The real and virtual landscape : young people's interpretations of everyday spaces through visual art practice

Abstract

Place-based Art Education is a learner-centred pedagogical approach which aims to develop a sense of place among the students. This academic research study has a twofold goal: one is to investigate young people's interpretations of everyday landscapes they inhabit, in order to raise an awareness of their surroundings, and second is to investigate how contemporary living spaces can contribute to art education at a higher education level. A group of art students, studying for their advanced level and attending Higher Secondary School were involved in the study to collect the necessary data. The visual art programme was spread over an entire academic year and consisted of a main project with the theme 'Everyday Landscapes: Places, People and Situations.' Group interviews and questionnaires were then carried out to triangulate data. The following study takes shape into six sections. The Introduction outlines the rationale behind the study and what brought about the interest in researching this particular topic in relation to hands on experience. The Literature Review chapter starts with brief definitions of place and continues to highlight the characteristics of the two major education theories used as framework for this study, namely Placed-based Education and Visual Culture Art Education (VCAF). The Research Methodology chapter gives a clear description of the project and discusses in some detail the methods of data collection.