UNIVERSITY OF BUCHAREST

FACULTY OF PHILOSOPHY

ARTISTIC KNOWLEDGE. THE EDUCATION OF

AESTHETIC SENSIBILITY IN SCHOOLS
- Summary of the thesis -

PhD: PREDESCU Mdlina-Adriana (Gheorghe-Tnase)

Scientific Supervisor: Prof. Univ. Dr. VASILE MORAR

Artistic Knowledge. The Education of Aesthetic Sensibility in Schools

- Summary of the thesis The Doctoral Thesis entitled Artistic Knowledge. The Education of Aesthetic
Sensibility in Schools claims, from the perspective of philosophical aesthetics, the
legitimacy of formative facets of the arts, through artistic and aesthetic education,
based on the type of knowledge specific for the arts.
The internal motivation of this work consists in high school, school and
kindergarten teaching experience, in this context noting the general attitude related to
art and art education. Beyond the fact that the representative disciplines for the artistic
domain are only two (arts and music education), with one hour a week each, without
further opportunities to supplement the hourly beach, there is the social phenomenon
of minimizing the role of this curriculum area (even at kindergarten math activities are
considered more important than artistic ones). Artistic activities and their products are
considered as simple games, recreations or practice for the manual skills, often at
higher grades, they are perceived as elements that overcrowd the curriculum, as a
separate module, removed from the context of a mainly theoretical education.
The theoretical premise that started this research, in the direction of artistic
knowledge and aesthetic education, was established by the ideas of Herbert Read
exposed in The Origins of Form in Art, supporting the existence of an alternative form
of knowledge, the aesthetic knowledge, that should be valued in an authentic and
balancing aesthetic education.
The purpose of this paper is therefore to confirm the status of knowledge of
the art, including its formative role, to support a deep approach to aesthetic and
artistic education, in the meaning of its influence on the individual and social level.
Specific objectives of the thesis followed:
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Exposure of balancing psichological and social function of art

exerted by its characteristics;

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The argumentation of the status of knowledge for the art;

Support of the role of art in moral character influention and

formation, in education;

Demonstration of the necessity for artistic or aesthetic education,

by way of the existence of specific types of knowledge and multiple

intelligences;
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Practical argumentation through image analysis, for the role of art

education as an activity with internal motivation, in personal development.

The topicality of this study is supported by the status of art in the
contemporary society, in relation to the technical, scientific and economic domain, by
the tendency of withdrawal, isolation of the artistic area, the same status being
reserved for the art in education, despite the numerous specialized studies highlighting
the necessity for arts education in general education.
The original character of the thesis consists in the multidisciplinary
approach to the proposed theme, by researching the viewpoints belonging to the
philosophical aesthetics, alongside the developmental and cognitive psychology
theories that promote alternative types of intelligence and which have been implicated
in innovative forms of education. Also, pedagogy and didactic design have been
involved by means of research in the artistic curriculum area, and of the education
framework plans and curricula of general artistic disciplines.
An exhaustive research of all aspects of knowledge in art or ethical valences
of aesthetic education was not intended, but a presentation of the views of some
thinkers of ancient times, and of the contemporary period, that reveal the fundamental
characteristics of this type of knowledge and can serve as support for the
argumentation of a cognitive component of art, transmissible through practical
learning, through comprehension, and support the role of art in influencing the moral
character and the social improvement, thus being sustained the necessity of artistic
and aesthetics education, nowadays.
Methodological instruments used to achieve these objectives were the
interpretative review of the proposed philosophical works, whose argumentative
efforts support the thesis theme, the exposition of the results of studies in the
aesthetic, artistic and creative education, and on practical level, the research of the
curricular structure of education in Romania in the arts domain, and the visual
analysis of works of arts belonging to the artistic educated people proposed cases.
The first chapter of the thesis includes a presentation of contemporary art
perception and of the causes of this situation, with a perspective on the superiority of
scientific, technical, economic domains, in relation to the cultural and artistic field.
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Based on arguments taken from the works of Tudor Vianu and Ion lanoi, we
sustained the opportunity for seeking a balance between those areas and the arts, in
order to exploit fundamental features of art: concreteness, unbreakable link with the
object, the unity of sign and meaning, holistic approach to the reality, in images, as
well as immediacy in reception, artistic communication, which can counteract the
effect of abstraction, specialized fragmentation, mediation and ongoing effort in the
area of science.
We analyzed the socio-economic causes and the philosophical foundations
for the contemporary perception of the arts as corresponding to a lower level,
following the arguments of thinkers Luc Ferry and Richard Shusterman. Thus, Ferry
argues that the marginalized status of art is because it expresses itself the consumerist
society that it criticisize, while Shusterman argues, indicating the cause of the
fundamental contemporary attitude in relation to the art, beibg the origins heritage of
European philosophy, when Plato set a hierarchy between philosophy as bearer of
wisdom, and art, which he lowers to the level of imitation of an imitation, and thus
deny it the status of knowledge. Aristotelian theory, as well as the history of
aesthetics, was influenced by this first vision of art as mimesis, to which Aristotle
adds the term Katharsis, that will be later used for the isolation of the arts domain
from life and reality itself. Shusterman brings into question, in relation to the
Aristotelian works, the separation of the three domains of knowledge: theoria, praxis
(action) and poiesis (production), the latter being considered a serving of the two, in
that its purpose is not in the production activity itself, nor in the person who runs it,
but in the finished product, which will lead to a reification of the work of art, as
isolated object, without utility. Shusterman argues for a pragmatic understanding of
the arts, in the sense of the aesthetic experience theorized by John Dewey, experience
that is not isolated, but rather experienced as part of life. Separation between art and
life led to the elimination of its role in knowledge and education, since Kant the
aesthetic domain is completely isolated and considered absolutely disinterested, with
no purpose other than aesthetic pleasure, distinct from emotion and charm.
Another cause of contemporary attitudes toward art is found by Luc Ferry in
the phenomenon of subjectivization, typical for the modernity. The authonomy of
aesthetic domain, since Immanuel Kant, means the isolation of art from the
intellectual knowledge field, with the reserve of a connection with a "general
knowledge" required for the "free play" of the faculties of imagination and intellect.
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The stage of subject-monad, cogito, can be overcome by the universality of the

