21r4 1 A 1 LEARNINGT0PAIN T' scxwu . ""- ý, I ýý wx- HARRIET SLEIGH fi A I1r ý1 1 ` ,,, ,, THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN REDACTED DUE TO THIRD PARTY RIGHTS OR OTHER LEGAL ISSUES 3 ABSTRACT The project was an attempt to explore various forms of transmission and acquisition involved in socialisation into fine art. It involved an intense study of the Slade School of Fine Art, in which fine art is the only subject offered to the undergratuate students. It was possible to distinguish four modes or approaches to the learning of fine art. Each mode was considered to entail a specific concept of art which entailed a specific structure of transmission and acquisition. The concept of classification was used to distinguish the conception of art and the concept framing was used to distinguish the different structures of transmission/acquisition. The analysis of the interviews of the staff revealed a relatively strong orientation to three of the four modes. The analysis of the students' interviews tended to show that individual students switched their orientation across the four years of the course. An important part of the study was an exploration of the explicit and implicit criteria staff were using and the extent to which these were understood by the students. A major focus of the analysis was upon the particular form of vulnerability experienced as a consequence of the students' orientation to a particular mode. Although the numbers in the sample are small and the study is confined to only one institution it is hoped that some light has been thrown upon forms of transmission/acquisition where hierarchical relationships are implicit, sequencing rules are weak and criteria are diffuse and implicit. 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank all the staff and students at the Slade for their helpfulness, tolerance and co-operation in this project. I would like especially to mention Professor Coldstream, without whose permission I could not have gained access to the Slade in the first place, and I. E. Tregarthen Jenkin; both were unfailingly helpful in making available background and administrative information and answering innumberable questions. I am also greatly in debt to Patrick George, Stuart Brisley, Bernard Cohen and Tess Jaray who allowed me to attend their first year sessions as a participant observer, and to the first year students who tolerated my regular presence. I would also like to thank the following further members of staff who gave of their valuable time in interviews: Lisbeth-inne H. Bawden, Chris Briscoe, Jeffery Camp, R. B. Claughton, Michael Fossick, Noel Forster, Malcolm Hughes, Keith Vaughan, James Leahy, David Leverett, Chris Rawlence, Barry Salt, Bartholomeu dos Santos, Peter Snow, Phillip Sutton and Euan Uglow. I would equally like to thank all the sixty=two students who gave of their time to be interviewed. To many of the above members of staff as well as to the students, I am also deeply grateful for the readiness with which they granted me access to tutorials, interviews and other semi-private situations. I am also in the debt of Mrs. Bennett (Professor Coldstream's secretary), Cressida Jelf and Jacqueline James (the two other administrative secretaries) who contributed valuable factual information and smoothed path for me in innumerable other ways. Icy greatest debt must however be to Professor Bernstein, for his patience and enthusiasm, Throughout the enterprise he brought to bear on the project numerous insights which contributed greatly to the evolution of the concepts employed. 5 CONTENTS LEARNING TO PAINT Page P i Abstract 3 3 Acknowledgments 4 ä ii Y Introduction -A brief description of work already g done in the area of socialisation of art students; the purpose of the projeot; the nature of the data collected; the institution in terms of the content and form of control. Historical background 24 i) History Professor Poynter's conception of art education; aims and the organisational realisation; schematic 'outside and tinside history of the Slade; significance of changes in its autonom; nature and strength of boundary. ii) Professor Coldstream Background, basic innovations in the Slade. Stuoturpl f_: 36 iii) Staff - Patterns in length of employment and recruitment of staff. iv) Students - Historical changes in sex distribution and overall population. i6- 6 Page 2 Constraints 46 i) The Diploma - Reorganisation and its implications ii) Financial - Consequence of dependence on U. G. C. iii) Space - Persistent demands for increase iv) Library - Description of contents and use 3 Administration 58 control procedures: i) Selection of students Organisation; criteria operated; consequential nature of intake. ii) Attendance Formal organisation; actual operation iii) Tutors Function; organisation and criteria employed in allocation of tutors; private and group tutorials. iv) Models - Criteria employed in selection; consequences v) The Staff Student Consultative Committee - Its formation; function; successes and failures 74 4 Theoretical approach The concepts of classification and frame; their derivation and modification; the meaning of art strongly classified and art weakly classified in relation to the syntax; the artist and the audience; the four learning modes in relation to a range of interactions. 