I had a similar experience- my animation teacher regularly overlooked me. My last straw was when I walked up to his desk for help, and he yelled "you're wasting your time" (in front of the entire class, ofc) because I wanted to do an accurate timing chart before animating. I'm now at a different school studying comp sci and my love and drive to create art has returned. Art school def 'sucked the life' out of me, but I'm exploring with fresh eyes (and trying to be less hard on myself). Those experiences really do stick with you. It's great that you stayed true to yourself and spoke up :)
My teacher yelled at me in class because he a inpatient buffoon. So in front of everyone i said loudly and even more angrily, “Another failed artist ladies and gentlemen.” Pointing at him. lol. some people laughed. He just told me to leave. We never spoke of it again and we never talked in class again.
College courses can be extremely limiting because they force you into believing you have to perform a certain way doing something. Art is a unique form created by everyone uniquely. Part of the fun is developing your own set of skills, at your own pace, through your own experiences. Express yourself through the way you feel, not the way someone tells you to. Have confidence in who you are, and how you express yourself, as a Creator.
I’m sorry you had this experience. Some of the least creative people I’ve ever met are wanna be creatives. You can usually figure out who they are immediately as they are super type A but claim to be artists. Steer very clear of them and anyone who tries to control your ability to create freely.
i been in uni for art for 3 years.... it made me hate making art. they made me feel like im an imposter in the art community / industry and that i would never be good enough.
That’s some garbage, but it seems like the universal experience. They can eat sand. Your art is awesome and you deserve to make things you love and love what you make.
11:58 Yup! Professional career artists who've never been to art school are so common. It's mortifying to see all these mega talented working artists who actually attribute some of their success to NOT going to art school or college. If I could warn my younger self or others like me about art school I would tell them that you should save the money and stick with illustration (something that requires 0 college). If you want formal training, just take independent art classes or (free) online tutorials; join in-person workshops. Or (in some cases) work on an undergrad at a regular college to squeeze in those general education credits for a Plan B career if an art career just doesn't pan out. Either way you'd actually have a way better chance of having the time and money to do things you actually want to do compared to being stuck with overpriced school debt.
In my country, you are expected to choose a certain strand of study, whether it be science and mathematics, social science, or general academics in 10th grade, and pursue it from 11th to college. I had made the decision to take the arts and design course at the age of 16, and it was expected of me (and every other student) to stick to that strand and pursue it further into college. Once we had chosen, switching strands was discouraged. It was permitted but not generally accepted. It was hard enough to choose a college and career at 18. You can imagine how daunting it is to do it at 16. I had been the only one in my grade to choose arts and design. And by circumstance, finished grade ten by the very beginning of Covid lockdown. I enrolled in an art school for fine arts. Unfortunately, my mental health had declined significantly to the point that I had to drop out by reasons unrelated to school. And since it was still technically high school, I had to wait another year to go back- it was a break that I needed but felt ashamed by considering I would be older than my classmates by the time I would go back to 11th grade. A year later, I had chosen to enroll in a different school for fashion design this time. Finished 11th grade but by 12th grade I had been disillusioned by my choice. Any of the joy I once had in making art had been gone. I could not even stand to pick up a pencil and had resigned to missing months worth of classes. I made the ultimate decision to drop out again. The shame I felt had increased tenfold. But I knew that if I had chosen to suck it up and continue, I would regret it even more. I'm plagued with worry. I second-guess all my decisions and feel so terrible about having wasted so much time and money and energy to pursuing a field that I no longer cared for. All of my friends have graduated, they'd gone to college, some even managed to move out of the country and start living as the proper adults they were. But I was still stuck in my childish ways, with not even a high school diploma to make up for all the effort. I've made the decision to change strands into the humanities. One that I am sure of, this time. And one that does not fill me with dread about my future. It took so much and so long, but life is not a race. I had to learn to live with my decisions. I'm glad that I'm not alone in thinking that art school was simply not the right choice. I wish we had all known better, but we would not have learned at all. There are a lot of problems with the way that art school is structured. Most of my problems emerged when I was usually forced to make art that I did not like, even though my teachers and classmates liked it. It evolved to the point where I hated art itself, the institution, the very idea of creating art. I did get over it, eventually. I have a renewed appreciation for art and art making. But it's not something that I would ever go through again. I still worry of course about going through highschool a third time, and most of it is the fault of the system itself. But I still am grateful for having learned such a valuable lesson.
