| Most art educators would consider an art spontaneously done by children without any adults' interference or prompting, to be more valuable than other kinds of works that they produced. Lark-Horovitz et al. have defined the spontaneous, children's art in "What Children Draw" as drawing "made on their own initiative as a play activity or in pursuit of individual interest". As compared to free or voluntary art that is "made on request but with the children choosing their own subjects" and the directed "topic proposed" work in art lessons, spontaneous art is thus considered to be a better source to understand children. (Lark-Horovitz et al. 1973, p. 75) However, it is common for children to stop drawing intensively as they grow older. Starting from about 9 to 10 years of age, many of them would stop spontaneously to relate their personal experience in their drawings and other forms of artistic creation. | There is a substantial decrease in the time younger adolescents spend on art activities as presented by Timmers et al.. Their research findings show 8.7% of involvement, as compared to the older adolescents' 1.5% of involvement that came out from the study carried out by Csikszentmihalyi and Larson. (Steinberg, 1996, p.253) Even an educator such as Howard Gardner believes that "…for a reason that we do not yet completely understand, enthusiasm about acquiring skills in the arts and the nearly capacity to immerse oneself fully in an expressive medium seem lacking in most adolescents, at least in our culture." (Gardner, 1982, p. 215) |
| One of the explanations that art educators have for such phenomenon is the development of verbal language that overrides children's need to find expression in the visual form. There are other possibilities such as the self-consciousness of adolescents that is germinating at around this time. It causes them to take an over critical attitude towards their own works which results thus in their decreased interest in art. The influence of peer pressure may also lead to the termination of many adolescents' involvement in art-related activities. Then, the busy schedule with numerous different activities may fragment the life of most adolescents, leaving them with very little time and energy for 'big-scale' artistic creations. | Could there be another possibility
that is tied to the characteristic and definition of art, instead of the
creator, which can account for this prominent decrease in the spontaneous
involvement in art activities of adolescents ? |
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| In the representational art works of children, there is a frequent strive and struggle to create and represent the common reality that "refers to the familiar and everyday perceptions and experiences of objects and events that we human share in common" (Wilson, 1989, pg. 23). Beyond this familiar notion of common reality there are other dimensions of reality that Wilson has echoed after Hans and Schulamith Kreitler's definitions. Such are the archeological, the normative and the prophetic realities as other aspects of reality that can be discovered in the creative world of young artists. | The archeological reality is a "reality of the self [within] the human mind as being composed of layer upon layer of memories, feelings, thoughts, impressions and desire." (Wilson, 1989, pg. 24) The normative reality is a "reality of good and bad, of right and wrong, of just and unjust, a reality of standards, subsuming the implicit and the explicit rules by which an individual or a society behaves." (Wilson, 1989, pg. 29) The prophetic reality is where "construct, refine and rehearse anticipated events, encounters and conversation" (Wilson, 1989, pg. 32) that may take place in the future to seek control and establish security. |
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| Unlike children whose reality is only related to their own concrete experiences, adolescents have more versions of reality as a result of their improved mental abilities. The formal operational thinking that is characteristic of adolescents' thinking, significantly influences the way adolescents experience life and perceive the world around them. The emergence of prepositional reasoning forms the basis for the development of different cognitive abilities (e.g., thinking about possibilities, abstract concepts, thinking and metacognition) which are likely to leave behind certain traces in the daily behavior of adolescents. Perhaps it is the criteria that adults, art teachers, and art educators had classified as art that excludes some of these most artful scribbles. | Efland has pointed out that children's art has become what we as adults and especially as art teachers have made of it. (Efland, 1976) The Wilsons had also unveiled that art education's "practices … suppress - at least in art classes - the most obvious adult influences while subtly 'motivating' children to produce adult conceptions of what children's art should look like…" (Wilsons, 1977, p. 5) Thus, although there may be a decrease in formal drawings that adolescents would want to create inside proper sketch books during art lessons, yet, the adolescents may continue to be engage in 'drawing". |
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| Many adolescents continue to doodle and create
marks on desks and other surfaces when they are bored, frustrated, stressed
and anxious, while others may attempt different forms of expressions, for
example, graffiti. The psychological aspects and the inner world of multiple
realities of adolescents may be revealed through this special type of 'drawing'
and scribbling, in replacement of the more formal expression that adults
expect from them.
