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Renaissance
Drawing had been taught through apprenticeship and working under artists. http://www.italianrenaissanceresources.com/units/unit-3/essays/training-and-practice/ --- More information on how artists were trained during the renaissance. -
Jacob Bigelow
Born in 1787. Bigelow, a physician, and was the first signer of the petition for drawing legislation. He encouraged approaches to education through scientific demonstration and the use of visual models. https://www.remembermyjourney.com/Memorial/14673436 --- Timeline of Jacob Bigelow's life -
Shift from Apprenticeship to School Education
The art academy replaced apprenticeship in Europe. Art Education was then based on mastery of the human figure by perfecting each part from copying two-dimensional engraving and then three-dimensional plaster casts. It was not until they had been judged capable of drawing the figure that they were allowed to draw from life. This remained the model for artist education for the entirety of the 1800s and in some places later. https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/sara/hd_sara.htm -
Mary Ann Dwight
Mary Ann Dwight was born. Dwight wrote books on astronomy, poetry and is best remembered for her books on art, such as "The Study of Art". https://archive.org/details/introductiontost00dwigrich -
John Gadsby Chapman is Born
Painter and printmaker born in Alexandria, Virginia. Attended Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in 1827. During his life, he studied art in Rome and Florence, before teaching art and pursuing his personal practice in America. https://americanart.si.edu/artist/john-gadsby-chapman-829 --- About his life and art -
Elements of Technology
Bigelow connected visual arts with technical literacy through his lectures at Lowell Institute. His lectures were published at Elements of Technology in 1829. Bigelow's lectures were on the fine art of painting, sculpture, printmaking, architecture, heating and ventilation, machinery, energy sources, metallurgy, and other technologies. https://books.google.com/books?id=ed8JAAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false --- Link to "Elements of Technology" -
Middle class emerges
During the eighteenth century art had been restricted to the upper class, however, by the 1830’s more Americans had the free time and money to pursue refinement in “vernacular gentility” (Bushman). This growing interest in art was also due to the emerging middle class wanting to distinguish themselves from the lower class. http://cameronblevins.org/cblevins/Quals/BookSummaries/Bushman_TheRefinementofAmerica.html -- The Refinement of America: Persons, Houses, Cities (1992) (Bushman) -
Art Education for Boys and Girls
Art Education for young boys during this time was centered around reflecting their gentlemanly status and preparing them for professions in engineering or architecture. Art training for young girls at this time included needlework, drawing, and painting, “ornamental subjects”. Female students would collect and draw plants, learning the scientific structures of the plants as well as developing botanical references. https://arthistoryteachingresources.org/lessons/gender-in-nineteenth-century-art/ -
Normal Schools
Massachusetts established the first public school for training teachers, called normal schools. Many of these schools are now branches of universities. https://www.pbs.org/onlyateacher/timeline.html --- See "Normal Schools" on timeline. -
Walter Smith is Born
Walter Smith, a man born in 1839, in Kamerton England, had emigrated to the United States in 1871 after accepting a position as drawing supervisor for the Boston public schools as well as state agent for industrial drawings. He played a part in the creation of the Massachusetts Normal Art School, and later returned back to England after getting involved in some controversy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Smith_(art_educator) -
Industrial Revolution's effect on Art Education
The industrial revolution is one context for 19th-century art education. Drawing was an essential part of occupation. Boys in school were taught visual-spatial, mathematical and technical skills in drawing. Power machinery was invented. Due to new machinery and the growing industrial economy, it became paramount for people to be able to read and create drawings. Engineer’s drawings showed workmen how to build new mills or install machinery. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3106007?seq=1 -
Chapman’s American Drawing Book
Chapman’s American Drawing Book was published in 1847. During this time multiple artists began publishing drawing books. Chapman argued, “If everyone could write, everyone could draw” (Stankiewicz pg. 1). http://www.projectarts.org/pdfs_texts/The%20American%20Drawing%20Book.pdf --- link to Chapman’s American Drawing Book -
Reasons for Learning to Draw according to Chapman
To make recognizable forms accurate; understand visual images.
Train the eye and hand.
To give artistic education to workmen to improve American goods and better compete with European manufacturers.
To help copyists avoid errors in their work.
To provide means of support to dependent females who can educate their children by knowing how to draw.
Support growth of national good taste and national art.
