Art teaching and development of visual reading: use of textile printing in high school¹

Abstract

The present study is based on the importance of the process of reading and analyzing artistic and textile visual works for the comprehensive development of students. Our procedures were firstly based on the conceptual framework proposed by Abigail Housen, which states that the process of reading visual languages involve basic development stages, namely narrative, constructive, classifying, interpretative, and re-creative – where the latter indicates the student has acquired and consolidated skills of conscious reading. This framework was combined with the triangular approach developed by Ana M. Barbosa in terms of the need to contextualize, make, and appraise art works. To make a deeper observation of the aesthetic-artistic process, we analyzed visual readings of artistic and textile prints by students and teachers of art and fashion collected in a school environment from 2014 to 2015 and guided by the basic question: “What do you see in this print?”. Thus, we observed the coherence of Housen’s stages of aesthetic development and the need for Barbosa’s triangulation, but we highlight the need and the didactic-pedagogical importance of developing image reading in the context of visual literacy as a way to promote collective expression, discussion and reflection and as an essential process for the development of aesthetic and artistic learning, which we believe leads students’ awareness of themselves, of others, and of the world - the basis for thinking autonomously. Thus it promotes the student’s development as a critical subject and citizen, as indicated by new literature findings.

Art teaching; Image reading; Aesthetic appraisal; Textile printing; Abigail Housen