(Respondents: Marvin Saltzman, Pamela Winfield, Dan Ellison, Tom Starland, John Most)

I taught and taught well for 40 years. Your 1st premise was wrong. One does not train "artists" You give enough for the student to do whatever they wish to do and you have enough of an eye to critic..encourage and "open doors." You also have to be brutally honest. And as a result as well as successes in the visual arts there exists successes in Law, Medicine business and existing. Most students should not be in the arts. And, of course the ultimate problem…lack of hunger. If the student does not have a need to make objects..it will not matter. Academia..non-art…does matter. Learn to look at the world and you might be able to look at a visual problem.
Dr. Pamela D. Winfield, Meredith College

All advice is a form of nostalgia, but I found that my undergrad art history course opened up a new world of art and culture to me. Now as a college prof, I also naturally think that a Liberal Arts curriculum has a lot to offer the average studio artist. Ideally academia should broaden perceived knowledge and relativize received convention. What better font for new ideas / resource for new techniques and approaches could a budding artist ask for?
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Dan Ellison (Art and Museum Law)
My rambled thought on the question posed: Expose kids to as much art as possible at as early an age as possible. Make sure that early elementary school teachers are trained at encouraging creativity and not squelching it. When coloring, its a good thing to know how to stay within the lines–but its also a good thing to sometimes color outside the lines!

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Tom Starland (Carolina Arts)
It is my experience that most, but not all young artists - with fresh degrees in hand, are poorly prepared for life after academia - a.k.a. - the real world. Somewhere before a student plans to leave the protected environment of the halls of knowledge they should be asked what type of artist they hope to be. This determination should be based on the facts of the student’s future - after school.

Will they continue to live in the womb of their parents, off the trust of a family patriarch, off the income of a spouse, or will they be faced with the reality of earning a living on their own? It’s important to know where you stand and what or whose resources you will be able to fall back on. For after school, there is no meal plan.

Will they be an artist who pursues a job in the many art related fields, working a 9 to 5 job or a self-motivated fine artist?

Will they be the kind of artist who is in pursuit of true uncompromising art, ever in search of further academia, hoping to one day be the instructor, not the student?

Will they be the kind of artist who is in pursuit of true uncompromising art, ever in search of the next funding source, in the form of grants, fellowships or residencies, to support their next creation?

Will they be the kind of artist who is in pursuit of mostly uncompromising art, ever in search of the next exhibit opportunity hoping to sell enough art along the way to provide them the resources to continue their art, while working part-time in an arts related field to pay the rent?

Will they be the kind of artist who although in pursuit of true uncompromising art, will always be in search of ways to provide themselves with an income - through artistic endeavors - meaning they will do whatever it takes, but draw a line they will not pass over?

Will they be the kind of artist who will make any compromise to make as much money as they can - no matter what?

Will they be the kind of artist who is in pursuit of true uncompromising art but ends up marrying that law student (male or female) they met at a kegger behind the dorm and three children later put through school - return to their pursuit or art?

There are many variations of all these descriptions - everyone is different, so no two artists will follow the same path, but it is important to try and decide what type of artist you plan or would like to be. Different opportunities present themselves depending on which path you decide to follow.

In the pursuit of this determination, academia should do its best to expose said art student to as many examples of these different types of artists. They should be exposed to lectures by experts from the real world - gallery owners, art collectors, non-profit administrators, art critics, staff from local art museums, interior designers, art publishers, and anyone who has a real job related to the visual arts community - outside of academia. These are people who already know there are too many students coming out of academia with degrees that say they are an artist.

Students should also be instructed on how some folks, fortunately not many, from within this community on the outside will take advantage of their naiveté. They rely on a fresh crop of art students hungry for opportunity.

Not being an artist or even an art student myself, I’ll leave what and how students should be instructed in the arts to others. But I plead for the student’s sake and those of us already on the outside - give them a preview of what is waiting for them in the real world - after academia. Or keep them there. Spare us the burden of finishing their education - without tuition support.

I have met art students who are amazingly prepared for life after academia - either by their university or college, sometimes by family members who are artists, and a few who just naturally seem to be prepared for the real world. It’s a joy to watch them navigate their careers, but it is agonizing to watch others who are completely lost - with degrees in hand.

In my college days I had a roommate who was an art student of some talent. One day we were in the art building and I asked him if there were careers or jobs for all these people who would be one day graduating with a degree in art. He laughed and told me of course not. His explanation was that the teaching of art is expensive - too expensive to teach just the talented - many, many students and their tuition is needed to pay for all the facilities, equipment, supplies and instructors needed to teach the talented.

I asked if the others - the less talented - knew this fact. He said they’ll find out soon enough. Within a year, I one day looked around my classroom and decided I would no longer bother becoming an accountant. And, within a few more years, that talented roommate of mine would leave the art department to become a psychologist.

Given our world, our North American culture and society, what is the best way to train artists?

There is no single way. That is to say, each artist should gamble on finding circumstances that benefit their own way of putting things together. In some cases this could be as banal as a “creative writing” program. In some cases this could be as exciting as drinking absinthe or reading Donne.

How are those who “have the calling” most suitably prepared to understand art, art history, the ethics of the studio, of the art world, criticism and on and on?

Any understanding of art comes from something deeper than education. Or something that supercedes education. It is more valuable, let’s say. Any understanding of art is a mystery.

For poets, academia is the worst way. Academic poets are trapped in a contradiction. They try to represent madness, ecstasy, confusion, in an ordering, normalizing environment. You see, academia is not a mystery. But by nature, poetry is a mystery. Again, there is no right answer. This is all wrong anyway. How things actually work is different. No?

I would say, “study fields in universities outside of literature or art that enhance your art. Or teach yourself.” I would say, “build a reading life not based upon an institution’s identity or a professor’s whim, build it upon your own sense of what has happened and what is happening in, let’s say, experimental poetry, or any cultural community that works for you.” Of course, that is wrong too.

Dirt and grime. Not washing your hands. Leave the safe harbor of education for the rough water of your specific field. Abnormalize.

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