Wow, thank you for sharing! I cannot IMAGINE the pressure to choose your life path at 16. I’m so sorry you had to go through all of that. I hope humanities brings you the joy you’re looking for; I took an anthropology class at one point and loved it. I think the idea of exploring new things as adults needs to be more commonplace. There’s nothing wrong with trying something, figuring out it’s not for you, and being able to try something else. You’re going to do great and I wish you the best!
That final group project where they want you to re-write the bylaws of the university honestly sounds like someone decided to take their job and make the students do it for a group project. I'd be curious to know where you went to uni. All the best.
Agreed. That was the point I brought up in the “tribunal” and in the review for the course. I went to Brenau University. Cute school, great ghosts, more than a few shitty teachers.
I’m in my last year of college for an associates degree in fine arts and I understand completely! I’ve questioned my ability to create authentically. I doubt my own originality because of some of my professors 😢
I'll be 30 this year and one of my biggest regrets from the last 8 years was going back to art school in 2017. I was in Media Arts and Animation which had a 90% drop out rate (something the school's financial aid administrator lied about). Even though I actually did well in a majority of my classes I still ended up quitting the next year and could never regret it because I hated the environment that much. Art school didn't make me hate drawing as much as I hated the idea of working as an animator here in the U.S (precisely BECAUSE I like drawing and don't want to live under a desk for a living). I wish I had gone to a regular college or been given no higher education at all. I wouldn't be in debt and I would've had more wiggle room to pursue valuable experiences much sooner.
It’s all such a scam. I should have left when I changed majors. The absolute shock I had when those student loans came due; I was lucky enough to be able to pay them off quickly but that 50k sure would have been nice.
Didn't go to art school, but took a single art class in my first (of 3 incomplete years) of college. That class was supposedly supposed to work with a potential degree in art education, but later turned out to not actually fulfill any credit so yeah lovely!! love college for that!!! Taking a class you cant even use is totally not a waste of time and money!!! :/ Anywho! I took one class. Not even in art school, mind you. Maybe not nearly as bad, but still. They really made the whole thing boring/draining as heck. It might have been cause it was a basic drawing course, but the way she had us "critique" each other and point out all the flaws in our practice/prompt pieces as well as highlight the "good stuff" made my skin kinda crawl. She also said no to digital art at one point, which kinda made some sense but also was confusing cause some people in the class were graphic design majors who wanted to use the techniques and apply them to their practice/skills??? It feels so odd to go to a class to learn or grow, and then be pushed to do the basics (which, by the way, I knew a lot of already but maybe I'm just being overdramatic?? I took art 3 years in highschool, and I did lots of tutorials and used books and online stuff to learn. If I sound like I'm complaining for no reason, ignore this then) I felt bad about what I was learning because it felt so like, boring in the way I was doing it. It was better than any of my other classes I took at the time which were Gen EDS, I'll give it that, but.....still made me feel like a failure or like I was not cut out for the field. All because the basic stuff didn't turn out all that well. Also, when you have a set style and way of doing art already, it's odd and almost counterintuitive to my creative process to be told a different approach??? I feel like ever since that class, I have avoided doing art. I feel like it made me overly critical of my mistakes, and stunted me.
I have made pieces since then, but I used to be creative every day, cranking out new art like it was no one's business. My highschool teacher made art seem fun and exciting; that teacher made me feel like I was naive for ever thinking that. I feel like now I am stuck in this pit of feeling not good enough, even when I know that has never been the case. Especially when you see other people's in front of you and subconsciously compare yourself. I often feel bad for not being that good at drawing people, even though landscapes and animals are something I am decently good at (as well as cartoon characters/styles). It's important to note that I also have Tourrette's, a movement disorder, so that professor's crisp clean lines she wanted from my peers and I is not going to translate when that is not me nor ever will be and it doesn't fit my art style!! I can make pieces without that in mind, they just have to have thicker lineart that is not easy to make look bad. :'>
I don’t understand how high school art classes are so fun and college actually tries to kill you. It took me eight years to want to try drawing again, and I made almost nothing for myself in four years of college (I did take a print making class that rocked). I grew up with a narcissistic parent who constantly put me down, had one hell of a frenemy who backstabbed me constantly, and college just compounded all that crap. I’m sorry you had that experience and I hope you find your way back to making things you love. To hell with delicate line work; if Jackson Pollock can throw paint at a canvas, you can have thick delicious line art.