judgment of taste, due to common sense. For some thinkers like Nietzsche, there is no
single Truth, so the common viewpoint has no relevance, each interpretation is
isolated by accepting difference. For Heidegger, the truth is both aesthetic subject and
object in the work of art. We are dealing with a critique of the cogito, a perspectivism,
ultraindividualism, final separation of interpretations, that justify the artistic vanguard,
the many trends and tendencies in art. The crisis of culture, arts, in this context,
consists in the fact that the modernist and postmodernist art is the concrete
manifestation of these theoretical visions, but also in the absence of values from the
contemporary society, as any contestation cannot be evidenced by opposition to any
standard of normality.
We analyzed the notions of artistic knowledge and artistic truth in presenting
the viewpoints exposed in Aesthetics treatise of 1983. Thus, it is argued that the
artwork is not an opaque object, it has a message, a human reaction, by means of
artistic knowledge we have access to the experiences of people from any place and
time, which supports educational, formative values of art. Artistic truth is not
objective, scientific, or historical truth, but a truth of the essence of life, with multiple,
fundamentally human meanings. In this context, aesthetic and artistic education is the
development of aesthetic sensitivity, of the capacities for conscious perception of the
artistic act. A person trained in an artistically impregnated environment will learn
naturally, as a foreign language, the specific artistic language. Aesthetic education,
consisting in encouraging aesthetic skills through creative and performance activities,
is formative for a proper aesthetic perception.
The two basic types of education, ethical and aesthetical, are adjacent in the
analysis carried out in the first chapter, following their mutual support in a formative
way. Andr Comte-Sponville describes the aesthetic education, the training of virtues,
as development under the influence of love (of the parents), by the action of the two
concepts (both related, in the ancient times), Good and Beauty, to the Love for the
Ideas of Beauty and Good, as ultimate aim of education. We analyzed the aesthetic
writings of Friedrich Schiller, or Letters on the aesthetic education of mankind, which
indicates as the way forward for political and social improvement, initiating the moral
development of individuals, the instrument for this moral education being the art,
which unifies matter and spirit and expresses the essence of human nature, thus
bringing balance in society. Herbert Read in turn supports the idea of moral
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improvement through moral education, the latter can be supported through aesthetic
education, which is the element of balance with the character of vitality, in relation to
theoretical or Cartesian education. Art, as image, is the first symbolic language that
appeared before verbal language, therefore it helps to meet basic human needs and
requires implementation in education. Pragmatist philosopher John Dewey argued
since the early twentieth century for the progressivist education, where the school is a
small society in which learning is effective experience of social life in the same way
as it is lived outside the school. Moral education would be in this context learning by
cooperation, not by competition, with methods that include practical activities,
productive, among them the arts. In his study Homo Aesteticus, Luc Ferry argues for a
recovery of the pronounced aesthetic tendencies, of promoting the authenticity and
expressiveness, of the propensity for performance of the society, subsumed by Ferry
in the expression "aesthetics era". He also argues for a transfer to the ethics domain,
by taking the model of the aesthetic and cultural domain.
In the second chapter of the thesis we examined important works from
ancient times to emphasize the premises of the contemporary attitude in relation to the
arts field, including arts education, but also to argue for a positive perception of the
poetic arts in the ancient Greece. We presented the specific terms used in Greek
writings on arts, which were inherited by the philosophical aesthetics writings until
present. Analyzing the Republic of Plato dialogue, we found that placing art on the
third level of participation in truth, was due to the need to establish a hierarchy
between philosophy and poetry, in the context of an argument for the role of the
bearer of wisdom. Indicating a series of paragraphs of this paper, we argued the
important role that art has in the city designed by Plato, that of the educator of
citizens, of character modeling, with reserve on the selection of aesthetic elements
suitable for this influence. We also showed appreciation declared by the philosopher
for a particular type of art, the idealist type, thus being removed the interpretation of
rejection or inferiority of the artistic field in the Platonic work.
There were also analyzed works of Aristotle's practical philosophy, including
the Nicomachean Ethics, where we displayed the dianoetic virtues, in order to present
these concepts as specific terms, as well as an argument against the intellectual
