The Vision Behind Young Artists' Studio

You began your career teaching children’s art classes, then went on to a long-time teaching position at the post-secondary level as well as working with adult learners. What made you want to come back to teaching children and youth?

Culture is an intergenerational project. I’ve been lucky. I had very good teachers and artists who shared their knowledge with me. When you value what has been given to you, you want to pass it on. I’ve been teaching for a long time. I’ve worked with all ages and in a range of settings, but at this stage I wanted to work with young people again and I wanted to be able to do it differently

What are the things that you want to do differently?

Two things, really. First, I wanted to offer a program where young people in the visual arts have the opportunity for substantial development. Culturally, we appreciate that acquiring the skills to play a sport, or a musical instrument, or to dance is more than a one-shot kind of experience and there are many programs in those fields where children can progress through distinct developmental stages and grow. But we don’t have equivalent kinds of programs for kids in the visual arts and children and families don’t know where to go for next steps.

With cuts to arts in public schools, there aren’t the opportunities we would hope for there.

Yes, schools are under chronic budgetary and time restraints, and this exacerbates the common learning pattern in the visual arts. Art teachers in public schools are very important, but the hurdles they face in delivering their programs are serious and aren’t talked about enough.

What pattern do you observe in visual arts learning?

Kids get off to a great start in the visual arts. In the kindergarten years, maybe even up to grade 1 or 2, in the time frame when their fine motor skills are really taking-off, children’s artwork can be very powerful, like a burst of creative expression. But typically, it tails off after that because there are very few supports for the next stage of development. Sometimes things pick up again at the end of high school when there is a sudden rush to prepare entrance portfolios to post-secondary programs, but not always.

So, the middle years are a missed opportunity.

Yes, the middle years are incredible years for visual arts learning.  So much can be accomplished. These are the years for slow and steady development, experimentation. And it’s a time for having fun and learning without outside pressures.

What is the second thing you want to do differently?

I wanted to design a program that ensured breadth in young people’s visual arts learning. The art focus for many young people gets narrow very early. I saw the effects of this at the college level all the time. A common example is when kids get involved in a particular comic style and that’s all they do. I love comics, but, to develop an original comic form, to be creative and inventive in the language of comics, artists are pulling from a wide range of art skills and influences. 

What does breadth look like?

Breadth can be a lot of things, but well-balanced learning addresses core areas in the visual: design and composition, observation and representation, materials and process, visual narrative, and formal elements and principles which are things like colour, shape, line, etc.

How does this unfold in a class?

Over the course of the three terms, our projects and exercises work through these areas, circling back and making connections. We will spend time drawing with different media, painting, printmaking, constructing, and designing and creating visual narratives.

How does the program change with each age group?

All good art teaching is really training the student’s capacity to visualize, to think, to express, to have a voice in visual terms. Visualization is imaginative work. It’s also a practical plan that requires skill. 

Younger children visualize quickly in part because their motor and technical skills are limited, as are their influences, and the complexity of their ideas—and it’s important to respect this. They work more quickly because they are working within the more limited scope of what they can accomplish and articulate. But the real strength of very young artists is they are fearless, and that’s something you want to protect. As a teacher you are working little bit, by little bit to expand the scope of their skills and ideas, and you’re encouraging their confidence, so it keeps up with each new challenge. I find it good practice to move between projects and materials at a steady pace at this age, not labour one skill or project for an overly long time, and whenever possible to leave time to come back to things.

As kids get older their focus matures, as do their motor and technical skills. They can work and imagine through increasingly extended artistic processes, and they will require more time. The pace will slow down. Sometimes older kids can struggle with perfectionism and that's one of the reasons why the structure of art classes is good for older kids. Classes set a reasonable timeframe to accomplish something, let go, and move on.

What was your art training like as a young person?

My parents are both artists, so I spent time in their studios watching them work. Being side-by-side with an artist in the studio is an incalculable kind of learning experience--watching them work, watching them pause to consider things, seeing the flow of their work; it’s very real. 

At the same time, I also took art classes as a young kid all the way to the end of high school, and I had the benefit of that structure. But art wasn’t my only thing. I did it because I enjoyed it. I also did sport. I studied music at school. In fact, I didn’t do art class in high school until grade 12 or 13. When I went to University, I didn’t apply to go into the art program, because I planned on doing French, but by the end of October in first year I found myself missing time in the studio, so I took some of my paintings and drawings to one of the profs; he filled-in the paperwork and let me join the following week without losing the year.

Is your goal with Young Artists’ Studio to help kids get into post-secondary programs?

It’s one goal, but it’s certainly not the exclusive one, nor the most important. 

Young Artists’ Studio is for kids in the middle years who enjoy learning in a hands-on way in a studio setting. It’s as much for those who want to try something new as for those with an abiding artistic curiosity.  

Some children will work in visual ways professionally one day, some will do different things. A good children’s art program brings together future artists and future art lovers, collectors and audiences; a strong culture happens when different kinds of involvement come together.

What is the most important thing young people need to thrive in the arts?

Community. Young Artists’ Studio program of yearlong art classes is more than the sum of its parts. There’s camaraderie in the studio that’s only possible when kids have a chance to spend time together with a shared focus. In the studio, young people are the first ones to appreciate other’s work, to value their ideas, experiments and accomplishments. 

At Hamilton Studio School, young artists are working with experienced and established artists, sharing ideas, working through artistic processes, problem solving, etc. On a small scale, our program is a real-world art community.

We should never forget that art is made to be seen, to be shared. Art needs community. Kids in sport need games or tournaments; kids in music and dance need recitals and performances; kids in visual arts need exhibitions and fairs. Hamilton Studio School organizes Young Artists exhibitions to give them the opportunity to gather with family, friends and community and celebrate their achievements. It’s all these pieces—each fun and rewarding in its own way--that make the experience.