Mende proverb (Boone, 1986 as cited in hooks, 1995, p.101)
In her 1995 essay ‘Talking art as the spirit moves us’, bell hooks writes about the biases that ‘bind and blind’ us. (hooks, 1995, p.102) and that seeing deeply can only happen if one is initiated, guided on how to see and understand a work of art from a culture other than our own.
Our biases bind and blind us whether we are aware of them or not, and this limits and constricts our critical vision. hooks refers to this as “white-supremacist identity politics” (hooks, 1995, p.102), and that those from the well-meaning left are complicit in this as well as the right. The view that the white, European viewpoint and approach to art (and design) is superior and the measure by which we judge other works.
This has huge ramifications for teaching art and design in European art schools, and is particularly impacting students from non-white European backgrounds, who presumably feel alienated by the curriculum, references, how we measure good or bad, and would presumably also create a feeling of insecurity, lack of faith in their own beliefs, and approaches, which are crucial for all students to nurture in terms of their own development and the development of art and design practice as a whole.
Reframing work by marginalised artists to fit with a white narrative is misguided and harmful to the true narrative of the work. This “represents a perfect gesture of colonisation and appropriation” (hooks, 1995, p.103).
Feedback and critiques are also an important space for discussion of work, for peers and tutors to be guided and initiated, and able to see and understand the work of non-whites more deeply. But also for the critical discourse to be meaningful, explored without fear of offending, not just giving praise to marginalised work, not applying the same criteria of aesthetics etc.
Something that I have found in my research into attempting to diversify the set of references I have for typography is that often the work of non-white designers, particularly black designers either fits into the category that hooks refers to as “Often it is only the anger and rage expressed by marginal groups that is “seen” by white folks” (hooks, 1995, p.103).
Hooks talks about the “tension between reformist work that aims to change the status quo so that we have access to the privileges of the dominant group and the more radical project of resistance that seeks to dismantle or transform the existing structure” (hooks, 1995, p.104).
She talks about the how non-white artists have a tension between creating work that will allow them access to the privileges of the dominant group, and the bigger project of dismantling the existing structure.
In her closing statement, hooks talks about the loss of art critic Sylvia Ardyn Boone, who was an influence on hooks, and the importance of being ‘initiated’, ‘guiding me so that I would look more closely at a given subject, so chat I would see deeply.’ (hooks, 1995, p.107) Hooks says ‘To sustain this critical legacy, African-American critics and our allies in struggle must dare to courageously speak our minds, to talk about art as the spirit moves us.’ (hooks, 1995, p.107).
As teachers, with big influence over our classrooms, we can create spaces for discussions that help students speak ‘courageously’ as hooks says. We can help create a space for open discussion and where global viewpoints can be expressed and discussed, challenging the dominant ideologies and perspectives, and to progress our understanding of art and design and how it can evolve as a global language for understanding the human condition.
Bibliography
hooks, b. (1995). ‘Talking art as the spirit moves us’, in Art on my mind: visual politics. New York: The New Press
Boone, S. A. (1986). Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.