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Al-Ahram Weekly 6 - 12 January 2000 Issue No. 463 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 6 - 12 January 2000 Issue No. 463
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Heritage Millennium Features Profile Living Travel Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Plain talk
By Mursi Saad El-Din
For some reason art has recently become one of my obsessions. Attending exhibition openings has come to be a routine activity in my life; so much so that I have not missed a single opening in Cairo's growing coterie of galleries.
But gallery going is not the only evidence of my increasing interest in art. I have also religiously followed all the news, events and developments relating to the world art scene or, to be more exact, the art scene of the English-speaking world. I never miss my London Sunday papers and the first thing I look for is the art section; it must be confessed that I am often very impressed by what I read. The Monet in the 20th Century exhibition, for example, lasted four months and was attended by nearly a million. On the first day of the exhibition 100,000 tickets were sold; long queues quickly formed at the entrance to the Royal Academy where the exhibition was held.
Another exhilarating item of news: museums of art in the United States are being built by the dozen. They have broadened the scope of their activities significantly, drawing in a larger audience, entertaining and educating huge numbers of art-lovers. According to Grace Glueck of the New York Times exhibition audiences have markedly increased. "Dozens of art museums," she writes "from New York to Los Angeles, from Seattle, Washington, to Portland, Main, are projecting, constructing and celebrating the completion of new quarters, and renovating old ones."
But what is even more impressive is that the function of these art museums has changed. Whereas before they were "very good creatures to have around", now they have become a basic amenity of metropolitan life. What is interesting is that these museums are established not only through public but also private initiatives. One possible reason for this is that art in the West is no longer an esoteric or avant-garde activity -- as, alas, it remains here -- but has already penetrated mainstream social and cultural life. This is partly due to educational efforts on the part of schools, as well as the widespread attention paid to art by the media which has created a better informed public. The younger generation, particularly, is "visually aware", and its members constitute the majority of museum and gallery-goers.
This brings me to the issue of art education and how to generate "visual awareness" among our own youth. There is no shortage of art galleries and museums in Cairo. They have been established by both the Ministry of Culture and private institutions. They display samples of different schools of art -- academic, impressionist, surrealist and abstract. On the opening day of an exhibition one sees crowds of viewers but, alas, the number of visitors dwindles so dramatically that towards the middle of the duration the artist stands there by himself.
Circa, the foremost Irish art magazine, published alongside its 89th issue (Autumn 1999) a supplement on art education under the title "A is for Art". In the introduction the two co-editors explain that "the issues addressed here are diverse. They include contested approaches to museum education; interdisciplinarity in the arts; pedagogic practices, research and indigenous design... etc."
"The experience of art education in the just concluded century," writes one contributor, "should not define our image of art education in the 21st century. What is needed is a balance between the realities of art education as we have known it, and the realistic possibilities of art education as it might be."
How true. I have always believed that art education is not a supportive function for other realms of learning but an integral educational experience in its own right.
The inclusion of art education in school curricula and its subsequent development in further and higher education is essential, since the role of art in an emerging programme of lifelong learning is central, something that could well be taken into account here in Egypt.
