The Aesthetic Realism Teaching Method Relates the Beauty in Art and the Beauty in Science
For the last several years, my colleague Donita Ellison and I have given presentations at Art conferences throughout the New York Metropolitan area showing how the Aesthetic Realism Teaching Method gracefully and powerfully relates the beauty in art and the beauty in science. Donita taught art at Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School and is an Aesthetic Realism Associate. I taught science at LaGuardia and am currently a consultant on the faculty of the Aesthetic Realism Foundation.
Using this principle by Eli Siegel as the basis of our talks, we have had a wonderful time showing that the beauty in art and science are not in different worlds or of different quality: "The world, art, and self explain each other: each is the aesthetic oneness of opposites." We have given presentations on the relation of sameness and change in embryonic development and the modeling of clay; how surface and depth are beautifully one in the structure of the human skin and the art of printmaking; how separation and junction are inextricably one in the structure and function of the human heart and the making of a coil pot.
In each of these presentations we have also described how the same opposites present in the subjects we discussed, every teacher and student wants to put together in his or her own personal life. For example, every student wants to feel that what they show on the outside, his or her surface, also represents what is deep within oneself. The Aesthetic Realism method answers the question, "Education: What For?" in the teaching of every subject--to like the world more and to know ourselves better. That it answers this question with a thrilling relation of fact and feeling, concentration and expansion, was the reason I loved using this method for more than 30 years.
These presentations grew out of a talk we gave at the 31st International Society for Education Through Art in New York City in August, 2002. To read this presentation on how power and delicacy are in the structure of the human hand and in prehistoric cave paintings, based on the Aesthetic Realism Teaching Method you can click here .
Using this principle by Eli Siegel as the basis of our talks, we have had a wonderful time showing that the beauty in art and science are not in different worlds or of different quality: "The world, art, and self explain each other: each is the aesthetic oneness of opposites." We have given presentations on the relation of sameness and change in embryonic development and the modeling of clay; how surface and depth are beautifully one in the structure of the human skin and the art of printmaking; how separation and junction are inextricably one in the structure and function of the human heart and the making of a coil pot.
In each of these presentations we have also described how the same opposites present in the subjects we discussed, every teacher and student wants to put together in his or her own personal life. For example, every student wants to feel that what they show on the outside, his or her surface, also represents what is deep within oneself. The Aesthetic Realism method answers the question, "Education: What For?" in the teaching of every subject--to like the world more and to know ourselves better. That it answers this question with a thrilling relation of fact and feeling, concentration and expansion, was the reason I loved using this method for more than 30 years.
These presentations grew out of a talk we gave at the 31st International Society for Education Through Art in New York City in August, 2002. To read this presentation on how power and delicacy are in the structure of the human hand and in prehistoric cave paintings, based on the Aesthetic Realism Teaching Method you can click here .
posted by Rosemary Plumstead at 9:30 AM
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