Art and Education
This makes art particularly difficult to assign value to. What is the value of incarcerated kids pouring themselves into a creative space where they find safety and belonging, and develop the courage to express beauty in a public way? How much money is that worth? What is the value of any child doing that?
We live in a time where our public discourse is dominated by the notion that education is, in fact, job preparation. If tech is where the jobs are, then why on earth teach music? I mean, teach music after school, or for fun, but by no means assign value to it the way we do the subjects of “real” value: the ones that will prepare workers of the future. Don’t believe me? I’m sure you do of course. But if you don’t, then review the last fifteen years and the massive, overwhelming, suffocating rise of STEM obsession: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math.
Why? Because education is viewed as job preparation. Because jobs make money. And money is easily measureable. This mentality, of course, ignores the soft elements, what I like to refer to as “essence,” including things like: passion, inclusion, identity, self-expression, joy. It seems self-evident that when children have full tanks in terms of these essential elements, then they build reserves like curiosity, creativity, and resilience, all of which are the building blocks of success at things such as STEM, or any other endeavor.
I went to music conservatory. Toward the end of my time there I became really interested in nonprofit organizations, and came to believe that the nonprofit structure was the place to focus if we were to grow community-based art making opportunities in America.
When my advisor learned I was going to graduate school to study music he called me to his office, “Is there anything I can do to convince you not to go to graduate school for music?” he said. “You are a smart guy. You write well, you research well, you should go to law school. Then you can become a lawyer, make money, and then you can buy any instrument you want, and play as much as you want in your free time.”
And I don’t think there’s an artist in the world who has not received that kind of advice from people who care about them. Because the conventional wisdom is that there’s no way to make money in the arts.
That’s not true, of course. But the truth is complicated, because it is extremely hard to assign simple, clear value to art. And we live in a simple, clear value-obsessed culture.
How obsessed are we with simple, clear value? Look at any social media platform where we place everything from meals, to thoughts, to commentary, to – mostly – pictures of ourselves, and then delight in how many thumbs-ups we get.
Plaintive voices make noise about soft elements like mental health, public good, kindness, cross-cultural understanding, or long-term issues such as public education or the environment. But it’s the hard elements, what I like to call “form,” those relating to power and money and physical health and appearance, that win most of the arguments.
Cover Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash
