We live in a globalized age of knowledge, yet our comprehension of the world around us remains within a pre-established hierarchy that has remained prevalent through power structures within history, paving the way for confirmation biases through which we choose to view the world today not just in art, but in cultural relevance. If art is an abstract subjective concept which is supposedly absorbed through a different lens by each modern human, then why is it that it is taught through such a binary lens in progressive, public universities by art majors and non-art majors alike?
In this model, introductory Art history classes revisit pre-existing western European art over and over again, while additional content is made available to students under the umbrella of 'Non-Western' art, or through the lens of ethnography, which in a way, strips it of its own identity, giving it a property of otherness. (Dumbadze) Many modern efforts have been made to increase the notion of inclusive representation of art in favor of a globalized economy and world view such as the emergence of biennales; however, due to the historically existing biases of initial art education, such an attempt has not been successful.
To put this into context, the Venice biennale of 2017 for example, although geared towards inclusivity included a 57 percent White artist representation which is not at all representative of the global demographics of art.
In order for art to act as a driver for social change and to become universal in collective human comprehension and compassion, there must be a radical shift in the way in which it is taught and introduced to students. In this globalized education system, students can be given guidelines for discovery rather than instructed on which artists constitute good art. (Levitt) By doing this and perhaps by investing in a diverse portfolio of 'globalized' art historians and instead of art being taught by region and pre-existing history, students are encouraged to learn about the theory and criticism of art-making, and then encouraged to identify and present their own library of artists rather than merely being exposed to a mostly roman, euro-centric lens and pre-existing biases. perhaps if we take our diverse thought processes into account, we would stop looking at the vast world of art and the world as a whole, through a binary lens.
References
Levitt, Peggy and Markella B. Rutherford. 2019. "Beyond the West: Barriers to Globalizing Art History." Art History Pedagogy & Practice 4, (1). https://academicworks.cuny.edu/ahpp/vol4/iss1/2
Dumbadze, Alexander Blair, and Hudson, Suzanne Perling. Contemporary Art : 1989 to the Present / Edited by Alexander Dumbadze and Suzanne Hudson. 2013. Print.
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