Khora, topos and praxis : diverse concepts and meanings of contemporary art education

Abstract

Khôra (meaning space) and topos (meaning place)xviii could be described as concepts with multiple and diverse meanings in which personal, social-cultural, historical, and aesthetic dimensions coexist. It seems that no single theory or conceptualisation could exhaust the diversely rich implication of these concepts, especially in what might inform art education theory and research. This seems to remain the case even when most scholars who have done extensive studies of the concept of place (as being khôra and/or topos) would possibly agree that understanding the multiple meanings of such concepts is key to understanding wider concepts about the world, including: our relationships with ourselves, with each other (across generations, distances, cultures) and with our surroundings.