5 Transmission 143 i) Transmission of the implicit criterion - The means by which the content is conveyed within two of the learning modes; identification of two implicit screening criteria; their transmission by the staff and perception by the students. ii) Modalities of transmission - Extracts from interaction in a range of contexts are presented verbatim and discussed, e. g. introduction to sessions, and assessments where the students work is present and where it is not present. 7 D DETAILED ANALYSIS OF INTERVIEWS Page 6 Staff: four mode - An attempt to locate the staff in the four 172 analysis modes. The network used is pressnted. 7 Students 190 i) Questionnaire - The questionnaire is presented* ii) Student background - Analysis of the first part of the students' interview; the network used to code responses; discussion of background factors (family, school, decision to go to art school, student and art, and preconception of the Slade. ) 8 Doing and pro? ress - Questions relating to the students' desorip- 232 tion of their work are analysed. A complex network used to code the responses is included with examples. (The discussion is broadly in terms of the four modes. ) 252 9 Concepts - Analysis of four questions which bear on the concept of staff student interaction; staff expectations; problems arising; crucial staff concepts; and the basic message of the teaching. 266 10 Relationships - Analysis of responses to two questions dealing with the students' perception of what the staff have in common; and the staff attributes to which they respond. 11 Vulnerability - Analysis questions on types of vulnerability. (The network used to code the responses with examples is presented prior to a discussion of the responses. ) Summary of chapters 8-11 - Table of key factors in frame analysis. 288 12 External factors - Analysis of two questions bearing on external factors, i. e. student contacts outside the Slade and student perception of the relation- ship between art and society. 8 Page 13 Students: four mode analysis An attempt to locate individual students 295 in the four modes; discussion of the changing patterns from year to year in .....:.....terms of the five frame components and of individual student's adherence to the four modes. Conclusion - Brief summary; methodological problems; 322 validity and possible applications. Appendix Transcripts of three student interviews 330 Bibliography 369 h6- 9 INTRODUCTION Socialisation into fine art has attracted little attention. It is only recently that sociologists have shown interest in professional socialisation and the problems of transmission of professional criteria. The profession which has attracted most research is medicine. There are a number of studies of, for instance, the socialisation of doctors, of nurses and even pharmacists*(l); they have succeeded in locating differing experiences with which the student must contend in order to acquire his professional status. Such studies tend to examine the values, competences and sensitivities entailed in the acquisition of professional status, but not the structure of transmission. An exception to this is C. Kakushin's study of 'The Professional Self-concept of Music Students*(2). He made a study of two of the most eminent music schools in the USA in order to try to locate relevant factors in the acquisition of a professional self concept. He distinguished irrelevant areas, such as antecedent factors and frequency of staff student contact, from relevant ones, such as professional performance and union membership. He concluded, "This self-concept is developed through actual participation in the activity that means most to the circle of musicians, professional performance. " This interesting study underlines the difference between a music student and an art student. A music student aspires to professional performance which is a group activity and only possible as a consequence of social contacts (thus the importance of union membership). In contrast an art student is not dependent on other people in the act of painting a picture. His is a solitary activity, and consequently he does not have to develop social contacts in order to perform. When it comes to the sociology of the visual arts, there has been less interest in the process of socialisation. Indeed this study is not concerned with the areas normally dealt with under the heading of sociol- hbý. 10 ogy of art. It is not for example concerned with such macro topics as the art market, either in terms of its historical evolution in this country or how it compares with other countries, nor is it concerned with the relationship of the artists' set of values to that of the wider society. J. R. Taylor and B. Brooke have written an interesting account of the historical background of the art market, describing how and why it emerged*(3).