Teaching Beyond the Curriculum
Abstract
Critical and Contextual Studies (CCS) alludes to a curricula space commonly associated with writing, ‘theory’ and critical thinking in the Art School. Models of CCS differ from institution to institution; while some appear isolated from the studio, others appear more integrated with making practices. Despite the varying models, there remains a mythologising of CCS knowing as cerebral, disembodied and other to the tacit and material knowing of studio practice. The social and historical construction of CCS is in tension with that of the making and ‘thingking’ (Dunnigan, 2013) of the studio. This tension provokes a generative critical space between CCS and studio practice, beyond the mythologised binaries of writing/making, theory/practice and thinking/doing that are part of their historical legacies. Drawing on education discourse about subject cultures (including Goodson and Mangan, 1995), Art School discourse about CCS (including Lockheart, 2018), and discourse on pedagogies (including Schick and Timperley, 2022) I propose that space generated through differences between CCS and the studio is ripe for expansive critical thinking. I talk from this space in making proposals for decolonising CCS pedagogies, practising writing as a material process with transdisciplinary capacity, and developing pedagogies of joy for a generative (rather than productive) Art School. This discussion is in the context of a politics of care and hope in and for the future of the Art School.
Jenny Rintoul is Senior Lecturer in Visual Culture at the University of the West of England. Jenny leads the Visual Culture Research Group (VCRG), which is a group of cross-disciplinary writers and makers interested in visuality and materiality (www.vcrg.co.uk), and is a member of the Ways of Writing in Art and Design Research Network (WoW). Her research on art and design education focuses on constructions of theory and practice, tacit ways of knowing, and demystifying ‘intuition’ and ‘integration’.