That's a lot worse than what I had. I stopped and threw everything out because the University I went to whose acronym could be pronounced "sucky" in a certain part of it... decided to *not* hire our long-term associate professor that was the *only* instructor for Ceramics as a full-time when she had put in considerable work for 10 years *and* had the school newspaper singing praises about her, and instead decided to hire a considerably less experienced and less competent instructor as a full-time instead. And I gave them a chance, and the new instructor blew it -- *horribly.* I decided to chuck *everything* that I made during all of her classes into the trash (some of it was salvaged by some classmates, but we're ignoring those) - and I am no longer bothering with ceramics because it's just... no. My planned projects were going to be focused on environmental sustainability. I'm giving everyone a giant middle-finger because that instructor was extraordinarily infuriating with... not even being able to run a classroom environment properly by allowing people to leave a mess on throwing wheels that they 'reserved' for the semester. I got called out for leaving someone on the wheel for *a few hours* when I was going to get back to working on that wheel, with a small note in clay stating that I was coming back - when people had messes left *for DAYS.* And I refused to "reserve" a wheel because those are a *SHARED RESOURCE.* Guess what? That instructor said "Oh, well, I could give you a wheel if you came to class more regularly" - she fking couldn't anyway because *ALL* of the wheels were "reserved" at the end. And practically *ALL* of the reserved wheels that were not in use were *FILTHY.* That was hardly the only thing she pissed me off on, with instead of just getting called out on leaving the wheel messy for a few hours *once* ...the instructor had to *bring it up a second time* a week later for no reason whatsoever - despite all of those other wheels being *filthy.* "We don't have enough wheels" was her excuse -- the reason we *DIDN'T HAVE ENOUGH* was because she had everyone else clogging *all* of them up for no reason. We *NEVER* had this issue with the previous associate professor, probably because the previous instructor *wasn't an idiot* Right. That newer instructor also shot down several projects of mine or got in the way without offering any reasonable alternatives. Another reason why I chucked everything out. "Materials are expensive" so instead of saying 'figure out how you can use less' -- she went with "you can't use the classroom's oxides - buy your own" to a broke college student. Also she flipped the hell out when I mentioned that I wanted to make some money off of one of my works, when all that should have been said was that the comment shouldn't be mentioned in an artist statement. Gee, I wonder why we have this idea of "starving artists" here when we're not allowed to make money from what we produce... when the point of this being a job is to make some amount of money, by default...? Honestly, this episode of the "Creative Mind" course reminds me of why people call Art School a scam. Random BS courses that are made to just pad credits and take your money without much of any proper teaching. And I was seeing another RUclipsr who was flaunting her credentials about being a TA that was talking about pet-peeves on VTuber design that... just wasn't getting information down correctly (she was nitpicking anatomy for not being the "exact perfect ratio" when the reality is... close enough is honestly good enough, because variances and such happen in reality -- and style-lization is a thing. And she was pretending thick thighs don't actually exist in reality when they very much do). Very self-centered focus on her personal design preferences. And that person... was helping with teaching...? At an art school...? You can see where this is going, right...? ...we don't even have proper qualified individuals teaching at those places anymore, apparently. Some people simply *are not meant to teach.* Period. And it's bad because there are somehow still people who will back up those people who are teaching straight up *wrong* or incorrect information as if the information was somehow correct when it clearly isn't Oh, don't get me started on this other thing where a certain "sucky" University had issues with its Nursing department with teaching from outdated information and testing on it, so what someone told me. This guy that was apparently working in Pharmacy and had relevant, up-to-date information and the person who told me about the situation apparently failed exams because *the school was teaching from textbooks that were considerably dated* (I'm guessing by a decade or half a decade, I don't remember what she told me). And to top it off, the Nursing department had Cliques. And the instructors who were managing a clinic with the students as interns were apparently OK with a student who was physically too short to carry a patient around off the ground to... have her denied of getting assistance from others who were working so she didn't have to drag the patient around on the ground. Because those other students found it "too troublesome" or that she was 'being a nuisance' -- when she had the best intentions for the patient. Gee... I wonder why our healthcare is so terrible in places...? There was a video from... Emily? I forget her full screenname on RUclips. But she was complaining about how there were nurses that were acting inappropriately like "Mean Girls." I wonder why we have those issues... (eye rolls)
ALL OF THIS. My high school ceramics teacher was amazing. And maybe I was a little bit of a brat because I thought ceramics was stupid and guess what my favorite class was. I’m pretty sure they didn’t hire super cool TA because they’d have to pay her what she’s worth. I’m sorry they tanked your passion; I’m interested to hear more about your environmental pottery work. I think that’s cool. Ironically, I’m a pharmacy technician, and the number of horror stories I’ve heard from the nursing school to actual nurses complaining to ME about needing a flu shot to, I dunno, work in a hospital with sick and compromised people, is baffling. Arts and Humanities are critical subjects that need to be taking seriously and treated well. And they can be fun. They should be fun. I hate that schools (and society) devalue the work of artists and try to shove us in boxes, reduce our creative expression, and just try to shut us down until we give up.
@@MeghanHarker So, I had two different pieces planned from my previous instructor. Both of them were going to talk about a bitter irony of resource cycling and how making permanent objects slowly remove resources from the cycle (as pieces that were removing resources from a cycle) The first piece was a water wheel. It was going to be lubricated by the water, and there would be a section where the wheel would start pumping a portion of the water to another container with a symbol with a lock to indicate resource being diverted and "locked down" semi-permanently as objects/possessions The other one was the one I was getting flak for when I said it was an opportunity for me to earn money. It was a... somewhat complicated snowflake plate. It required getting encased in glaze to fill in the gaps. Basically it was alluding to the "water cycle" and how the ceramic piece was removing some amount of resources from the cycle by "freezing" it in place. And how we should practice thinking a bit more on what materials and objects we choose to create and keep permanently. It was loosely tied to the first piece in terms of concept. Then there's the second part where there's a hidden talk about the "true cost" of things. Each plate was being made with extremely finicky processes that had a high chance of failing. So how many plates would need to be attempted in order to get one successful piece...? How many resources were wasted in the process? And since this was a piece tied to environmental sustainability, there was some loose connection to the term "green washing" -- because ceramics is a very... not green... medium. Burning fossil fuels or wood and tons of carbon emissions xD I might decide to have the plates made eventually, but without any of those messages. Just as an additional "fk you" to that instructor that flipped out about making money from the work. She gets what she wants, in the worst way possible with everyone else getting a middle finger and it being all her fault for that~ and people will get to know about that whole situation too :p
Greetings and sorry you have had such a horrifying experience with arts. As a very creative person I had this idea that arts was all about fun and beauty and creativity. as soon as I started my arts history degree, I was blasted with how arts are and have been a form of power, control, a currency. I hated everything and the more I studied arts the more distant I became to the art world. art galleries, particularly here in nz are 100% biased, you only get a spot if you are sleeping with a director or someone in charge, and pretty much everything that I loved about arts, (with very few exceptions) have become meaninless to me. staying art-illiterate is p[robably the best thing an arts person can do, stay true to what they like and admire without knowing the ins and out of the agendas behind the artworks is best practice to avoid huge disappointments.
I've never taken a dedicated art history class. I think if I were, I'd prefer to focus on a singular artist instead of the overall movement. Or on the development and curation of certain supplies or techniques. Everything has a dark history to it, a response to politics or world events, but I can see how that soured your taste for art.
It's crazy how art school almost universally traumatizes us lmao
For real. And we had to PAY FOR IT?!
I’m self taught and an indie animator, so it’s very interesting to see your perspective! I’m sorry you had to go through that.
It’s all right. What doesn’t kill you gives you a remarkable sense of humor!
I had a similar experience- my animation teacher regularly overlooked me. My last straw was when I walked up to his desk for help, and he yelled "you're wasting your time" (in front of the entire class, ofc) because I wanted to do an accurate timing chart before animating. I'm now at a different school studying comp sci and my love and drive to create art has returned. Art school def 'sucked the life' out of me, but I'm exploring with fresh eyes (and trying to be less hard on myself). Those experiences really do stick with you. It's great that you stayed true to yourself and spoke up :)
May he step on a lego every night for the rest of his life.
