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Henry Schaefer-Simmer was a German-born art educator who was best known for his 1948 book, The Unfolding of Artistic Activity, documenting his work with lay artists in support of his conviction that every person is born with an innate capacity for artistic development.
Biography
editEarly Life and Career in Germany
editHenry Walter Schaefer was born in Haan, Germany, the youngest of 11 children of Rosalie and Alfred Schaefer. He initially attended teacher college in deference to his father's wishes, but after his father died, he was able to study fine arts and art education for two years at Dusseldorf Academy. After serving briefly as an artillery man for the German army in World War 1[1] , he settled in Simmern, a small town near Cologne, to pursue his painting while supporting himself by teaching art (p 13). [1] To distinguish himself from another local painter with the same birth name, he amended his last name with -Simmern. [1] Schaefer-Simmern joined Das Junge Rheinland, a young artists’ association whose members included Otto Dix and Max_Ernst,[1] and began to gain some recognition as an Expressionist painter (Berta, p262). He held his first one-man show in Dusseldorf in 1922[1] and went on to participate in exhibitions in Berlin, Munich, and other German metropolitan centers. (p13).[1]
Schaefer-Simmern had found found the instructional methods in Dusseldorf excessively directive and uninspiring, citing the low point as an assignment to draw a wad of crumpled newspaper(262-263 Berta.) Setting aside methods of copying and life drawing, he encouraged his own students' to draw subjects that appealed to them and to work out visual problems in their own way. As his students progressed i, Schaefer-Simmern was struck by similarities between their work and that of untutored adult “folk” artists (p 13). In 1926, his students' work came to the German commissioner of art education, who arranged to have some of it exhibited in Berlin. (p 13)
In 1926, (Ray Berta, p 262) Schaefer -Simmern Began working in Frankfurt at the Musterschule, or Model School, one of many such schools established in Germany after WWI, where he continued to develop his approach to teaching art [1] (p 13) and was promoted to director of art instruction. (Berta, 262)
In 1928, the newspaper Frankfurter Zeitung sent Schaefer-Simmern to Prague to report on the International Congress of Art Education, where he was strongly impressed by the theories of Gustaf Britsch and the work of Viennese art educator Franz Cizek.[1](p 13) , whose children's program set aside copying, tracing and other formal instruction and letting them explore their own ideas through various media. Cizek's aim, according to a former student, was "not directed at all to creating artists, but, rather, to unfolding of the artistic personality of each individual." http://meredithsabbatical.blogspot.com/2010/03/franz-cizek-liberating-child-artist.html
In 1929, Schaefer-Simmern established a night school of art for laymen and unemployed workers in Frankfurt (Berta, p 262?), and in 1930, he launched a radio program for children called, "Who paints the most beautiful picture?" During the show, which was broadcast from Frankfurt seven days per week, he described a scene and encouraged the children to draw the picture from their own imaginations, after which their parents were invited to to mail in the results.
Schaefer-Simmern’s work as an art education began to earn recognition through an exhibition of his students’ work by the American Federation of Art in Washington, DC. The exhibit, called “New Ways of Art Education in Germany”, travelled to Boston, New York and Chicago.[1] (p 13).
After his promotion to director of graduate art education State Teachers College for Higher Education.[2] Schaefer-Simmern came under scrutiny for his opposition to the Nazi regime, Schaefer-Simmern opposed the Nazi regime and resisted what he saw as a perversion of art for political purposes Berta p 138. In April 7, 1933, Schaefer-Simmern refused to join the Nazi teacher’s Association and was banned from all leadership and teaching roles for being “politically unreliable”. 262 Berta His children’s radio broadcast was shut down. (Berta dates?)
United States
editIn 1937, Schaefer-Simmern fled Germany and arrived in the United States, where he had established some academic connections.[1] (p. 13) He taught himself English by listening to native speakers on the street and through the process of translating a book, John Dewey's Art as Experience...[1][3] In the same year, the Nierendorf Gallery arranged an exhibit of his work, and he was appointed as a guest lecturer at Cleveland Museum’s Department of Education.[1]
In 1939, Schaefer-Simmern received funding from the Russell_Sage_Foundationto evaluate his teaching approach with lay artists including intellectually disabled youth at Southbury Training School; delinquent boys at the New York City Reformatory; recent immigrants to the United States; and business and professional people. (Schaefer-Simmern, Henry. The unfolding of artistic activity. Its basis, processes, and implications. With a foreword by John Dewey. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1961.) The results of this project, which built upon Schaefer-Simmern's earlier work with unemployed workers in Frankfurt (Berta p 262), was documented in his book, "The Unfolding of Artistic Activity: Its Basis, Processes, and Implications", published by University of California Press in 1948. (Schaefer-Simmern, Henry. The unfolding of artistic activity. Its basis, processes, and implications. With a foreword by John Dewey. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1961.Preface, p xi).[4] The book appealed to the general public as well as to academic researchers and was reprinted four times and translated into German, Japanese and Russian.[1] ( p. 13) The most celebrated of Schaefer-Simmern's research subjects was Selma, a girl at Southbury Training School who had been assessed with the lowest I.Q. of all the participants and had a history of severe abuse and neglect. According to the institution's chief psychologist Seymour Sarason, Selma's behavior was marked by "fearfulness, marked introversion, impulsiveness", with signs of frequent hallucinations, and she was only allowed "the most routine and simple tasks, which she would complete only close supervision." Sarason observed that as Selma's artwork developed, she became markedly confident, happier, and more outgoing.
