So, here’s my question: what is the purpose of
art?
“Art is the means by which an artist comes to
see.”—John Gardner
“I say in speeches that a plausible mission of artists is to make people
appreciate being alive at least a little bit.”―Kurt Vonnegut
“Popular art is the dream of society; it does not examine itself.”—Margaret Atwood
“The artist is not a person endowed with free will who seeks his own
ends, but one who allows art to realize its purpose within him.”—Carl Jung
“Art's whatever you choose to frame.”—Fleur Adcock
“Art is our chief means of breaking bread with the dead.”—W. H. Auden
I am an artist and I am an
educator. I suppose not in that order. My vocations blend at some times and
conflict at others. I struggle with the concept of censorship. The artist in me
is saying that what I am doing is expressing the human condition, it’s holding
up a mirror to existence so that we may better assess it, it’s inspiring the
living by pointing out the truth of life, it’s entertainment.
Sounds high-fallootin’, doesn’t
it?
As a teacher, I attempt to lead
young people to question, assess, decide, and to think. To do this right, I
need to challenge them, to draw them out of their comfort zones.
Both art and education expose
their “audiences” to the challenging, the uncomfortable. Hiding from what makes
you exposes your fears and weaknesses only ceases your development as a human
being. Someone who does not know the world cannot know himself.
Alberta’s teachers are currently
suffering the constraints placed on them by the recently-passed Bill 44, which
allows students to opt out of lessons that they or their parents (mostly their
parents) find offend their religion, their sexual orientation, or their fear of
having to think about either. The fight is underway, and far from over, because
if it is assumed—
-that teachers think of their students first,
-that is, that we intend them no
harm,
-that we don’t intend to make
them atheists (or not),
-that we don’t intend to make
them gay (or not),
-that we don’t intend to make
them evil (or . . . not),
-that the texts we use in
teaching are valid because they challenge them as thinkers,
—then Bill
44 serves absolutely no purpose because there’s nothing in the curriculum to
protect kids from.
Of course, opportunists—those
with the best or the worst intentions—will see this as the time to impose their
own ideologies on the masses. Religion has a way of sticking it nose in. So do
noses on the front of busybodies.
I put this topic to a group of
young artists who are also my students. Writing class. All girls if it matters.
I asked them when censorship should
be applied to art. They were vehemently against it at first, for fear that
stifles creative expression.
So, swearing on the radio is
okay?
Well, no, But they bleep the
swears out.
Oh? I can’t listen to my
favorite Calgary radio station when my kids are in the car because the DJs are so crude.
They granted me that one.
However, that’s public consumption. Art,
something you choose to take in—film, photography, literature—that shouldn’t be
censored.
What if it’s in school and there
is no choice? Better yet, what about when the chosen art is pornography?
Racist? Abusive? What about how if you make an album but swear once on it then
your career is doomed because Wal-Mart won’t carry it?
When you ask yourself what art
is, you get a subjective answer. For me, porn is not art. For Ron Jeremy . . .
okay, bad example, but there’s someone
who would try to justify it, I’m sure. When we say that we must allow all art
to thrive so it may challenge our thinkers, you open the door to S and M, to
stupid anti-Islam films, to reality TV.
Bill 44 is stupid and limiting
and born out of right-right-wing fear mongering. It forgets the purpose of
studying texts in the classroom, the purpose of art. Censorship in the
classroom limits the ability of the teacher to teach. Censorship in art stifles
creativity. Yet, the fact is that there is a line for all of us at some point.
What makes me uptight may be
fine by you. Or not.
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