Dace Paeglite

Follow me – Follow the Clues and Recognise Abstractionism!

Dace Paeglite – Riga Pardaugavas Music and Art school, Latvia

Abstract:

This study summarizes the experience of the Art Department at Riga Pardaugavas Music and Art School in engaging students across various age groups (9–14 years). It examines effective strategies for communicating with students in a clear and engaging manner, particularly in introducing and elucidating the concept of “abstract work.”

The impetus to address abstractionism emerged from observations that children, their parents, and teachers often conflate simple stylization – which is distinct from realism – with abstractionism during art technique and style classes. To deepen participants’ understanding of this concept, an interactive dynamic art lesson titled “Follow Me!” was offered, wherein learners were guided by a sequence of prompting commands. Although participants were expected to follow the instructions carefully, they retained the freedom to choose the materials and representations for each subsequent step. This approach resulted in the creation of unique artworks by each student, characterized by diverse compositional strategies and visual effects; the final pieces featured only lines, squares, shapes, and colours. Notably, this methodology was also employed with adult audiences. The phenomenon can be attributed to the technical possibilities of contemporary visual art and the diverse means of expression available, which facilitate the creation of eclectic effects by incorporating multiple visual art styles within a single work. Consequently, this may lead to a lack of clearly defined evaluation criteria by teachers.

Our findings indicate that this methodology: enhanced the understanding of abstraction as a distinct visual art style; increased knowledge of how a flat silhouette or outline is formed from simple objects in space; enriched learners’ emotional experience by integrating personal narrative with the transformation of real objects into abstract representations; facilitated the development of a coherent working rhythm that enabled learners to complete their artwork in a single session; and provided multiple choices during class, allowing learners to utilize tools and materials freely and innovatively. In conclusion, abstractionism should not be perceived merely as an impersonal arrangement of lines, dots, geometric shapes, and colours; rather, it represents a multi-layered narrative uniquely constructed by each student, which imbues the term “abstract” with personal significance.