My teacher yelled at me in class because he a inpatient buffoon. So in front of everyone i said loudly and even more angrily, “Another failed artist ladies and gentlemen.” Pointing at him. lol. some people laughed. He just told me to leave. We never spoke of it again and we never talked in class again.
College courses can be extremely limiting because they force you into believing you have to perform a certain way doing something. Art is a unique form created by everyone uniquely. Part of the fun is developing your own set of skills, at your own pace, through your own experiences. Express yourself through the way you feel, not the way someone tells you to. Have confidence in who you are, and how you express yourself, as a Creator.
I was totally sold on choosing classes that interested me and found myself constantly disappointed. I wish we'd had an open studio.
I’m sorry you had this experience. Some of the least creative people I’ve ever met are wanna be creatives. You can usually figure out who they are immediately as they are super type A but claim to be artists. Steer very clear of them and anyone who tries to control your ability to create freely.
What doesn’t kill me only makes me funnier.
@@MeghanHarker Ive felt that way myself - some my best comedy comes from terrible jobs and bad co-op art experiences.
i been in uni for art for 3 years.... it made me hate making art. they made me feel like im an imposter in the art community / industry and that i would never be good enough.
That’s some garbage, but it seems like the universal experience. They can eat sand. Your art is awesome and you deserve to make things you love and love what you make.
11:58 Yup! Professional career artists who've never been to art school are so common. It's mortifying to see all these mega talented working artists who actually attribute some of their success to NOT going to art school or college.
If I could warn my younger self or others like me about art school I would tell them that you should save the money and stick with illustration (something that requires 0 college). If you want formal training, just take independent art classes or (free) online tutorials; join in-person workshops. Or (in some cases) work on an undergrad at a regular college to squeeze in those general education credits for a Plan B career if an art career just doesn't pan out. Either way you'd actually have a way better chance of having the time and money to do things you actually want to do compared to being stuck with overpriced school debt.
In my country, you are expected to choose a certain strand of study, whether it be science and mathematics, social science, or general academics in 10th grade, and pursue it from 11th to college. I had made the decision to take the arts and design course at the age of 16, and it was expected of me (and every other student) to stick to that strand and pursue it further into college. Once we had chosen, switching strands was discouraged. It was permitted but not generally accepted. It was hard enough to choose a college and career at 18. You can imagine how daunting it is to do it at 16.
I had been the only one in my grade to choose arts and design. And by circumstance, finished grade ten by the very beginning of Covid lockdown. I enrolled in an art school for fine arts. Unfortunately, my mental health had declined significantly to the point that I had to drop out by reasons unrelated to school. And since it was still technically high school, I had to wait another year to go back- it was a break that I needed but felt ashamed by considering I would be older than my classmates by the time I would go back to 11th grade.
A year later, I had chosen to enroll in a different school for fashion design this time. Finished 11th grade but by 12th grade I had been disillusioned by my choice.
Any of the joy I once had in making art had been gone. I could not even stand to pick up a pencil and had resigned to missing months worth of classes.
I made the ultimate decision to drop out again. The shame I felt had increased tenfold. But I knew that if I had chosen to suck it up and continue, I would regret it even more.
I'm plagued with worry. I second-guess all my decisions and feel so terrible about having wasted so much time and money and energy to pursuing a field that I no longer cared for. All of my friends have graduated, they'd gone to college, some even managed to move out of the country and start living as the proper adults they were. But I was still stuck in my childish ways, with not even a high school diploma to make up for all the effort.
I've made the decision to change strands into the humanities. One that I am sure of, this time. And one that does not fill me with dread about my future. It took so much and so long, but life is not a race. I had to learn to live with my decisions.
I'm glad that I'm not alone in thinking that art school was simply not the right choice. I wish we had all known better, but we would not have learned at all.
There are a lot of problems with the way that art school is structured. Most of my problems emerged when I was usually forced to make art that I did not like, even though my teachers and classmates liked it. It evolved to the point where I hated art itself, the institution, the very idea of creating art.
I did get over it, eventually. I have a renewed appreciation for art and art making. But it's not something that I would ever go through again.
I still worry of course about going through highschool a third time, and most of it is the fault of the system itself. But I still am grateful for having learned such a valuable lesson.
