Child art
Child art is drawings, paintings, or other artistic works created by children. It has been used as a therapeutic tool by psychologists and as an ethnographic tool to further understand children of the past. Within developmental theory, the art of each child reflects their level of self-awareness and the degree to which they are integrated with their environment.
Meanings
In its primary sense, the term was created by Franz Cižek in the 1890s. The following usages denote and connote different, sometimes parallel meanings:- In the world of contemporary fine art, "child art" refers to a subgenre of artists who depict children in their works;
- "child art" implies art intended for viewing by children — illustrations perhaps in a book for juvenile readers, done by a child or by a professional adult illustrator;
- as a synonym for juvenilia.
History
Agenda of art education for children was discussed at the International Conference of 1884, held in London at the Health Exhibition. The discussion framework was largely shaped by the widespread of schools of design for professional training of children and youth in the UK, beginning from 1852. Some of the conference participants underlined the importance of creativity, imaginations and special methodology for development of children's artistic skills. Ebenezer Cooke has pointed out that "if a child follows its bent and draws animals its own way, in action, and repeats them, outlines them, and colours them too, he will produce a drawing which may be comparable to the archaic period of more than one historic school". The proceedings of the conference, ed. by E. Cooke, were issued in the 1885–86 Journal of Education, published by the Society for the Development of the Science of Education.
Robert Ablett organized the first European exhibition of drawings by children in London, 1890. The first collection of 1250 children's drawing and sculpture pieces was assembled by Corrado Ricci, an Italian art historian.
Between 1895 and 1920, Franz Cižek championed the concept and practice of children's art in his art school, refusing to impose an aesthetic style on his students. At the International Conference on Education organized on the sidelines of the International Health Exhibition of 1884, the educator Ebenezer Cooke praised the practice of free drawing in children, as opposed to classical teaching, stating that it was a natural way for them to express themselves.
Aesthetic appreciation of children's art as untainted by adult influence was extolled by Franz Cižek, who called a child's drawing "a marvelous and precious document". Discovery of the aesthetic quality of the unskilled visual expression by children was related to the aesthetics of modernism and, in case of Cižek, to the Vienna Secession.
In 1897, Cižek opened the Juvenile Art Class, a weekend school upholding children creativity uninhibited by adult vocational standards. The initiative was supported by his Secession friends-artists and opposed by the traditional art teachers. The Class accepted pupils of 2 to 14 years old for two hours a week, free of charge, with no selection. Cižek claimed that he was working "as an artist, not as a teacher", and actually "learned and not taught". The work propagated the theory of developmental stages.
Psychologists' interest in children's art was reflected in works by Georg Kerschensteiner, Georges-Henri Luquet, Georges Rouma, Karl Bühler, Florence Goodenough, Helga Eng, Robert Coles. According to D.D. Kelly, consequent domination of Piagetian theory of cognitive psychology largely marginalized the psychological studies of children's art, which were revitalized only towards the end of the 20th century.
Stages of child art
As the child develops, their art passes through a number of stages. Four of them were for the first time defined by E. Cooke, under influence of Herbert Spencer's evolutionary theory.Presently, the stages are generally differentiated as follows:
Scribbling
From about their first birthday children achieve the fine motor control to handle a crayon. At first they scribble. The youngest child scribbles with a series of left and right motions, later up, down and then circular motions are added. The child appears to get considerable pleasure from watching the line or the colours appear. Often however children do not pay attention to the edges of the page and the lines go beyond the confines of the page. Children are often also interested in body painting and, given the opportunity, will draw on their hands or smear paint on their faces.Later, from about their second birthday, controlled scribbling starts. Children produce patterns of simple shapes: circles, crosses and star-bursts. They also become interested in arrangement and can produce simple collages of coloured paper, or place stones in patterns. Once children have established controlled scribbling they begin to name their scribbles.
