Life with visuals

“Art makes questions” - John Maeda. John Maeda, in this Ted talk, discusses the development of art and the link between art design, technology and leadership. What struck me, in this very interesting piece, was that the art was not pushed to the sidelines, the aesthetic extra that makes the final piece pretty, but has no substance. In this piece art was firmly a central role in development and leadership “because in many senses, a regular leader loves to avoid mistakes. Someone who’s creative actually loves to learn from mistakes”.https://www.ted.com/talks/john_maeda_how_art_technology_and_design_inform_creative_leaders/transcript?language=enIt seems to me that visual media was seen in the same way. It was seen as the aesthetic extra, not a central part of technological development and information dissemination. I know that when I was at school we did not analysis visual images, they were just the extra that complimented the written words. I was lucky enough to go to university where I studied Media, which included many units on the “reading” and analysing of visual images. I know it opened my mind. I no longer saw the newspaper image as a picture to support the text. I saw it as a text of it’s own, with meaning, power and connotations. Once you start to “read” you can’t stop and you look at films, adverts and visual art and start to analyse the choice of image, colour, font, words. It was not the teaching that was revolutionary, it was having someone make you open your eyes and analysis the images around you. This changed how I interacted with images and how I view their importance.I am now lucky enough to teach MYP Design, where we concentrate on visual media for some of the units, namely Image Manipulation, Product Development, Film and Advert creation. For these units we engage pupils in discussions about visual media; What does it “say”? What methods have been used? How is it being used to manipulate you?  Again it is not about “teaching” rather it’s an open and honest discussion about the images that they are looking at. We all read these images differently and through open discussion and debate interesting ideas are discovered, I learn as much from my pupils as they from me. In this respect I was very interested in the Jones piece on visual hierarchy. The ideas and concepts written here are ones that I currently discuss , however I think this written piece explains it beautifully and I will be referencing it in my future lessons. I particularly love the line “...most people are inherently visual thinkers, not data processors.” as it encapsulates how I see images and our interactions with them.As an aside: I took this image in Ireland firstly because it is a beautiful place (more so when it is less foggy) but also because it was used in the film Leap Year (not a film I would recommend) however I wanted to compare the actual sight to the changes added through CGI. Have a look at the  film images and see what you think. It becomes harder to "read" images when the lines between fact and fiction are blurred.The problem that I face however, is not the lack of opportunity to discuss visual media. My problem is that the pupils do not seem to transfer this knowledge. I know for example that they work on these skills in their English class. However, when we begin this unit it as if they have never discussed visual media before. They discuss and analyse images and the potential meanings, however they give little consideration to the images they post and share. For me the largest hurdle is to ensure that the work they do in class if taken and used across all aspects of their life. It is  a big dream, but one I think it is vital to engage with.As the Technology Coach at the school I hope to put together a series of short workshops on various aspects of “Digital Life” - I have not thought a good umbrella name yet so this will do for now! One of those sessions would be on visual media, both in their own spheres and in a global context, I think the Dove v’s Greenpeace videos would be an excellent starting point for the global discussions.Now my challenge for this series of Blogs, to try and make my blog more appealing. To be honest this will be very hard for me as I am a “bish bash bosh” person, however, PD is about development, so why not start looking at myself now!