Graffiti can be considered as a form of expression,
in the eyes of the 'artists', when art is taken to be an expression of
emotion and thoughts. It is a form of vandalism in the eyes of the law
and culprits can be committed to serious punishment based on the law code
of different societies. Even the liberal art critic, Gablik, agreed that
"to many people, the presence of graffiti in the environment has come to
symbolize violation, social anarchy, and moral breakdown." (Gablik, 1984,
p. 103)
|
Besides being a form of expression, graffiti is also "a form of communication that is both personal and free of everyday social restraints that normally prevent people from giving uninhibited reign to their thoughts." (Abel, 1977, p. 3) As such, these sometimes crude inscriptions offer some intriguing insights into the people who author them and into the society to which these people belong." (Abel, 1977, p. 3) There are other functions that graffiti serve in the world today. For example, in New York, families of the victims of crime and violence commission graffiti artists to paint murals in memorial of the deceased. (Cooper & Sciorra, 1994) |
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| Graffiti can be considered to be a kind of symbol
or sign making activity, which is part of human nature.
According to Suzanne Langer, symbol making is "one of the basic needs of people" and is "an innate capacity of the human mind, rooted in the mind's capacity to synthesize, delay and modify our reactions". (Zurmuehlen, 1990, p. ?) "It is beyond the direct concern of survival before such an account for the imagination, sense of value, and interests in all sorts of activities can be produced. To make symbols means that the individual possesses an awareness of life beyond personal concerns." (Zurmuehlen, 1990, p. ?) |
A serious examination of
many graffiti may find such intentions of their creators. Their works contain
messages and information as an artistic statement of the artists. They
are also likely to include the creator's imaginations and feelings. Thus
like a work of art, they become a prime symbol that cannot be constructed
by a synthesis of elements - its total value is an emergent quality that
is non-additive.
Art "embodies the artist's own imagination of organized feeling; the rhythms of life; the forms of emotion, while it offers the viewers a way of conceiving emotion." (Zurmuehlen, 1990, p. ) Thus, serious graffiti art would have to consider the aesthetic qualities, that is the formal and visual effects of the works. |
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| One of the main criteria that makes graffiti art
distinguishable is the unique aesthetic quality that emerges from the form.
This is more important than the explicit hostility in the content which
may reflect certain biased opinions against a third party, and even prejudiced
statements against different races, ethnic groups, gender, religions, nationalities,
institution, and so on.
All these differences in the ethics of the 'content' will have to meet the stylistic expression and the use of a medium successfully in order to became graffiti art. Very often, it takes the trained viewers to detach these differences, while the majority of the audience, especially adolescents, are unlikely to make the differentiation. Because of this pursue to attain aesthetic qualities, many graffiti artists are constantly striving for personal improvement in their next engagement. |
Only when adolescents are able to be guided towards such endeavors and such a level of judgment and appreciation, may the graffiti they produce be justified as a form of spontaneous art. Till then, graffiti will remain at the edge of crime that poses a constant threat and a source of worry for many. The established norms of society will find it difficult to justify graffiti and they are likely to continue adopting their restricted definition of art to the canvas hang on the white walls of museums and art galleries. |
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| “It is the problem posed by a culture that includes changes,
innovation, and even revolution as part of it basic myth system… Change
is also an integral part of our myth of freedom. Individual freedom in
[modern] culture is in large part defined as the freedom to change – one's
mind, one's job, one's home, and so forth.” (Pelfrey, 1985, p.28)
Thus, Modern artists are pressurized to be continuously
changing, seeking stylistic, thematic, conceptual differences from the
movement that precedes one after and another. This is a reflection of the
mentality of the modern society where tradition is usually not being treasured
and over glorification is placed on changes and innovations.