Schaefer-Simmern began teaching as a guest lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley in the fall of 1945[2] and remained there for four years, while also holding weekly classes for superintendents and teachers of art education in Bay Area schools.[2] In 1949, he founded his Institute of Art Education in Berkeley, where he conducted classes six days a week[1] in addition to weekly classes in San Francisco at the Jewish Community Center.[1] The Institute was in operation until 1971.[1] He also lectured at universities throughout the United States. He later taught at St. Mary's College of CaliforniaSt. Mary's College of California, which granted him an honorary doctorate in 1975.[1] After his retirement, he worked on his final book, which was completed after his death by his wife and a former student.
Theory
editHenry Schaefer-Simmern's approach to art education was based on the theories of Gustav Britsch, who held that with human beings are born with an innate ability to create artistic form, and that if this capacity is nurtured without interfering in the process, the simple yet harmonious configurations of shapes and lines seen in the art of children and untutored adults will evolve into increasingly complex and sophisticated works of art, . (Abrahamson) Schaefer Simmern further maintained that the process of self-critique, discovery, and trial and error involved in this striving creates, "Form forms" . . They exist not only in the art of children, adolescents, and adults in whom visual conceiving is functioning but also in many works of folk art, aboriginal art, historic art, and prehistoric art. However, cultural influences may not always encourage the creation of Gestalt, artistic forms. Indeed, a culture may suppress such forms and the inherent mental process of visual, artistic conceiving.
editContributions
editHenry Schaefer-Simmern was a strong influence on Seymour Sarason who worked with Schaefer-Simmern at Southbury Training Institution in the 1940's and was a pioneer in the field of Community Psychology.
Students of Henry Schaefer-Simmern
editSylvia Fein Wayne Anderson Clement Renzi Eleanor Arbeit
Gustaf Adolf Britsch (11 August 1879 – 27 October 1923) was an early 20th-century German art theorist and the founder of Gustaf Britsch Institute in Starnberg, Germany.
External Links
editChildren's Museum of the Arts New York. "The Henry Schaefer-Simmern Collection is a set of 155 paintings and drawings created between the 1930s and 70s by children ages 3-15 in Germany, Switzerland, Holland, and the United States. The artwork was originally collected by art educator Henry Schaefer-Simmern in order to illustrate his theories on art education for children in his book "The Unfolding of Artistic Activity" (1948)."
Smithsonian Archives of American Art. Roy E. Abrahamason papers relating to Henry Schaefer-Simmern, 1951-1985 Roy E. Abrahamason papers relating to Henry Schaefer-Simmern, 1951-1985
References
edit- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Abrahamson, Roy E. (December 1980). "Henry Schaefer-Simmern: His Life and Works". Art Education. 33 (8): 12–16. doi:10.2307/3192404. JSTOR 3192404.
- ^ a b c The Oakland Tribune. Hitler purgee to take post at U.C. August 15, 1945.
- ^ Dewey, John. Art as experience. New York: The Berkeley Publishing Group (1934)
- ^ Schaefer-Simmern, Henry (1961). The Unfolding of Artistic Activity: Its Basis, Processes, and Implications. University of California Press. ISBN 0520011414.
Bibliography
editBerta, Raymond C. His figure and his ground: An art educational biography of Henry Schaefer-Simmern. (Volumes I and II) Stanford University, 1994 (UMI 300 N. Zeeb Rd. Ann Arbor, MI48106)
Fein, Sylvia. Heidi's Horse Pleasant Hill (1976): Exelrod Press
Die Gestalt (magazine). Herrmann, H. (ed.) Ratingen, Germany: Aloys Henn Verlag.
Seymour_SarasonSarason, Seymour. The Challenge of Art to Psychology. New Haven (1990): Yale University Press.
Schaefer-Simmern, Henry. The unfolding of artistic activity. Its basis, processes, and implications. With a foreword by John Dewey. Berkeley (1948): University of California Press.