Us AND Them - by Shawn Sobers
An enquiry into how Art educators negotiate popular approaches to student creativity - A Guide

CONTENTS:

Home - Essay Question and Outline

1. Introduction: The Art of Smoking
-Art today
-Art's growing family

2. Lecturers' Approaches
- On Individuality
- On Clichés
- On Commercialism
- On Criteria
- Summary

3. Students Challenging Tutors
4. Future Challenges
5. Conclusion

References
Bibliography
Self Evaluation

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Media Production lecturer in Higher Education

On: Clichés and the Challenges of Creativity

 
"Anything that starts with an alarm clock going off, I'll question it."


 

Question:
>Are there certain types of work that students present you with, that makes you cringe for whatever reason? Why do you cringe, and how do you deal with it?

Media Lecturer (ML):
>>"The starting point for me in any media communication is how good is the idea, and I put a lot of value by that. A lot of education at this level is about opening people's minds, and encouraging students to be open to all kinds of creative influences. It's not just about imitating what's been done before, like recreating daytime television or making a poor copy of a feature film. That doesn't do anything for me, and more importantly it doesn't do anything for the students. It's not taking them anywhere."

"There are clichés that you just want to avoid. With the students in the documentary module I saw at the beginning, anyone who says skateboarding, or lifts, alarmclocks, legalise cannabis, tattooing, body piercing, they are just clichés. But I'm not saying I just won't allow those things. The best documentary award of last year's degree students went to a student, who I tutored, who did a film about skateboarding. But that's because he was a semipro skateboarder, and he showed me some fantastic video footage that he had taken which went behind the scenes of that world, and he wanted to show how those people risk life and limb just to become a semi-professional skater. It was much more original than just showing a load of skateboarders doing stunts and falling off. Because of his approach it avoided becoming a cliché, but that's not an easy thing to do, and he came out with a really interesting story."

Q:
> So because the student pitched his idea like that - saying he specifically wanted to show the risks of people chasing their ambitions, rather than just saying, 'I want to make a film about skateboarding' - that made all the difference in how you responded?

ML:
>> "Absolutely! Absolutely. It makes all the difference. What he had was a story, but other than that it would have just been a subject. That's just one example. Anything that starts off with an alarm clock going off, I'll question it. The other thing I tend to be very wary of is anything that's so typically derivative of the latest thing. When I interview new students I see lots of videos they made at school that are trying to be remakes of The Matrix, which at this level just doesn't work. They just get let loose with a camera in a car park and it isn't strengthening those young people's skills, ideas or creativity in any way, shape or form."
 
 
 
 
 
        28.

I asked whether he thought music videos and advertising were also problem project ideas, as I know of many media courses which try to steer their students away from those forms, and I admit I relate to this reluctance even though I accept them both as massively creative forms. With music videos I fear that a student might see it as an opportunity to edit random, ill conceived shots together to music, without any real thought about why they've approached it that way. With advertising, unless it is done incredibly well it can come across as a crude, poor imitation, much like The Matrix example highlighted above. I admit that this may be a pessimistic view, to assume that students won't achieve, but to truly allow the students to develop as creative practitioners it is important to set parameters and challenges that will drive them. It is not about assuming the students won't achieve, but rather more about ensuring they do. I wouldn't necessarily ban a student from working in these ways, but I would be very cautious. With this in mind, I was most interested to hear the response.
 

ML:
>>"I think both music videos and advertising have got masses of creative potential within them and I actually find them really interesting media forms. I think advertising should be part of a media syllabus anyway because if you look at the statistics of the daily quality newspapers in this country, the breakdown of revenue would be something like, 30% from sales, 70% advertising. You could say the same for independent television, and for most of the digital broadcasters. You can't ignore it. Beyond that, the 40 second commercial narrative, when it's done well, is a fantastic medium, and you get some of the most interesting, creative work there is. So I have no problem with it whatsoever. I have no problem with hitting students with some of the commercial realities of the media industry."

"I love music videos. I've even made them in my own time before I came to work here. I think there is a certain amount of academic snobbery around music video. Actually, I would quite like to let students do music videos. It would be very popular! But again it would have to be done in a way that was not derivative, there would be big copyright issues, and would have to be done would some very creative parameters around it. Advertising is good because you can put parameters around a brief, so students are working creatively within a very restrictive format. And I actually think you sometimes get better results when you work like that."

Q:
> I agree, but I see the difficulty in music videos at this level could lead to a student just shooting random shots without much thought. If a student wants to do it then I try to say how about thinking about narrative, or an approach which gives it some thought and integrity. What do you think about that?

ML:
>> "Well to a point, but I don't fully buy that argument either because to me it's not just narrative. I hear tutors say, "You can do a music video as long as there's a story in it", and the best videos don't really have stories to them. For me, you can do a music video if its really good and inspiring with creative imagery, that is used in a new and different way. At a professional level, I think music videos contain some of the best imagery around."

"For me, teaching lens-based media is the difference between just recording what's in front of the camera, and actively going out to seek an image. Media education is about creative images and sounds that communicates something, has a unique interpretation, or contains a particular aesthetic."

  

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