To help schoolgirls select subjects for needlework from nature. -
Beliefs of Mary Ann Dwight
Barnard’s American Journal of Education published a series of Dwight's articles on art education. She argued art in school should be taught with the same thoroughness as other subjects. At the time art was taught through copying from collected engravings. Dwight believed that this practice of copying only produced superficial skills. She associated drawing with not only vernacular gentility but also with technical literacy. -
Mary Ann Dwight, The Last Year of Her Life
Dwight established a school in Hartford Connecticut that offered preparation for artists, teachers, and art critics. -
Merchant Need for Skilled Artists Arise
Following the Civil War, merchants sought to export manufactured goods to build international trade. Draftsmen and designers had to be brought in from Europe to design and produce these goods merchants sought after. (Textiles, furniture, decorative objects). This was very expensive, and the most cost-effective thing to do was source artists from within the states. -
Free Art Education Petition
Massachusetts merchants and manufacturers petitioned the state legislature to require drawing to be taught for free at night for workers. This act was responded to by granting men, women, and children free access to classes in drawing. http://www.noteaccess.com/APPROACHES/ArtEd/History/MADrawingAct.htm -
Teacher's receptions on having to teach art
As art became more commonplace within schools, teachers were tasked with working it into their lessons, and for teachers this was another responsibility tacked onto their work and so this led to some teachers seeing this as a waste of time or providing lackluster art lessons. -
Walter Smith's attempt to change how art is taught.
Walter Smith upon arriving in the US in 1871 would invite different teachers and artists to classes for them to understand his methods of teaching the students in order for them to be able to in practice, use his methods to garner more interest and involvement from students and teachers. His method was focused around creating an understanding and application of terms used to describe art as well as to use calculations and planning in their work. -
Louis Prang and Walter Smith
Louis Prang was a man interested in art education as it helped further his business. Soon after Walter arrived in Boston, Prang became his publisher, and they worked with one another until 1881 where the two began to have problems with one another leading to Smith's departure back to England. https://americanantiquarian.org/prang/education -
Prang adapting Smith's Textbooks pt.1
Smith was very particular with his work and disliked it when anyone would try suggest improvements and when Smith left for England, Prang sought out to improve the books, and better suit the current needs of the teachers. The books' scope expanded from linear drawing to art education focusing on the teaching of the arts. -
Prang adapting Smith's Textbooks pt.2
Prang wrote about three different types of drawing, those being; constructive, representational, and decorative.
Constructive drawing incorporated calculations, geometry, planning which is what Smith had been trying to push but ultimately this type of drawing was the least taught.
Decorative drawing focused on the beauty of the art and how it was done throughout history, later color was looked at, and it eventually was built into the elements and principles of design. -
Prang adapting Smith's Textbooks pt.3
Representational drawing, the last type of drawing Prang wrote about, focused on capturing objects as the eye saw them, and to understand how to translate what they saw to paper. Some drawings were of nature, some focused on perspective and some on the forms which were observed. Most late nineteenth century art books focused primarily on this type of drawing. -
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How students are taught
Some studies were done and psychologist Stanley Hall and art educator Mary Dana Hicks found out that the ways schools were teaching students was inherently flawed. Schools shouldn't be trying to make the students adapt to their teaching but the teaching should adapt to the students being taught. Forcing students to learn a specific way hinders student's ability to learn and that regarding art, creativity should be recognized rather than just focusing on teaching techniques. -
Walter Smith's effort and the result
Walter Smith had published books, held student art galleries, established the Mass Normal Art School, and hired specialists to help teach and supervise art classes. In the end he was caught up in some controversy and lost his position and moved back to England. His efforts on reform didn't manage to gain the traction and were overtaken by older methods of art education, though his influence and teachings still were prominent and modeled. -
Representational Drawing and The Principles of Art
With the movement pushing representational art came with changes to how the principles of art were taught to students and how to apply it. Before this, students were simply taught to draw, lacking in understanding what they were drawing and the lack of freedom in how they do draw their subject. The rise of representational drawing in schools allowed for more diverse and creative works from students and simply more interest in general. -
The rise of Nature Drawings
In the 1890s nature drawings became popular, using natural objects as the subjects, focusing on things like form and color. This method of drawing became popular due to the fact that the students were encouraged to understand what they were drawing and describe it while the teachers would correct pronunciation and such, and sometimes the fruits used may be eaten afterwards. -
The Eleventh state Exhibition
The eleventh state exhibition of drawing was held for students and was used as a sort of assessment to see what their effort until then culminated in. Thousands of different pieces were submitted from near 60 different communities, and resulted in some disappointment although a few different schools were able to produce different and impressive results as well as a overall increase in use of color, varying mediums/subjects, and less industrial drawing.
