A Master of Writing

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Writing articles does not come easy for me. I struggle to get my thoughts organized and then shaped into something resembling a readable form that, hopefully, is both clear and concise. Being an accomplished procrastinator doesn’t help one bit. I can easily waver on facing up to the task at hand or caving to the Siren’s bewitching song of any of my current studio art projects. However, when the subject is an issue that I am passionate about and has concerned me for years, and in listening to the complaints of college art school students I mentor has unfortunately not improved, I find the task at hand flows easily.

I have listened to story after story of university art school instructors pushing the importance of the intellectual content of the student’s work while totally neglecting teaching artistic technique or skill development. Students are taught to think like art critics but are not given the fundamental tools to becoming productive artists! While attending art school 47 years ago, I had this very experience, and unfortunately, I am still hearing these same stories of ideology of theory over skill.

Each year at the annual conference, we host a special event called