Blog post 3

Blog post 3

Sofia Greenberg

It is interesting to consider art school, as opposed to other types of education, in terms of Thompson’s categories of time. It is also interesting to consider art school in terms of play versus work. Fine Arts education, I think, blurs the boundaries between work and leisure, and between task-time and labor-time.

First of all, the general education habit of homework is absolutely task-time oriented. A student must complete homework by a certain deadline, but beyond that the student has freedom and control in choosing when and where to do it. Because art school must function in a somewhat academic structure, there are mandated classes that a student must attend during set hours of the day. In this sense, the students are indeed bound to labor-time, with designated hours of concentration and attendance, and designated breaks for idleness or leisure. Also, the student’s work has generally no connection to the revolving of the earth; day light and seasons do not affect a student’s ability to produce work or attend classes, so in this way too education time differs from pre-industrial cyclical time. However, the act of making art is not the same as the act of writing a report, taking notes on a lecture, or filling out math sheets. Art-making is primarily a pleasurable activity, and the student attending art school probably enjoys making art, considers it a kind of play. In this way, art school lies ambiguously between the work and leisure realm. Making art also entails an aspect of task-time. Even though the student is required to fulfill certain amounts of attendance and academic work, the larger focus is on the student’s art. Producing art, in a sense, is more similar to pre-industrial work than industrial work. The artist, like the farmer, attends to the task at hand until it is finished, and then can look at his or her work with satisfaction and take a break. Both the farmer and the artist are directly connected to their work, whereas the factory worker fulfills as many tasks as possible until it is time to clock out, and only benefits monetarily from his or her effort. I imagine that most art students go to art school so that some day, by qualification and skill mastery, they can live a life predominantly task-time oriented, and leisurely. I must admit, though, sometimes I find myself bizarrely craving a labor-time, standard job, to do something semi-mindless for however many hours and have very little responsibility beyond that.

I think the irony of the massive expense of art school versus the likelihood of getting wealthy as an artist is pretty horrible. Student debt is a devilish thing. However, because no one is forced to go to CCA, I think students have to take responsibility for our choice to attend an expensive school that will not likely lead us to stable incomes. I justify this choice by telling myself I will be a creative writing teacher, someday, and a BA will provide credentials for getting that job. I think that for a very long time the realm of Fine Arts as an occupation has been reserved for the elite who can afford not to have all-consuming, "real" jobs. This is an ugly aspect of the Capitalist mindset. I feel pretty conflicted about the moralities surrounding the issue of art school, and I choose not to think about the fact that I’m paying a shit load of money for very little job-training.

I don’t know if I completely understand the connection between the French general strike and the British student protests. But from my understanding, keeping the tuition for higher education reasonable allows more people (people in a broader financial range) to get training for better jobs; jobs that require employees to have gone to university tend to make more money and allow earlier retirement.