Rhode Island School of Design - Portfolio Yearbook (Providence, RI)

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This is in answer to a request for a statement on the Divi- sion of Fine Arts that might still be meaningful ten years hence. Lacking the gift of foresight | have addressed myself to the present. What follows is a series of obser- vations and thoughts occasioned by the continuing proc- ess of assessing our programs as we plan for the future. In many ways the initiative in education has been seized by the student as a result of his impatience with older methods and a desire to become engaged in the shaping of his world more quickly than older schedules will allow. Three qualities identify the good student here. One, his deep concern for his own education; two, his realization that in the process of learning he may achieve self-identity; and three, a desire to place himself mean- ingfully in the context of his civilization. Responding to activities within and without our walls, Fine Arts education is changing at a tempo not thought of a few years ago. Some of the change is clearly good, some must await a judgment made possible only with the passage of time. One thing stands out very clearly, how- ever, despite the fact that the college has taken the po- sition that its business is education and quite reasonably disclaimed any special power to produce artists, it is inescapable that our students increasingly act in the be- lief that the educational process and that of becoming an artist are not necessarily two separate functions. Such a posture suggests a revolution in design education if it is viable in the organizational framework necessary to any institution of higher learning. Increasingly it is evident that learning to brush on paint, to carve stone, or to throw a pot may hold less significance for our students than the exercise of men- tal powers and physical skills necessary to accomplish these functions. More importantly the possible by-prod- ucts of self-identity and the realization of emerging cre-

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Samuel F. Hershey Mrs. Martha Paisner Robert H. Miller

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ative capability have transcended the importance of the object made or the skills required for their making. Edu- cationally such exercises are voyages of discovery that do not operate on aclosed circuit. The charts of the voy- age, the log book, and even the travelled terrain itself represented by the painting, carving, or pot are present and open records for others to study and enjoy. Such an attitude toward learning may be close to the heart of the matter in the attempt to communicate, one individual to another, that is characteristic of the best efforts of art- ists’ past and present. Our students find themselves in the center of converg- ing pressures to acquire skills, to take jobs, and to fill their role in society. These are large orders to fill and in time, of course, they must be filled. A search for purpos e, the belief in the necessity to reaffirm dignity of the in- dividual and a faith in his kind of inquiry, call to our stu- dents much more strongly than any requirements to fill existing niches. With it all there is a sense of responsibil- ity made almost a duty by the needs of our times, a re- sponsibility | feel certain will be fulfilled. If our students can learn, as artists, to speak for themselves, one day they may speak for others. GILBERT A. FRANKLIN