What scope is there for sharing the way I work and themes I've been looking at into an educational context, but applied as more formal research? What insight could be gained from doing this that may inform or enhance something in our understanding of how best children learn? How might this inform our understanding of creativity using methodology that is qualitative rather than quantitative?Â
I found this article really helpful to understand what auto ethnographic research might look like:
Art-Based Methodologies (ABR)
• Researchers use art as a tool to
do/make research;
• This involves the research
process itself;
• Active research with participants;
• Research as practice;
• Conducted by researcher or by
creative artists.
• Researchers use art as a product
to represent data;
• Creative visualization of data;
• The focus here is more on a final
product rather than the process;
• This could be done by the
researcher or by an artist for
example
As I think more about how my work fits within a wider context, particularly in relation to working as an artist educator, I wanted to investigate what autoethnography is and what methodoloigies are used in this type of research. I think there's scope for seeing where this could take me in the future and I'd like to keep options open for further research beyond this course.
Not the most beautiful graphic, but....
How can the personal experiences I'm expressing in my work connect with a wider cultural, political or social context? How can looking at archaeological/anthropological and neurological themes translate into further art making that holds enhanced relevance to us today?
Visual autoethnographers use visuals to represent and reflect on potential shared experience with viewers, facilitating commonality while simultaneously providing individual moments of subjective reflection.
I've recently come across this online peer reviewed magasine as I wanted to find out more on autoethnography. https://theautoethnographer.com/about-the-autoethnographer/
Autoethnography is a method of qualitative inquiry that unites autobiography (telling about one’s life) and ethnography (studying culture) by utilizing lived experience as evidence with which to explore cultural phenomena. As such, the researcher is typically the lone participant in an autoethnographic study, recognizing that critical exploration of one’s own experiences can provide cultural insight in a way that quantitative or large scale studies cannot. Similarly, autoethnographers understand that just as critical exploration of culture can illuminate one’s lived experiences as part of that culture, our research and inquiry can shape us just as much as we shape it.
It's interesting to consider that intersection between that which we experience, and how this can contribute to some cultural insight.
Using lived experience to find evidence for a cultural 'phenomenon' one is exploring. What can be defined as a phenomenon in this context?
I've been thinking about the journey of doing this course, and how, in quite an accidental way, it has become such a personal one for me. An auto-ethnographic journey has facilitated the emergence of something of myself and my lived experience. I feel pretty aquatinted with what this has been for me on a personal level, and now I wonder how or in what way this can be utilised as 'evidence' to explore cultural insight. I've been looking a lot at memory and art making within an archaeological or therapeutic context - could this be the cultural insight? Can I bring this even further into an educational context, using my role as educator to strengthen my auto ethnographic practice? Is this the wider context in which my work sits, or might sit in the future?
My research paper was on Ithell Colquhoun and I proposed that her 'automatic' art making was a more than a way for her to connect with the occult and the world beyond. I'm reminded of the conclusion I came to in the paper:
Colquhoun not only challenged the conventions in which art was produced and displayed, but paved her own path at a time when women were often denied artistic opportunity or exposed to sexist evaluations of their work. But her story is less about detachment from a patriarchal group, and more about attachment to a more profound calling. She sought out a deeper relationship with the spirit world and found it in the far reaches of Cornwall. She also found a way, perhaps subconsciously, to harness the spirit within herself, releasing experiences and exposing aspects of herself perhaps long forgotten. With the Latin derivation of the word ‘occult’ describing ‘that which is closed off, secret and hidden away’ (Jenkins, p10), an intriguing connection is made. We all have facets of ourselves that we unearth or suppress to varying degrees, and I suggest that Colquhoun’s automatic and somatic art-making in Cornwall dislodged something of herself held beneath - with her geographical shift a catalyst for this. We are thus reminded how critical ‘place’ is to our sense of belonging, resolution and wholeness. Finally, and considering widely accepted theories on the power of art to heal, I also suggest that there is more to learn from Colquhoun’s methods that could inform this theory further – helping us understand why we make art and what messages we bury within it.Â
Janet's feedback on my paper mentions 'This trajectory could potentially embrace a holistic and interdisciplinary approach, fostering a deeper understanding of the intricate connections between art, occultism, neurobiology, and identity'.
I'd love to explore these links more. It feels like a really exciting way to combine the autobiographical with the ethnographic.
I want to ensure the neurology and archaeology grounding is not forgotten and that the work I do still sits within a wider space. I guess this means not wanting to make my work purely about me (me, me) which I'm pretty adverse to. I want to keep thinking about things like the power of art to heal or restore, the value it holds for children in primary education, the importance of allowing challenging experiences to be processed and allowing oneself to live once again in the present - and how creativity is a vital life force through which to do this. Perhaps there's scope for me doing some more research on this, to find a way to gain more insight for myself but also to others.