Reading my book... 'Figuring It Out' by Colin Renfrew, which I chose because I have enjoyed reading 'But Is It Art?' by Cynthia Freeland - the theory of art is something I'm really, really interested in. I feel reading these sorts of books is something I need to do to keep my brain going... like at A Level, I think a balance of physical creativity and intellectual subjects is necessary for me. Last year I also found that reading became a part of my creative practice... reading about the history or philosophy of a type of artwork gives me new ideas.
Aside from these things, reading just now also made me think about art at school... I knew nothing of art history before foundation, and I'm really puzzled over why not - there just seems so much out there to learn, which I am really excited about, but I guess I am shocked by how little I know. But why were we not even introduced to art theory and philosophy, and told to draw pasta or rope or copy an artist's work instead... Recently I have got quite annoyed at how people might view art as an 'easy' subject, or one which doesn't require a lot of brains or academia... but there is so much intellect and meaning and interesting ideas to learn about within the subject. The book is describing how art can inform our knowledge of human development... art is as good as science in learning about the world around us.
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