38 / Artists
This post was contributed by my brother.
In 1934 a group of men, mostly
miners who were members of their local WEA, decided to hire the academic,
Robert Lyon, to answer the question of "What is art?"
In Lee Hall's splendid play, "The
Pitman Painters", he amusingly illustrated how Robert Lyon at first
spoke about art in a way that had absolutely no meaning for the
miners. However, to Lyon's credit, it soon became clear that the best way
forward would be to engage the group in picture making, so that they could
learn for themselves. He encouraged them to go home and paint what they saw and
come back to discuss what they had produced.
To stand in front of their pictures in the
Woodhorn Museum Gallery at Ashington is a truly moving experience, not because
it is great art, but because their collective work provides a powerful
commentary on the world they lived in and about what was important to
them. A channel of communication had been opened.
In "The Story of Art" by E.H.Gombrich, he begins with the sentence "There is no such thing as art.
There are only artists." This, of course, extends the invitation to
everyone to just get on and do it and it is here that we come to the point
of this blog post.
In a time of financial restraint, the
opportunities for young people to engage in some form creative activity are
being squeezed. It is a process that must be resisted by every means
possible. The value of creative art is not easily measured, but neglected and a
whole realm of human understanding could be lost to a generation, as
it was indeed for the mine workers.
© Edward Bates |