superiority of the virtue of speculative wisdom, sophia, thus leaving open the
possibility of a fulfilled life in search of the three types of knowledge mentioned by
Aristotle: theoretical, practical or ethical and poietic or productive, which can be used
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to promote the aesthetic, artistic and creative education. In the Aristotelian Poetics
and Politics, aspects regarding the role of art and artists in ancient Greek society are
revealed, poetry is seen as close to the Universal, with the philosophy and the concept
of Katharsis adding a function of purification and healing the soul, for the art, while
its role of influencing the soul is exploited by the formation of character (ethos
theory), achieved through art education. We can see that for Aristotle the scope of
education is not only theoretical, but also an ethical one, the formative activity on the
ethos being represented by the practice and appreciation of art. Regarding this issue
we presented developments in Hellenistic aesthetics.
The third chapter of the thesis includes the presentation of the problem of
knowledge in art, analyzing the works of contemporary philosophers in which the
valence of the art as bearer of expression and significance, is recognized, and thus its
role in education. The work of John Dewey Art as experience denounce the
remoteness of art in the contemporary world, in an artificial environment represented
by museum and gallery, lacking the possibility of communicating its fundamental
human meanings. The manufacturer of art, the artist, is totally separated from the
consumer, that is the art amateur. Conceiving the art as manual work, not involving
intelligence, thought, is the consequence of separation between mind and body,
thought and practice. Dewey argues that the value of aesthetic experience as essential
experience of life, inclusive experience, merging the subjective with the objective,
and Kantian disinterestedness signifying lack of interest just outside the artwork. The
artists aesthetic experience is converted in the experience form as represented by the
work, as significance of it, and thus transmits the knowledge specific for the art, in the
receiver's own experience.
Analysis of the work Truth and Method by Hans-Georg Gadamer reveals
that the truth is not entirely circumscribed by the scientific accuracy and
demonstration, because reason is limited, and by understanding the religious tradition,
contemplating the work of art and the historical analysis of the phenomenon we have
access to a kind of truth inaccessible to scientific methods. Artistic experience, along
with philosophy, proves the limitation of the scientific knowledge. The connection of
art with truth (gr. aletheia, un-concealment) is taken up by Gadamer, from
Heidegger's theory exposed in The origin of the work of art. Truth as un-concealment
opens up, leaving itself to be understood in the artwork. The understanding occurred
through the "hermeneutic circle" is not a scientific method for Gadamer, but a kind of
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practical knowledge, from the ancient phronesis family. Revealing the cognitive
valence of the aesthetic experience, Gadamer argues that art is not a copy of reality,
but it adds to its Being.
The specific features of knowledge are exposed in the analysis of the work
of Mikel Dufrenne, Phenomenology of the aesthetic experience. Unlike the previous
theories, the aesthetic object is totally isolated from the outside world for Dufrenne,
but the communion with it is done through total focus of the subjects attention. Art is
an affirmation of the Truth of Being, imposed by the presence of the aesthetic object.
The act of aesthetic perception is seen as layered and has not an immediate nature, it
constantly oscillates between the emotional and reflective level. The reflection
involved in the aesthetic experience is not represented by discursive thought, but by a
previous knowledge present both in consciousness of the artist and in the
consciousness of the receiver, so artistic knowledge occurs through the mediation of
the "affective a priori" represented by the aesthetic sentiment and aesthetic categories.
Aesthetic sentiments are unique for each person, but emotional categories to which
they belong are generally common to all people. The existence of this specific type of
knowledge, distinct from discursive, theoretical knowledge, demonstrates the
necessity for aesthetic and artistic education, which should correspond to this
knowledge.
As part of the fourth chapter we presented the applied aspects of artistic
and creative type of knowledge, in the light of contemporary psychological and
pedagogical theories that can support the necessity for aesthetic and artistic education.
Multiple intelligences theory of Howard Gardner sustains a pluralistic view of
intelligence, given the existence of alternative cognitive styles distinct from the
cognitive type promoted by classic schools, such as the one measured by IQ tests.
Gardner has identified, as biologically and psychologically based computational
capabilities, first seven, then nine intelligences types: musical, bodily-kinesthetic,
logical-mathematical,

