Abstract:

Art, Education and Drawing Materials is a PhD research programme that I'm developing at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Oporto University. For this research, a partnership between the University and Viarco (pencil factory) was established.

The aim of this project is to create drawing workshops and, simultaneously, to develop new drawing materials. Thus, it appeals to the articulation between teaching practices and contemporary artistic practices and also to the research, experimentation and production of drawing instruments.
The project works on two fronts.

The first relates to the creation of drawing workshops, with the following objectives:
1) the approach of artistic languages, drawing in particular, to the community involved;
2) the promotion of the proximity between public, artists and the processes of materials production;
3) the awareness of the work context in the field of visual arts;
4) the development and research in the area of drawing as a process, as a way of thinking and communicating;
5) the development of artistic literacy.

The second part of this work involves research, development and experimentation in the field of drawing and of the production of drawing materials. Here, in cooperation with Viarco, the aim is to create new drawing technologies through the production of innovative materials. In this way, the company's competitiveness and the interest of the artistic community in the production and distribution panorama are increased.

This project springs from this primary question: What are the possibilities of a dialogue between producers and users of various backgrounds promoting an understanding of drawing in the scope of the development of materials?

The creation of these drawing workshops contemplates various approaches in the production of knowledge through drawing, and endorses the implementation of methodological and pedagogical practices that are in the frontline on the field of research in artistic education. Currently, the research in this field is done through the development and implementation of actions in which collaborative work acquires a central role. Therefore, the partnership and the interaction between the University and Viarco is a key point in the development of this project.

To carry out this project, I'm working with the material producers, artists and a group of art students. This is a qualitative research where the researcher works as a mediator between the needs of the drawing practice and the sphere of drawing materials production, as well as in the development of methodological and pedagogical practices in the artistic education field. The research is defined ontologically by a holistic vision of reality, and epistemologically by the production of knowledge as a result of practice and critical reflection. Thus, it can be affirmed that this qualitative model intends to replace the scientific notions of explanation, prediction and control by the positivist model of understanding, meaning and action.

To understand art education today requires the reflection on the changes that have occurred in the post-modern world, art and aesthetics. Thinking about the artist solely as a maker and not also as a researcher would mean understanding his activity isolated from the social. So, this research can be understood as the production and organization of communicable knowledge, susceptible to future approaches and elaborations of meaning, in order to build new perspectives on art pedagogical practice.

Keywords:

Artistic education, drawing practice, pedagogical practice, university/industry cooperation.