Visual cultural studies and its discontents

pp. 93-108

in: Jan Jagodzinski, Visual art and education in an era of designer capitalism, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2010

Abstract

In relation to all that has been said regarding designer capitalism, the general concern to be examined here is the impact of visual cultural studies (VCS) within its confines, especially in relation to its viability for art education. There is a general agreement among members of the International Art Education Association (INSEA) and the National Art Education Association (NAEA) that visual cultural education should provide a way to respond to designer capitalism by becoming critical of its impact. It should, for all intensive purposes, begin to replace the traditional teaching of studio art in public schools, as we have known it, or at least form one large segment of its curriculum. By visual culture, I am referring mostly to advertising, issues of representation on television and in film, and the screen culture that comes our way via the Internet, cell phone imaging, and, perhaps, satellite imaging (see Parks 2005).