linguistic,

visual-spatial,

intrerpersonal,

intrapersonal,

naturalistic and existential. Gardner's theory has been implemented into schools with
a curriculum following the multiple intelligences and distinct cognitive modes in
children and has been applied in the research of educational programs in the arts
education and alternative education. The Project Zero of Harvard University
conducted a set of evaluation programs such as Spectrum, developed into the
Spectrum classroom, or the Arts PROPEL arts curriculum, assessed by process
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portfolio. Likewise, we mention as outstanding and very actual, the contribution, in

the beginning of the twentieth century, of John Dewey on progressivist education,
supporting a type of school where social life is currently deployed experience and not
just a preparation for a distant future. Dewey gives an important role to the productive
manual activities, which are means to attract children to more abstract disciplines,
these principles also inspiring Gardner in his ideas about schools based on multiple
intelligences.
The triarchic theory of intelligence by Robert Strernberg has in common
with Gardner's theory, the disproof of an unique intelligence corresponding to IQ
tests, but Sternberg believes that there are only three types of intelligence,
componential or analytic, experiential or synthetic and contextual or practical. The
first type of intelligence represents the classical academic type, consisting in the
ability to process information, the second type, the synthetic intelligence, is
represented by the creative response to a new experience, while the third case of
intelligence, the practical type, is the ability to adapt to the environment, the so-called
"street-smarts". These three aspects of intelligence can be overlaid to the Aristotelian
three types of knowledge: theoretical, practical and poietic.
Implications of artistic creativity in education are described according to the
monumental work published at Springer in 2007, edited by Liora Bresler,
International Handbook of Research in Arts Education, seeking creativity in child
development, in teaching applied methods and research. We mention that a very large
number of studies has been made, regarding artistic creativity in education, also that
some of their results contradicted some earlier assumptions, for example the study of
creativity National Agency for Education in Sweden in 1999, which showed, contrary
to the practice preconceptions, that it cannot be demonstrated a decrease in the artistic
creativity, after a certain age (especially in primary schools), also gender differences
are not confirmed, nor socio-economic levels differences, on the artistic and creative
skills and capabilities. Numerous studies that have attempted to demonstrate the
implication of artistic education in creativity, and its transfer to other cognitive areas,
found evidence of partial transfer between similar areas. The students in the schools
with larger variety of art courses proved more creative than students who were not
attending art classes, but it is possible that those who choose these courses to be more
natively creative. The study on the "Learning through Art" program demonstrates a
transfer between artistic creativity and results in mathematics and language, also
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showing that the influence of arts courses for the students, parents and teachers was
affective, social, students becoming more motivated to learn and benefitting under all
aspects from the program. A study of Kathleen Gallagher, also demonstrates that
drama affects the social, cultural, academic life of the students, developing creativity
and expressiveness.
There was also presented a profile of the creative personality as it is exposed
in Creative Vision, the study of Jakob Getzels and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.
Individuals with high artistic creativity, the people who become artists, are
characterized by great spatial perception, accentuated aesthetic values, low level of
economic and social values, which can be understood as a rejection of materialism
and sociability; future artists are therefore distant, unsociable, introspective,
independent, nonconformist, experimental, unpredictable. In a study on the
implementation of free compositions, the results showed that the best scores were
obtained of the students with the most creative works (engaged in finding, not solving
plastic problem). The artist career is followed by the students according to the level of
creativity, the level of aesthetic value, but contrary to their own personality traits: they
are distant, introverted, unsociable, but are forced to open a studio, give parties to
attract potential customers or get known by the gallerists; they are creative and
independent, but entering a gallery system may lead to be transformed into commands
executants, plain problem solver. In the research, creativity in the visual arts
experience is understood as a process of internal or external psychological conflict,
which is solved on the symbolic visual level, through which a new emotional balance
emerges.
The fifth chapter contains the results of the international research related to
arts education, presented in the International Handbook of Research in Arts
Education. For each artistic area (visual arts, music, drama, dance, literature)
corresponding to specific artistic education, we organized a chapter in which we
presented aspects of the history of that field of education, as well as types of current
curriculum, one of the chapters being dedicated to arts integrated curriculum. The
second part of Chapter V describes specific instances of Romanian education system,
studying art education by analyzing curricula and syllabi current at the time of writing
the thesis. We also presented additional initiatives in relation to curricular offer,
belonging to the local institutions or schools. The results of the studies on arts
education internationally, compared to the national situation of these areas show a
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diversity of types of curriculum, a variety of specific artistic disciplines, revealing a