Wow, thank you for sharing! I cannot IMAGINE the pressure to choose your life path at 16. I’m so sorry you had to go through all of that. I hope humanities brings you the joy you’re looking for; I took an anthropology class at one point and loved it. I think the idea of exploring new things as adults needs to be more commonplace. There’s nothing wrong with trying something, figuring out it’s not for you, and being able to try something else. You’re going to do great and I wish you the best!
That final group project where they want you to re-write the bylaws of the university honestly sounds like someone decided to take their job and make the students do it for a group project. I'd be curious to know where you went to uni. All the best.
Agreed. That was the point I brought up in the “tribunal” and in the review for the course. I went to Brenau University. Cute school, great ghosts, more than a few shitty teachers.
I'm glad I attended art school in Chicago. Best thing I ever did!
Part of me wishes I'd gone to a different college, like RISD or something that focused more on art specifically, but whatcha gonna do?
I’m in my last year of college for an associates degree in fine arts and I understand completely! I’ve questioned my ability to create authentically. I doubt my own originality because of some of my professors 😢
You're almost out! You can make it. Biggest lesson I learned: make what YOU want. They can kick rocks.
art school is a waste of time
Pretty much. I prefer one-off classes.
Me who never went to art school: 😬
I guess I can't REALLY blame the school; but one bad teacher really does tank the whole experience.
I'll be 30 this year and one of my biggest regrets from the last 8 years was going back to art school in 2017. I was in Media Arts and Animation which had a 90% drop out rate (something the school's financial aid administrator lied about). Even though I actually did well in a majority of my classes I still ended up quitting the next year and could never regret it because I hated the environment that much. Art school didn't make me hate drawing as much as I hated the idea of working as an animator here in the U.S (precisely BECAUSE I like drawing and don't want to live under a desk for a living).
I wish I had gone to a regular college or been given no higher education at all. I wouldn't be in debt and I would've had more wiggle room to pursue valuable experiences much sooner.
It’s all such a scam. I should have left when I changed majors. The absolute shock I had when those student loans came due; I was lucky enough to be able to pay them off quickly but that 50k sure would have been nice.
Thank you for sharing your story!! (It’s Lizzie btw lol)
Hi, friend!
Didn't go to art school, but took a single art class in my first (of 3 incomplete years) of college.
That class was supposedly supposed to work with a potential degree in art education, but later turned out to not actually fulfill any credit so yeah lovely!! love college for that!!! Taking a class you cant even use is totally not a waste of time and money!!! :/
Anywho! I took one class. Not even in art school, mind you. Maybe not nearly as bad, but still. They really made the whole thing boring/draining as heck. It might have been cause it was a basic drawing course, but the way she had us "critique" each other and point out all the flaws in our practice/prompt pieces as well as highlight the "good stuff" made my skin kinda crawl. She also said no to digital art at one point, which kinda made some sense but also was confusing cause some people in the class were graphic design majors who wanted to use the techniques and apply them to their practice/skills???
It feels so odd to go to a class to learn or grow, and then be pushed to do the basics (which, by the way, I knew a lot of already but maybe I'm just being overdramatic?? I took art 3 years in highschool, and I did lots of tutorials and used books and online stuff to learn. If I sound like I'm complaining for no reason, ignore this then)
I felt bad about what I was learning because it felt so like, boring in the way I was doing it. It was better than any of my other classes I took at the time which were Gen EDS, I'll give it that, but.....still made me feel like a failure or like I was not cut out for the field. All because the basic stuff didn't turn out all that well.
Also, when you have a set style and way of doing art already, it's odd and almost counterintuitive to my creative process to be told a different approach??? I feel like ever since that class, I have avoided doing art. I feel like it made me overly critical of my mistakes, and stunted me.
I have made pieces since then, but I used to be creative every day, cranking out new art like it was no one's business. My highschool teacher made art seem fun and exciting; that teacher made me feel like I was naive for ever thinking that.
I feel like now I am stuck in this pit of feeling not good enough, even when I know that has never been the case. Especially when you see other people's in front of you and subconsciously compare yourself. I often feel bad for not being that good at drawing people, even though landscapes and animals are something I am decently good at (as well as cartoon characters/styles).
