Class 12: April 7, 2008

Closure

What a way to end: art deconstruction. I wasn't sure tonight if I had learned more about being an art critic or a curriculum designer! Both works were quite thought provoking. I haven't been to the WAG in years... many years. Maybe its time for a trip.

One of the sharp sticking points for me in this course was the concept of deconstruction. It's not as if I have not deconstructed anything in my life. I, and all of us, have been deconstructing all kinds of things since birth (though not necessarily consciously). During this course, however, the term took on a new meaning. So, I read a little bit about Derrida. It was worth it.

Marshall McLuhan was a great deconstructor. Recall from McLuhan's Wake that is was said that Marshall needed to get right to the bottom of things. I found a kindred spirit in McLuhan in that way. I am notorious for wanting to prove everything at an axiomatic level. Once I can't dig any deeper, it is then that I think I've achieved necessary understanding. With curriculum and education, the exercise it is quite interesting. We really need to become philosphers and ask the big questions, like, "What's the point of it all?" Who does education serve? Curriculum really is a tool in the social construction process, no? We shape out tools, then they shape us? I think so. Yet, it's not something totally unnatural. I am not necessarily a Darwinian evolutionist, but I believe in evolution nonetheless. I think of the neanderthal with the bone in the Space Odyssey clip. Discovery is natural, and how much by accident? And, once we discover how to think, the eureka moments just keep coming. We even learn to consciously deconstruct the reality that shapes us. What a life! There is so much to learn. What is possible? What can we know? If I'm going on a tangent, well, I'll forgive myself. I must make that trip to the WAG.

I'm still thinking about those paintings. With Rockwell, if the man's head is at the center, then perhaps with the suggestion of the cosmos in the colour painting, it means that there is one mind at the center of the universe, reality, reason, truth. Who's the author of truth? Maybe some guy in a grey suit who walks with an umbrella, even on sunny days. You think that guy ever rode a horse? It looks more to me like he's dressed to ride on a train. I just went back to look at the Colville painting in Google images (see the course blog for the link) and considered this idea. There is a single light on the train (if someone said this in class, I didn't hear it well). Might the horse be drawn to the light? What if the horse went into the light? Perhaps then a transformation occurred: the old horse died... the horse changed, saw things differently, changed direction, and became the light itself. At one time, neanderthal man was wild and free, but one day, became aware of the light of reason, and voila... progress. With reason, neanderthals could light their own way, construct their own reality... change the direction of their lives. Who knows... it's a painting! Must go the WAG.