Applicability of internet fine arts' challenges at creating fine arts' assignments

Katja Mulej (2020) Applicability of internet fine arts' challenges at creating fine arts' assignments. MSc thesis.

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Abstract

With the popularization and spread of social media came the appearance of artists and creators on the internet who are creating and participating in various Internet Art Challenges. I was curious if art teachers knew about them and if Internet Art Challenges could be a good alternative source of inspiration to the current sources art teachers use for inspiration now when forming art assignments and tasks. I have divided this thesis into the theoretic part, author's part and empiric part, because I wanted to research and present this topic in a clear and systematic way. In the theoretical part, I presented the already existing research related to the topic of teachers’ use of the internet for the purposes of fine arts lessons. The results of the research presented do not directly indicate how much the teachers use the internet for the purposes of fine arts lessons. They merely hint at it. I also examined the characteristics of good art assignments, which require a balance of proper art technique, combined with an art motive and art problem for students across different age groups. Attention is also paid to the ambiguity of freedom and control that emerges in fine arts lessons. In the author's work, I elaborate on Internet Art Challenges and pay special attention to the challenge called Inktober, which I also participated in. I present the technique of ink, the course of the challenge I participated in, formally analyze some of the works that stood out, and present the positive and negative characteristics of the challenge that I experienced first-hand. The formal analysis of my works allows me to come up with personal findings and findings about how the challenge affected my creation. This information is useful to me in the empirical section of the thesis where I interview seven fine arts teachers. From the interviews, I find that some teachers use the internet a lot for the purposes of fine arts lessons and that they are all very critical of the information provided on the web. It also turned out that they all knew an online resource with a lot of art ideas, i.e. Pinterest, which they were very critical of. I compared the characteristics of Pinterest's art ideas and the features of Internet Art Challenges like Inktober with the features of good school art assignments. I have found that Internet Art Challenges and good school art assignments have many characteristics in common and therefore represent a better alternative to finding inspiration for fine arts teachers than the Pinterest art ideas. The interview with the teachers also revealed that good resources with artistic ideas cannot replace the teacher's creativity and ingenuity while teaching in class. The results of the research are useful in the field of fine arts pedagogy, as they can be helpful for art teachers who would like to find new sources of inspiration that would benefit them with composing art activities and assignments. They also provide insight into the ever-evolving world of Internet Art Challenges and young creators who participate in them via social networks for a variety of reasons.

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