It's important to note that I also have Tourrette's, a movement disorder, so that professor's crisp clean lines she wanted from my peers and I is not going to translate when that is not me nor ever will be and it doesn't fit my art style!! I can make pieces without that in mind, they just have to have thicker lineart that is not easy to make look bad. :'>
I don’t understand how high school art classes are so fun and college actually tries to kill you. It took me eight years to want to try drawing again, and I made almost nothing for myself in four years of college (I did take a print making class that rocked). I grew up with a narcissistic parent who constantly put me down, had one hell of a frenemy who backstabbed me constantly, and college just compounded all that crap. I’m sorry you had that experience and I hope you find your way back to making things you love. To hell with delicate line work; if Jackson Pollock can throw paint at a canvas, you can have thick delicious line art.
That's a lot worse than what I had. I stopped and threw everything out because the University I went to whose acronym could be pronounced "sucky" in a certain part of it... decided to *not* hire our long-term associate professor that was the *only* instructor for Ceramics as a full-time when she had put in considerable work for 10 years *and* had the school newspaper singing praises about her, and instead decided to hire a considerably less experienced and less competent instructor as a full-time instead. And I gave them a chance, and the new instructor blew it -- *horribly.*
I decided to chuck *everything* that I made during all of her classes into the trash (some of it was salvaged by some classmates, but we're ignoring those) - and I am no longer bothering with ceramics because it's just... no. My planned projects were going to be focused on environmental sustainability. I'm giving everyone a giant middle-finger because that instructor was extraordinarily infuriating with... not even being able to run a classroom environment properly by allowing people to leave a mess on throwing wheels that they 'reserved' for the semester. I got called out for leaving someone on the wheel for *a few hours* when I was going to get back to working on that wheel, with a small note in clay stating that I was coming back - when people had messes left *for DAYS.* And I refused to "reserve" a wheel because those are a *SHARED RESOURCE.* Guess what? That instructor said "Oh, well, I could give you a wheel if you came to class more regularly" - she fking couldn't anyway because *ALL* of the wheels were "reserved" at the end. And practically *ALL* of the reserved wheels that were not in use were *FILTHY.* That was hardly the only thing she pissed me off on, with instead of just getting called out on leaving the wheel messy for a few hours *once* ...the instructor had to *bring it up a second time* a week later for no reason whatsoever - despite all of those other wheels being *filthy.* "We don't have enough wheels" was her excuse -- the reason we *DIDN'T HAVE ENOUGH* was because she had everyone else clogging *all* of them up for no reason. We *NEVER* had this issue with the previous associate professor, probably because the previous instructor *wasn't an idiot*
Right. That newer instructor also shot down several projects of mine or got in the way without offering any reasonable alternatives. Another reason why I chucked everything out. "Materials are expensive" so instead of saying 'figure out how you can use less' -- she went with "you can't use the classroom's oxides - buy your own" to a broke college student. Also she flipped the hell out when I mentioned that I wanted to make some money off of one of my works, when all that should have been said was that the comment shouldn't be mentioned in an artist statement. Gee, I wonder why we have this idea of "starving artists" here when we're not allowed to make money from what we produce... when the point of this being a job is to make some amount of money, by default...?
