The History of American Art Education

Learning About Art in American Schools

Peter Smith

• Publisher: Praeger
• Year: 1996
• Print ISBN: 9780313298707
• eBook ISBN: 9780313031724
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Art
• Subtopic: Art General

The ideas, people, and events that developed art education are described and analyzed so that art educators and educators in general will have a better understanding of what has happened (and is happening) to visual art in the schools. Peter Smith raises the issue of art education's inordinate emphasis on Eurocentric art. He challenges the often expressed notion that the field of education is the cause of art education's problems and proposes that confused conceptions within the art world are just as much a root of the difficulty. No other book in art education history gives such close and analytical attention to the careers of women in the field. The materials on Germanic cultural and historical influences are unequaled as is the scholarly treatment of Viktor Lowenfeld, probably the most influential single figure in 20th-century American art education.

Table of contents

• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1. The Beginnings of Education in the Visual Arts in America
• 2. The Dismissal of Walter Smith: Historiographic Explanation, the American Art Scene, and Visual Arts Education in the Late Nineteenth Century
• 3. Germanic Influences
• 4. Franz Cizek and the Elusiveness of Historical Knowledge
• 5. American Attempts to Democratize Art: Picture Study
• 6. American Women in Visual Arts Education: Outstanding Leaders and the Interaction Between Gender Bias and Art’s Status
• 7. A Charismatic American
• 8. Gender and the History of Visual Arts Education: Survival and Disappearance
• 9. Of Women and Art Education: Roles of Importance
• 10. A Colossus of Sorts
• 11. The Post-Lowenfeld Era: Radical Dissent and Thoughtful Revisionism
• 12. From Aesthetic Education to Discipline-based Art Education: Intellectualizations and Confusions
• References
• Index