|
“Modernism so embraced notions of freedom and
autonomy – and of art needing to answer only to its own logic, its own
laws, the pure aesthetic without a function…” (Gablik, 1984,
p. 119) The 80s is considered to be the golden age of graffiti art,
“with the complex, abstract letter forms called wild style” (Fineberg,
1996, p. ) being identified and also many graffiti artists were showing
their works in “well-lighted rooms”. (Gablik, 1984, p. 103) These
artists include the famous Feith Haring who could afford to open his own
gallery, specializing in the sale of his ‘graffiti art’, and Lee (Quinones),
TAKIS 183 who is the first tag-up . Subsequently, new graffiti artists
made it into the art scene, this include “the Caine and Fabulous Five,
Crash, Dondi, Futuna 2000, Lady Pink, Phase II, Rammellzee, Revolt, Sean
and Zephyr”, as recorded in Fineberg’s contemporary America art history.
(Fineberg, 1996, p. )
|
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| An undeniable fact is that graffiti, graffiti
vandalism and graffiti art will continue to be part of future adolescents’
involvement with the easy accessibility of spray paint and cheap
painting materials. Also as the stress of living in modern society continue
to accelerate, adolescents who are at the receiving end of all these outcomes,
will have to find venue to venture their inner need, that is to express
and to communicate. Thus, Gomez had suggested some integrated solutions
based on successful studied cases in Denmark, Great Britain, Sweden and
Paris to curb graffiti vandalism, they are:
|
|
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Abel. E.L. and Buckley B. E. (1977) The Handwriting on the Wall: Towards a Sociology and Psychology of Graffiti. Connecticut: Greenwood PressBack to Top
Cooper, M., & Sciorra, J. (1994) R.I.P. New York Spraycan Memorials. London: Thames and Hudson.
Efland, A. (1976) The School Art Style: A Functional Analysis Studies in Art Education. Studies in Art Education, 17(2), p37 - 44.
Fehr, D. E. (1994) Promise and Paradox: Art Education in the Postmodern Arena. Studies in Art Education, 35 (4), 209 – 217.
Ferell, J. (1995) Urban Graffiti: Crime, Control, and Resistance. Youth & Society, September 27 (1), 73 – 92.
Fineberg, J. (1997) Art Since 1940 Strategies of Being. NJ: Prentice Hall.
Gablik, S. (1984) Has Modernism Failed? NY: Thames and Hudson.
Gardner, H. (1982) Unfolding or Teaching: On the Optimal Training of Artistic Skills. Art, Mind and Brain. NY: Basic Books, 208 – 217.
Gomez, M. (1993). The writing on our walls: Finding solutions through distinguishing graffiti art from graffiti vandalism. University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform, 26, 633 – 707.
Horworth, L.N. (1989). Graffiti. Handbook of American Popular Culture, M. Thomas Inge ed. 556 – 557.
Lark-Horovitz, B., Lewis, H., and Luca, M., (1973). What children draw? From Understanding children’s art for better teaching, 35 - 45.
Pelfrey, R. H., Pelfrey, M. H. (1985) Art and Mass Media. NY: Havpert and Row.
Steinberg, L. (1996). Adolescence (4th Ed..) NY: McGraw-Hill.
Wilson, B., and Wilson, M., (1982). What Children Draw? From Teaching children to draw: A guide for parents and teachers, 19 - 37.
Wilson, B., (1977). An Iconoclastic view of the Imagery Source in the Drawing of Young People, Art Education, January, 5 - 11.
Zurmuehlen, M.J. (1990). Studio Art: Praxis, Symbol, Presence. VA: National Art Education Association.
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