviations are, which leaves me feeling really stupid. This is why writing abbreviations (for the most part--unless they are universally household or common art knowledge) are not allowed on the forum. Even in those cases, I personally don't care for them, but I've let a lot of them slide anyway because I hate being despised as the abbreviation police. Plus, I have to reveal how dense I am!

Speaking of being dense, I didn't even go to high school, so no art classes there. Didn't go to school often enough before that to pick up much art in the other dozens of schools I went to. I don't even remember many kindergarten art projects, since I went to three different schools there too. Probably never got to finish anything. I do remember making a Mother's day card once.

No art people in my family anywhere, but my mom taught ballroom dancing before she was married to my dad. My dad played drums in the army during WWII. That's the extent of any "art" close to me but I didn't even know that my dad played drums until I'd already been playing for a good five years in! He never mentioned it. And never mentioned he had a whole family with kids before he ever met my mother! How's that for being a man of little words!?

I learned from posters, museums, the public library, picture books, and mostly trial and error. I was pretty naive most of the way through. Meanwhile, my friends with normal families went to college and I was very envious I didn't get to go to art school. I was already overwhelmed having to work a couple jobs to support myself. I know it was possible to work and do school at the same time (people did it), but I wasn't mentally stable enough. I tried though. Several times.

And I know I've mentioned all this before, the windbag I am. 😂

 

[Bartc]

Yes, In My Experience. I'll try to refrain from using those abbreviations. Thought they were pretty standard by now.

Obviously, you learned to create on your own and that's the triumph more important than any sheepskin in my book.

 

[Artyczar]

Yes, In My Experience. I'll try to refrain from using those abbreviations. Thought they were pretty standard by now.

Exactly why I said it makes me feel stupid. Now I feel even more stupid if these things are "standard by now." And old, and antiquated...and I've been on the internet since the very early 1990s! You'd think I'd learn something! But I don't really text on my phone, especially not with younger people. I do know what LOL is. I know there's some abbreviation for that about rolling on the floor too, but I couldn't tell you what it is! I'm usually not lazy enough to type "LOL." Instead, I take the extra hour and a half to type "ha ha."