Honestly, this episode of the "Creative Mind" course reminds me of why people call Art School a scam. Random BS courses that are made to just pad credits and take your money without much of any proper teaching. And I was seeing another RUclipsr who was flaunting her credentials about being a TA that was talking about pet-peeves on VTuber design that... just wasn't getting information down correctly (she was nitpicking anatomy for not being the "exact perfect ratio" when the reality is... close enough is honestly good enough, because variances and such happen in reality -- and style-lization is a thing. And she was pretending thick thighs don't actually exist in reality when they very much do). Very self-centered focus on her personal design preferences. And that person... was helping with teaching...? At an art school...? You can see where this is going, right...? ...we don't even have proper qualified individuals teaching at those places anymore, apparently. Some people simply *are not meant to teach.* Period. And it's bad because there are somehow still people who will back up those people who are teaching straight up *wrong* or incorrect information as if the information was somehow correct when it clearly isn't
Oh, don't get me started on this other thing where a certain "sucky" University had issues with its Nursing department with teaching from outdated information and testing on it, so what someone told me. This guy that was apparently working in Pharmacy and had relevant, up-to-date information and the person who told me about the situation apparently failed exams because *the school was teaching from textbooks that were considerably dated* (I'm guessing by a decade or half a decade, I don't remember what she told me). And to top it off, the Nursing department had Cliques. And the instructors who were managing a clinic with the students as interns were apparently OK with a student who was physically too short to carry a patient around off the ground to... have her denied of getting assistance from others who were working so she didn't have to drag the patient around on the ground. Because those other students found it "too troublesome" or that she was 'being a nuisance' -- when she had the best intentions for the patient. Gee... I wonder why our healthcare is so terrible in places...? There was a video from... Emily? I forget her full screenname on RUclips. But she was complaining about how there were nurses that were acting inappropriately like "Mean Girls." I wonder why we have those issues... (eye rolls)
ALL OF THIS. My high school ceramics teacher was amazing. And maybe I was a little bit of a brat because I thought ceramics was stupid and guess what my favorite class was. I’m pretty sure they didn’t hire super cool TA because they’d have to pay her what she’s worth. I’m sorry they tanked your passion; I’m interested to hear more about your environmental pottery work. I think that’s cool.
Ironically, I’m a pharmacy technician, and the number of horror stories I’ve heard from the nursing school to actual nurses complaining to ME about needing a flu shot to, I dunno, work in a hospital with sick and compromised people, is baffling.
Arts and Humanities are critical subjects that need to be taking seriously and treated well. And they can be fun. They should be fun. I hate that schools (and society) devalue the work of artists and try to shove us in boxes, reduce our creative expression, and just try to shut us down until we give up.
@@MeghanHarker So, I had two different pieces planned from my previous instructor. Both of them were going to talk about a bitter irony of resource cycling and how making permanent objects slowly remove resources from the cycle (as pieces that were removing resources from a cycle)
The first piece was a water wheel. It was going to be lubricated by the water, and there would be a section where the wheel would start pumping a portion of the water to another container with a symbol with a lock to indicate resource being diverted and "locked down" semi-permanently as objects/possessions
The other one was the one I was getting flak for when I said it was an opportunity for me to earn money. It was a... somewhat complicated snowflake plate. It required getting encased in glaze to fill in the gaps. Basically it was alluding to the "water cycle" and how the ceramic piece was removing some amount of resources from the cycle by "freezing" it in place. And how we should practice thinking a bit more on what materials and objects we choose to create and keep permanently. It was loosely tied to the first piece in terms of concept. Then there's the second part where there's a hidden talk about the "true cost" of things. Each plate was being made with extremely finicky processes that had a high chance of failing. So how many plates would need to be attempted in order to get one successful piece...? How many resources were wasted in the process? And since this was a piece tied to environmental sustainability, there was some loose connection to the term "green washing" -- because ceramics is a very... not green... medium. Burning fossil fuels or wood and tons of carbon emissions xD
I might decide to have the plates made eventually, but without any of those messages. Just as an additional "fk you" to that instructor that flipped out about making money from the work. She gets what she wants, in the worst way possible with everyone else getting a middle finger and it being all her fault for that~ and people will get to know about that whole situation too :p
@@gaerekxenos Those sound incredible! I’m sorry that teacher made you feel badly about your work.
Greetings and sorry you have had such a horrifying experience with arts. As a very creative person I had this idea that arts was all about fun and beauty and creativity. as soon as I started my arts history degree, I was blasted with how arts are and have been a form of power, control, a currency. I hated everything and the more I studied arts the more distant I became to the art world. art galleries, particularly here in nz are 100% biased, you only get a spot if you are sleeping with a director or someone in charge, and pretty much everything that I loved about arts, (with very few exceptions) have become meaninless to me. staying art-illiterate is p[robably the best thing an arts person can do, stay true to what they like and admire without knowing the ins and out of the agendas behind the artworks is best practice to avoid huge disappointments.
I've never taken a dedicated art history class. I think if I were, I'd prefer to focus on a singular artist instead of the overall movement. Or on the development and curation of certain supplies or techniques. Everything has a dark history to it, a response to politics or world events, but I can see how that soured your taste for art.
@@MeghanHarker oh thanks for your reply, it means something.
laughs in fiction writing workshops 🤜🤛
Bro. For real. 🤜🏻🤛🏻