Basic Problems of Studies in Art Education and Curriculum Criticism

Abstract

In modern times, 'art education' was formed as the function of three factors: 'art', 'education' and 'child'. In the post-modern framework, however, the trinity relatioship has been deconstructed and melted. The main purpose of this study was to clarify the critical/fundamental issues involved in art education at the time of the millenium transition. The transformation of art education from modernist criticism to post-modernism which was caused partly by the change of art concepts in the post-modern society seemingly impacted on the educational priorities and practices. The result of the 'conceptual analysis' extracted the following implications which may provide an overarching perspective in the new era: 1. To solve the paradoxical relationships between 'evolution of modern art' and 'growth of children' in the curriculum studies. 2. To develop a 'syntactic structures' (Schwab) in the new vision of 'totality' which is observed in today's movement of art, media and technology, surpassing the paradigm of 'formalism'. 3. To develop the practical discourse of 'curriculum criticism', which swings back and forth between art/art education, teachers/children, teachers/researchers, theories/practice, and construction/deconstruction of the curriculum.