The art of the child and its teaching.
There is an ingrained view in society, that the painter's task is to faithfully recreate nature. According to this view, the objects expressed in the image should be as close as possible to the image of reality, and the skill of reproduction is usually admired and appreciated. But such a view is not correct. It's impossible to specify, what the term means: compatibility with nature. The painter's job is different. Man is not a dead apparatus and cannot recreate reality in a mechanical way in the image he creates. It will always be interpreted and expressed in some way. It can also use common ones, and even trivial methods, but it can also express itself in its own and original way - and therefore creatively. In the first case, we will be dealing with worthless production, in the second - with value, an authentic statement. A significant value, which we appreciate in this matter, therefore there is neither conformity to nature, nor mere technical mastery, but the concept and the power of its expression.
People often use diagrams, it makes his life easier. But on this subject it is necessary, to constantly create new solutions, even for the same tasks. The use of diagrams is therefore something fundamentally flawed in painting. A painting scheme is created on the principle of repeating someone else's, but also of its own form and is an ossified form, which is born of a lack of creative effort.
A child differs from an adult in this, he doesn't have much experience. If we do not impose a certain way of seeing and expressing reality, if he does it himself, automatically creates its own concepts and realizations. It doesn't cause him much trouble, because it does so directly and simply. When it is not burdened by other people's patterns or your own habits, expresses reality in its own way.
To, that children enjoy drawing and painting, is due to the ease of expression in this area. And actually, they retain this ease for so long, how long they work in their own way and have not been "taught" at the parental home or school, how to do it. Upon taking over someone else's, In the absence of a ready-made experience, the child's creative capacity is extinguished and he ceases to create his own, authentic painting forms.
How sensitive and delicate human nature is in this respect, we are generally unaware.
However, in reality, sometimes a minor error on the part of the pedagogue is enough, to disrupt the autonomous creative process, distort, and even extinguish. Creative expression must take place in an atmosphere of complete independence and mental concentration. Every creator, and so the child, breaks through the realm of the unknown and discovers a new one, a hitherto non-existent world of forms. And that requires these conditions.
In the assessment of creative work, therefore, it should not be treated as good - such results, in which we only externally approached the photographic image of reality, but such, in which the author's authentic experience found expression in an individual interpretation of reality.
From the author of the artwork, so since childhood, calligraphy of the form should not be required, technical proficiency and skill in expressing oneself or subordinating oneself to another's vision, teacher's vision, and no stabilized forms at all. The correct solution can only be created while maintaining the independence of feeling and seeing reality. Progress and teaching methods in this subject do not rely on the transfer of developed experience, but on opposing them and on making the individual move independently in this sphere in order to constantly create new solutions. This basic principle of evaluating a work of art applies equally to an adult work of art, as well as the child.
Someone might say, that such a setting of the matter is difficult and goes far beyond the average human needs, so he's in school, basic education of the individual unnecessary; that the object is needed by the average individual only to this extent, that is necessary to use this skill practically, that is, to express with drawing and color specific objects and ideas. And that therefore you can and should instill specific messages, which is given to the student, same as in all other subjects.
But the practice of teaching gives us irrefutable evidence against this. Children taught in this way draw and paint worse and worse, very quickly they get completely discouraged and stop dealing with this subject. Without taking into account the creative elements, it is impossible to teach anyone the skills of drawing and painting, one can only distort his talent, manner, schematize. Leaving aside the creative moments of the subject, we deprive children of an important element, which is undoubtedly the joy of creation. What's more, narrowing down the requirements, we don't minimize the difficulties, and just the opposite, we enlarge them. Learning becomes for children, and, in turn, unbearable compulsion and torment for the teacher. With this kind of learning method, we deprive ourselves of an important element, which is the shaping of a lively and creative human psyche in this way, and thus all the far-reaching consequences of awakening creativity in man, revealing abilities.
We must be clear, that we are dealing with in this matter, also in the case of a child, with real creativity, with art - not with imitation. Statements of the most serious theoreticians of art and the greatest artists confirm the existence of "child art", with all its charm and indisputable, educational and educational values. In teaching this subject, we must therefore be particularly vigilant to these values. Teaching methods that are valid in other subjects cannot be mechanically transferred to this particular subject. You cannot brutally impose ready-made formulations and methods of dealing with the subject on the child, in which it can and must create its own expression and its own discoveries. It's just that in this subject, as we have already mentioned, one should not "teach" and "teach", but rather one should create an atmosphere favorable for independent, creative work.
If art at all, and we will surround the child's art with such an atmosphere, it will develop very nicely. Only one should not force this development and bend it to other people's concepts and ideas.