Master of Fine Arts Show - November 15, 2001
Master of Fine Arts Show @ U of O
(transcript)
Lottie: Welcome to VizCity, I’m Lottie Striesinger
Terry: And I’m Terry Way. Today our discussion focuses on a small, but I think significant shift, that has taken place at the University of Oregon fine art department. Let me give you a little background. The fine art department has had a strong figurative studies emphasis of the past 30-some years. Much of that emphasis was due to classes that were set up by Professor Paul Buckner in the 1960s. Paul is a sculptor whose emphasis is on the human form. He retired several years ago, which called into question whether or not the figurative studies line would continue. This is what has happened: the position which Buckner retired from has not been filled by an instructor with a figurative emphasis. The figurative classes in the sculpture department are still listed in the catalog, but they are not being funded. Which means that the only active figurative class left is in the painting departments figure drawing. Which brings us to the topic for discussion: is it important for today’s students to be well grounded in the human form?
Lottie: And I would like to enlarge that and ask, is it important for artists and architects today to be classically trained? And what do we mean by classically trained?
Terry: Well classic/academic, I think, could almost be used as the same word, and I believe academic studies involve skill building. These are the exercises that lead to developing your own voice, eventually.
Lottie: So I would think what would be needed is some art history, but not too much so you don’t get discouraged by the great masters and never do anything of your own. Some anatomy and some figure drawing and modeling, and that’s what I wish I had had when I started out and I’m having to catch up on it now, although I’m enjoying that. I feel that the understanding of the human body and its proportions is especially interesting for architects, because how the body will feel in the building is of critical importance, and for instance I have always felt about the rectangular glass walled skyscrapers in our big cities, that I wouldn’t want to work or live in them. They feel out of scale to me. I feel uncomfortable in them.
Terry: Yes, well academic or classic studies teaches you skills, it teaches you to interpret, in this case, what we are talking today is the human form. And that is quite different than an emotional interpretation, which I think modern art focuses more on the emotional content and not so much on the skill of interpretation.
Lottie: But I think you can do a better job of conveying the emotional content if you know your basics.
Terry: Absolutely, I believe it’s natural for a student to go into a line of study and go to the ABCs, and then they naturally want to jump over to M and N, they want to kind of skip some things and I think it’s the training and it’s the universities’ position, they should impose some basic requirements so that the student isn’t likely to have holes in their skill level and interpretation level.
Lottie: Right, so, as a potter I feel it was really critically important for me to learn to center and to open the clay and to pull up basic shapes even though now I usually go way beyond that. But I know where I’m coming from, so to speak.
Terry: Yes, well many artists that we know, we look at their most recent things, let’s take Picasso for instance. He did some really wild exploration late in his life. But look back at the beginning. He was a very good draftsman. He could render the human form. I mean he had his skills in a line. He knew what he was doing and then he took those skills and created his own voice.
Lottie: And I don’t, can’t help but think that this is what makes his own voice so strong.
Terry: Absolutely!
Lottie: We can relate to it.
Terry: Tom Wolf said, to quote him, “Inspiration without skill equals modern art”.
Lottie: (laughter). That’s very good. I myself am taking some life drawing sessions. And I’m catching up there now. And I love that, actually. But I took a little survey of what the other people in my class, it’s not a class, in my session, thought. And they said, why the figure is in! It’s the pre-eminent image now.
Terry: Well some of us don’t think the figure was ever out.
Lottie: Right.
Terry: I’ll say right up-front that I’m totally biased about this because my degree, Master of Fine Arts degree, from the University, in sculpture, focuses on the human form. So, I’m not pretending to be unbiased about this.
Lottie: Time for another example from history? All right. It used to be, of course, that art and architecture were not separate fields. They were together. And the most wonderful example of that is the Caryatids on the Acropolis, where these figures of young women are holding up the roof, and what could be a better symbol of the importance of the body and the building.
Terry: Yes, and we will go out with that classic figurative image in our brains. This has been VizCity, I’m Terry Way.
Lottie: And I’m Lottie Striesinger.
