Context elaborations - Level 6 art history
Context elaborations are possible contexts for learning, with a suggestion of how they might be used with the focus achievement objective.
The listed context elaborations are examples only. Teachers can select and use entirely different contexts in response to local situation, community relevance, and students’ interests and needs.
Teachers may consider survey, chronological, or thematic approaches to teaching students about New Zealand art, artists, artefacts, and visual culture. These should include a range of art of Māori, Pasifika, and other cultures to reflect the cultural diversity of the local and school community as well as the national character.
Māori artists expressed their political or ideological values on issues such as land rights and colonisation through their artwork. Emare Karaka’s and Shane Cotton’s paintings reflect contemporary viewpoints on these issues. Use iconography through the symbolic meanings attributed to the objects Cotton and Karaka depict to demonstrate links between context and subject matter.
In-depth study of the issues and viewpoints raised in the reading of one artist’s ideas
- Marian Maguire’s printmaking locates imagery from early colonial encounters with Māori, alongside Herakles’ heroic endeavour to colonise New Zealand or fight at Gallipoli, in an interesting inversion of place and time. Learn more about
Marion Maguire.
- This site has sufficient Maguire prints and teaching resources to engage in-depth with a range of readings and interpretations of contemporary issues.
- Discuss beliefs and ideas, such as the Māori and Pasifika creation stories, and link these to themes and narratives in contemporary imagery, for example, John Pule’s stories of recent migration in contrast to the contemporary interpretation of whaikairo in Robyn Kahukiwa’s paintings.
- Identify a range of media, processes, and techniques, such as watercolour, oil in painting, or carving or casting in sculpture, as used by artists studied in the course.
- Base a unit of work on a field trip to local dealer or to regional art galleries or museums. A visit to a dealer gallery may involve discussions about how value is attached to art and why selected objects may be considered art. A museum trip may contrast the value of ethnographic or historical values in contrast to aesthetic value. A walking tour of an area of local interest may reveal links between the neighbourhood’s historical context, such as Selwyn churches, and the influence of architecture and art from Europe or Britain.
- A unit of learning could investigate relevant sources of visual culture based on student choice – this might include street or graffiti art. Artists such as Otis Frizzell or Banksy are popular and relevant expressions of youth culture. Discussion in class could consider issues of property ownership and artistic license.
- Begin with the biography of artists, especially artists with their beginnings in the local area, even the students at school. Study art from the perspective of the artist (life choices, difficulties, motivations, travel, recognition).
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Last updated June 6, 2012
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