growing concern in granding an important role for the arts in education. Regarding the
reality of the Romanian education, the research of the curricular offer revealed a
different situation from the international one: the common educational framework
plans, outside of vocational departments, that is the artistic disciplines, are very underrepresented: one hour of music education and arts education per week, from first until
seventh grade, one hour a week, common to both disciplines in eighth grade, and in
grades IX and X, only for humanities specialization and certain vocational
specialization, one hour of musical education and visual education, but following a
theoretical oriented curriculum. Given the ideal of Romanian education made public
in the first part of the new Law on Education, which includes "the free, full and
harmonious development of human individuality, in autonomous personality
formation and assuming a value system that is necessary for personal fulfillment and
development" we consider that to achieve this goal, as well as to represent the area of
competence of cultural awareness and expression mentioned in the Law, to form an
active and voluntary public for the contemporary art, but also to meet the basic need
of expression of the aesthetic sensitivity, requires that artistic disciplines being
allowed a broader curricular space, represented in the common core curriculum
available to all students, of optional subjects, mentioning the minimum and maximum
levels of competence in these areas. In this way it could be avoided the already being
felt overload of the curriculum, by applying these levels of competence for most
disciplines.
The sixth and final chapter represents the practical contribution of the
thesis, by analyzing a series of images representing visual arts works, belonging to
subjects who manifested artistic skills in fine arts in childhood and received formal or
non-formal art education. The results of the nine case studies show that arts activities
conducted under the guidance of a specialist art teacher who uses teaching methods
that encourage children's creativity and spontaneity of expression, have for products
quality artistic work, showing a high degree of creativity and expressiveness.
Regarding the lower level of creativity present in the small schooling (primary
school), due to acquisitions in theory, the analyzed cases show that this decline may
be attenuated by exercise, by sustainded, formal or non-formal artistic activities.
Getzels and Csikszentmihalyi's findings in 1976 can partly be confirmed by the
conclusions of our research cases, about the choice of an artistic career: not everyone
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who has skills and develop them in childhood, will follow a university with artistic
profile, three cases being addressed in this situation. The reason for this
disengagement by the fine arts is generally financial, sometimes with social
involvement (one subject preferred medicine domain). The artistic career option is not
only linked to the talent, skills, but also the psychological profile of the person, to the
aesthetic values in relation to the economic ones, to the socio-economic and family
membership.
We emphasize that, given the importance of aesthetic and artistic education
in the context of harmonious, holistic human development, Romanian education
frameworks does not cover current needs of this development, therefore the students
in Romania do not benefit on an education of the aesthetic sensibility, as much as
students from other countries. Education reform, in whose name continuous changes
and instability of the educational system occurs, should include a radical reform of the
curriculum, including the field of cultural awareness and expression, through a broad
representation of artistic disciplines, possibly optional. Also, local and institutional
initiatives require a stronger involvement of relevant institutions (municipalities, local
councils, school inspectorates and independent cultural organizations), in order to
support courses in institutions, organization of festivals, exhibitions, competitions for
children and adolescents in various artistic fields, thus art being promoted together
with all its formative, cognitive, ethical, social, cultural implications.

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