Arts Education Beyond Art

People and societies thrive on a versatile and imaginative awareness. Yet the critical debate on arts education is still too often about the qualities of artefacts and technical skills, and tends to neglect issues such as the critical function of the arts in society, artistic cognition and cognitive development, changing artistic and cultural practices, and research into arts participation. Therefore it seems time for a change in perspective, shifting the focus from the qualities of artefacts to those of embodied cognitive and social processes. Arts Education Beyond Art argues that education of the arts, both for children and adults, should focus on the qualities of the processes generated by the artistic artefacts, and on these artefacts as means to an end. Instead of teaching how to look at art, we should teach how to look at life – through art. Contributors: Michel van der Aa, Franz Billmayer, Bernard Darras, Willem Elias, Pascal Gielen, Arnon Grunberg, Barend van Heusden, Susanne Keuchel, Aernout Mik, Charlotte Mutsaers, Ramsey Nasr, Gijs Scholten van Aschat, Lode Vermeersch, Barbara Visser, Ernst Wagner