Art Awareness Week (Proposal)

“Exhibiting Passion Represents Everyone’s Skills”

Proposal for an Art Awareness Week

The XPRES student organization is a group composed of University of Memphis students, and founded on the values of freedom of speech and expression of character. The XPRES student organization proposes an Art Awareness Week to specifically recognize various aspects of art beyond what is commonly accepted, and change the way art is generally perceived among the campus community.

Problem         

When the word “art” is Googled, the first ten pages of results at the least, mention nothing but art institutions, art programs, graphics, paintings, etc. all referencing to what the XPRES student organization chooses to label as typical arts. Society only acknowledges a vague portion of the substance of the word art such as those briefly mentioned in the above statement, generally because most people are not aware of the capacity of art’s essence. For example: most skills and characteristics such as academics and athleticism are unrecognized as art by some people and essentially are not categorized as such.  Most people commonly assume that art has nothing to do with them, simply because they assume that art is only limited to painting, drawing, music, and dancing, etc.

Solution

Through excessive exposure to art beyond what is typically assumed, the XPRES student organization can significantly raise art awareness among the campus community. XPRES will accomplish this by hosting Art Awareness Week. Art Awareness Week will be a week strictly dedicated to exhibiting multiple aspects of art; most exhibits will consist of arts that are uncommon among general art forms, such as academics and abstract hobbies. During this week, there will be workshops for those who wish to develop various artistic capabilities, those who wish to obtain new abilities and seminars for those who do not fully recognize the artist submerged with-in them. These seminars and workshops will attempt to present art to the campus community in a whole new perspective by encouraging each individual to critically examine themself and his or her capabilities. In doing so, this will result in the recognition of art forms that students once possibly considered irrelevant to art, consequently resulting in students acknowledging their abilities as an artist. There will also be events displaying various unconventional forms of art as opposed to general art forms found common among society.

Art is any skill, craft, hobby and so on. These categories vary far beyond the common aspect of art, because they are not limited to the common assumption that follows the mentioning of the word. These categories include things across the spectrum varying from academics all the way to athletics. With all of these arts compacted into a central organization, everyone involved in the group has the opportunity to cross-appropriate: meaning that everyone has the opportunity to borrow characteristics from particular art forms, and use them to enhance their own, truly making any particular skills unique to the individual. Whether any individual person is passionate about a particular hobby or excels in academics or athletics, art’s virtuosity stretches far beyond sculpting, painting, etc. Various aspects of art that exist beyond the common are what XPRES thrives to bring to the forefront of society.

Successfully launching Arts Awareness Week will promote the exposure of art forms beyond the general, encouraging creativity and expression among the campus society. The XPRES student organization hopes that it will initiate a process of self-discovery, leading to self-development and enrich the lives of many.  

Benefits  

According to an internet article by Project for Public Spaces, Inc. art benefits range from everything such as the quality of life and social tourism, down to employment, culture and entertainment. The Travel Industry Association of America conducted a case study on New York City and Oregon back in January of the year 2001, which Project for Public Spaces, Inc. featured in their internet article. A brief portion of the case study’s results state that “Two-thirds (65%) of American adult travelers say they included a cultural, arts, heritage, or historic activity or event while on a trip of 50 miles or more, one-way, in the past year. This equates to 92.7 million cultural travelers (pg.1).” These studies obviously show the potential mass affect art awareness can have on the campus economy, which affects the over-all quality of life, entertainment and culture. If XPRES can successfully launch Art Awareness Week, this could result in more exposure for the campus community and become a tourist attraction. Tourists equal more money flowing through the school, which leads to more business opportunities which results in more jobs for both students and none-students alike. This expresses why it is important for society to grasp the essence of art in its entirety. Art can have a significant impact on society, vitalize an entire city, and bring life to a dying world.  

Conclusion

            If XPRES can encourage people to examine themselves and realize their true capabilities in the arts in both the general form and beyond what is commonly assumed, XPRES will be encouraging the progress of society and self-discovery. Arts Awareness Week will be a time dedicated to exposing people to art at its maximum capacity without isolating bits and pieces of it. We believe that doing this will successfully encourage the progression of the campus community and stimulate not only individual development, but economic success also.   

Short and Misunderstood

Art is a small word, but do not let its size fool you. Although the word is a few syllables short of being taken seriously, its context is vivid and virtually infinitive. Webster’s New World Dictionary specifically defines art as “any craft, trade or profession, or its principles,” “skill; craftsmanship.” Unfortunately, general society fails to realize this. As a group built on the laws of freedom of speech, promoting creativity and primarily expression, we at XPRES strongly desire to change the way art is seen by most individuals and prove that everyone has an art. We will do this by exposing society to the broader aspect of the short three letter word.  

For the typical human being, when the word “art” is mentioned, the first things that come to mind are anything related to a pencil, paint and a masterpiece of some sort. This may not be true for some, but generally art has received a vague persona. It has been accepted as any and/or everything related to graphics, drawing, painting, sculpting, building, and etc. It is true that society admires art of many sorts, such as paintings in art museums, to a wide variety of artistic professions. But, when it comes down to claiming art skills of their own, most deny their abilities. This is basically because they ultimately have a misconception of the term.

Most of society sees elaborate art sculptors, paintings and etc. and automatically assume that they cannot do art simply because they have difficulties painting or drawing, building, dancing and so on. Although these are examples of art, they are only forms of art, all a part of a larger system. The same individual who has difficulties with the common aspect of art may alternatively be an extraordinary mathematician. Math may not be framed and sold for thousands of dollars, but math is indeed a skill, which also requires practice. This alone makes math an art, thus making the mathematician an artist. This does not only apply to math, but an enormous variety of skills and practices as well. Consequently: athletes are artist, scientists are artist, engineers are artists, and linguists are artists and so on. Due to the fact that art is a form of expression, these skills provide a way for numerous individuals to express their unique personality through the passion of their art.

XPRES is all about creativity, unrestricted arts and utilizing these skills to freely exhibit unique individual expression. Even if a particular skill is not what’s common among general art forms, it is yet an art. Combining a wide variety of miscellaneous art forms will help not only those involved in the group, but also society, develop the skill of cross-appropriation. With all of these arts compacted into a central area, everyone involved in the group has the opportunity to borrow characteristics from particular art forms, and use them to enhance their own, truly making the skill unique to the individual. This develops self-character and exposes society to art beyond what is commonly assumed by most. This is how XPRES will make a revolutionary change.

Change amongst society will not necessarily be immediate, but will gradually take its course. As XPRES emerges into the mainstream, so will its system of expression; resulting in the recognition of arts surpassing everything that is common to the subject. This uncommon group will ignite a revolution and establish an uncommon law counteracting a common assumption. XPRES will attract a larger group of people by exposing civilians to a new aspect of art. Those who weren’t originally interested in the common art, may now take interest in being that athletic or scientific artist and etc.  The word art may remain short and brief when spoken, but its essence is too large to be contained. Art will no longer be misunderstood, but respected as it should be.