Pre-symbolism
From about age three, the child begins to combine circles and lines to make simple figures. At first, people are drawn without a body and with limbs emerging directly from the head. The eyes are often drawn large, filling up most of the face, and hands and feet are omitted. At this stage it may be impossible to identify the subject of the art without the child's help.Later drawings from this stage show figures drawn floating in space and sized to reflect the child's view of their importance. Most children at this age are not concerned with producing a realistic picture.
Symbolism
In this stage of a child's development, they create a vocabulary of images. Thus when a child draws a picture of a cat, they will always draw the same basic image, perhaps modified. This stage of drawing begins at around age five. The basic shapes are called symbols or schema.Each child develops their own set of symbols, which are based on their understanding of what is being drawn rather than on observation. Each child's symbols are therefore unique to the child. By this age, most children develop a "person" symbol which has a properly defined head, trunk and limbs which are in some sort of rough proportion.
Image:Faroe stamp 041 childrens year.jpg|thumb|Two schematic figures on a green base line
Before this stage the objects that child would draw would appear to float in space, but at about five to six years old the child introduces a baseline with which to organize their space. This baseline is often a green line at the bottom of the paper. The figures stand on this line. Slightly older children may also add secondary baselines for background objects and a skyline to hold the sun and clouds.
It is at this stage that cultural influences become more important. Children not only draw from life, but also copy images in their surroundings. They may draw copies of cartoons. Children also become more aware of the story-telling possibilities in a picture. The earliest understanding of a more realistic representation of space, such as using perspective, usually comes from copying.
Realism
As children mature they begin to find their symbols limiting. They realize that their schema for a person is not flexible enough, and does not resemble the real thing. At this stage, which begins at nine or ten years old, the child will lend greater importance to whether the drawing looks like the object being drawn. Around the age of nine or ten, many children develop a heightened visual awareness of their surroundings. They become more attentive to details and proportions in their drawings, often adding features like lips, fingernails, hairstyles, and joints when depicting people. Additionally, they show a growing interest in illustrating people in dynamic poses and various costumes.This can be a frustrating time for some children, as their aspirations outstrip their abilities and knowledge. Some children give up on drawing almost entirely. However, others become skilled, and it is at this stage that formal artistic training can benefit the child most. The baseline is dropped and the child can learn to use rules such as perspective to organize space better. Story-telling also becomes more refined and children will start to use formal devices such as the comic strip.
Therapeutic
can be an effective way for children to develop and connect with their emotions. Some autistic children have found that drawing can help them to express feelings that they have difficulty expressing otherwise. Similarly, children who have faced horrors such as war can find it difficult to talk about what they have experienced directly. The Chapman Art Therapy Treatment Intervention, for example, was designed in 2001 to help children exhibiting PTSD symptoms. "Mess-making" is another form of art therapy where children are permitted to paint outside of the confines of a canvas, often spilling and destroying materials. This treatment was used primarily on survivors of sexual violence. Art can help children come to terms with their emotions in these situations.The New York City Board of Education noted that following 9/11, schoolchildren exhibited PTSD symptoms at a rate five times higher than usual. Art therapists could gain insight into children's concerns about their family, pets, and friends, often asking whether the crisis was truly over or if more danger was imminent. Marygrace Berberian, who developed art therapy programs throughout New York City and facilitated the World Trade Center Children's Mural Project, emphasized the power of artistic expression in addressing this collective trauma. She described the nearly insurmountable grief that enveloped the community, noting, "artistic expression immediately alleviated the pain of a community struggling to make sense of an illogical sequence of events". The WTCCMP provided children an opportunity to participate in a healing process, contributing to a montage of 3,100 self-portraits from around the world. It became crucial for these vulnerable children to feel a sense of control and calm by the end of each therapeutic activity.
The first art therapist to specialize in children was Edith Kramer, who practiced throughout the 1940s. Influenced by Franz Cižek, she believed that a child's art reflected their "natural" development and thus mitigated the negative influences of society.