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• Students will examine the notions of labor and craftsmanship as they study how cultural tools and techniques apply to artistic practice. • Students will consider the use of tools and techniques as vehicles for understanding culture. • Students will complete an archeological record and a social history incorporating research and personal opinion about historic and contemporary tools and techniques.
Art:21 Web Site • Touch & Moor - Janine Antoni interview & clip • Collodian Process - Sally Mann interview & clip • Mother Land series - Sally Mann art work • Stone Carving - Martin Puryear interview & clip • Abstration & Ladder... - Martin Puryear interview & clip • Islam and Miniature Painting - Shahzia Sikander interview & clip • Venus's Wonderland - Shahzia Sikander art work • Korea: Home and Displacement - Do-Ho Suh interview & clip Additional Web Sites • http://www.clyes.clara.net/essays/artifacts.html The study of artifacts—archeology • http://www.aaanet.org Anthropology resources on the net • http://archnet.asu.edu A virtual library for archeology Classroom Materials • Examples of traditional and contemporary tools from current and historic usage • Works of student art
• What can we learn about past or distant cultures through the tools, techniques and products they create? • How do anthropologists study the artifacts of the past to learn about isolated or ancient life and events? • How might anthropologists in the future look at the tools and artifacts we currently use to create a social history of our time? • How have we improved technology to improve our lives and change the way we do things? • What are the tools visual artists use and how do they relate to other tools used in contemporary life? • How have major innovations in technology impacted the way artwork is made? • Does the word innovation always describe an advancement or an improvement? • How is innovation related to the tools and skills of the past, and the tools and skills we utilize now?
Traditional Tools and Technologies Select a historical period (Colonial America, Ancient Egypt, Native Americans from the Southwest, etc.) and have students research the tools and technologies used in that culture. What special skills and tools did artists and artisans use and create? How did they learn these skills? If new tools or technologies became available, how did they impact artistic output? The sculptor Martin Puryear says: “As a woodworker, I use tools all the time. And just paying attention to tools, the evolution of woodworking tools in itself—there’s a certain art history to that. You look at the forms that various utilitarian things have taken throughout history and there’s a shifting sense of beauty with the way that the different cultures have shaped things that fit the hand and are used to do a job.” Have students research the history of a tool from its first conception to contemporary time and document its impact on society. What human need was addressed by its invention? How did its use and design evolve over time? Is this tool still in use today or has it been surpassed by more recent inventions? (Time: One 45 minute session) Contemporary Practices View the Art:21 segments on Season Two artists Martin Puryear, Do-Ho Suh, Janine Antoni, and Season One artists Sally Mann, and Shahzia Sikander, and read their transcript pages found on this Web site. Discuss with your students the relationships each of these artists has with traditional tools and techniques. Ask students to identify what traditional tools and techniques they use and what traditional tools and techniques are manipulated for use in a non-traditional manner. Discuss the importance of craftsmanship in each artist’s work. When and how does craftsmanship alter the meaning of the artwork? What might an anthropologist from the future infer about our culture if he or she found a work of art from each of these artists? (Time: One 45 minute session) Family Traditions Janine Antoni talks about making things with her mother and the rest of her family. She describes her interest in the handmade and the important connections she makes between an object and its maker. Interview a family member about a skill or craft they use. Have students find out how their family member learned this particular skill or craft and the context in which they learned it. What do they do with the products of their labor? After interviewing their family member, have students research the history of this skill or craft and write a report locating your family member within this tradition. Alternately, students may research a skill or craft that was employed by their ancestors and incorporate a fictionalized personal story with historical research, or create a work of art incorporating that skill or craft. (Time: Two 45 minute sessions) Excavating Contemporary Artifacts Ask students to research an archeological excavation site and the civilization or culture that resided there. Have students examine what kinds of artifacts were discovered during the excavation and what archeologists were able to infer about the civilization from these artifacts. Have students present their findings to the class. Now ask students to imagine that an archeologist 1,000 years in the future will excavate the site of your school or town. Ask students to describe some of the objects they might discover and what conclusions an archeologist might make about the culture from analyzing these objects. Are there any objects that may lead them to incorrect conclusions? Have students create an archeological record based on a work of art created by a fellow student in their class. Ask students to imagine that they have found this work of art at an archeological site of the future, and then as students to analyze the source of the skills, techniques, ideas, and come to a conclusion about what he or she has made. Then, have students write a social history of the culture from which this artifact has come from, with the perspective of this future archeologist. (Time: Four to five 45 minute sessions)
• Have students reflected on the relationship of labor and craftsmanship to artistic practice and cultural tools and techniques? • Have students considered the value of studying artifacts and tools to understand culture? • Have students created an archeological record and a social history incorporating research and personal opinion about historic and contemporary tools and techniques? Find out how this lesson correlates to your state's education standards! On PBS TeacherSource do a search for "Art in the 21st Century" and click on the Standards Match icon.
While this lesson focuses on the use of labor and craftsmanship by the artists Martin Puryear, Sally Mann, Do-Ho Suh, Shahzia Sikander, and Janine Antoni, it can be altered to include other artists or combined with other lessons to form a unit such as: Dictators, Collaborators, Managers and Soloists Converging Media and New Materials Mediating Media New Tools, New Materials Did you use this lesson or generate your own activities based on ideas inspired by the lesson? Submit student art work, new lesson plans, and your comments to Art:21 and have them posted on the site. Help the Online Lesson Library grow! |
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