Via Flickr:
Here’s my art kit. I think it’s worthwhile to note what isn’t in it. There’s no ruler in here, no eraser (mostly because I lost it, actually), no geometry tools. I think I feel the lack of geometry tools pretty keenly, but it’s not a bad kit, as is.
I’m minded, as I look at this set of tools, about what we ask kids to bring to class. Are your students mostly burdened with pens and pencils, books and notebooks?
I’m conscious, as I look at these tools, at how far I’ve come by duplicating about 26 cards. You may not like the style of the cards, or what they represent, but there’s no question that my abilities as an artist have grown.
I’m also aware, on another level, that this set of tools represents an investment in my own education as an artist. I didn’t know how to use most of these tools when I began. Working with them required a precision that I had more or less lost since the last time I had any education as an artist. I still don’t feel like I’m a master or even an apprentice with the brush pens.
Gianbattista Vico, the 17th entry Italian philosopher, wrote that “we only know what we make.” Drawing the analogy of the cards and the tools necessary to produce them back to student tool kits… What tools are missing from a student’s tool kit that prevents them from thinking as deeply and as clearly as they could?
