That's another dilemma. Does one learn to use the "tools" independently of an idea for their use? I mean does one have an idea and then learn how to find and use the tools to manifest it. Some say absolutely yes. The other view is that the tools, and using them passively, without any particular purpose in mind, will soon evoke ideas for their use. If you give a student a chisel and a piece of wood and say, "do something interesting", it's most likely that the beginning student will try to make something already modelled, following a typical image (visual culture will provide the models). If the competition is high among students, the better ones will be more creative, or maybe just more technically adept. But if you say the job is to create an image of water, and do it with this chisel and block of wood, isn't the challenge different, to use the tools differently than one might have...to make something solid and static seem liquid and mobile? And the peculiar demand would challenge the student to pay very close attention to the tools and how to manipulate them, developing a sensitivity to them as well as to forming a visual idea.
I don't have an answer. Both ways have value. But when? And for whom? WC
