The group of six articles in this volume explore the theme “invisible in plain sight.” The authors examine the structures that enable or disable cultural visibility. They question: Who creates the visions of the world? Whose views are pre-empted

Keifer-Boyd, Karen T.

VCU Scholars Compass

1           Terry Barrett, Ohio State University, Columbus, OHDoug Blandy, University of Oregon, Eugene, ORPaul Bolin, Penn State University, University Park, PAKristin Congdon, University of Central Florida, Orlando, FLElizabeth Delacruz, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, ILPaul Duncum, Central Queensland University, AustraliaMike Emme, Central Washington University, Ellensburg, WAElizabeth Garber, University of Arizonia, Tucson, AZYvonne Gaudelius, Penn State University, University Park, PARobin Germany, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, TXOlivia Gude, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, ILKaren Hamblen, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LALaurie Hicks, University of Maine, Orono, MEConnie Landis, Eastern Montana University-Billings, Billings, MTKenneth Marantz, The Ohio State University (Emeritus), Columbus, OHDan Nadaner, California State University, Fresno, CA Ron Neperud, University of Wisconsin-Madison (Emeritus), Madison, WIRobert Saunders, former Connecticut State Art ConsultantDeborah Smith-Shank, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, ILMary Ann Stankiewicz, Independent Scholar & Consultant, Sarasota, FL Patricia Stuhr, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OHChristine Thompson, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, ILCharles Wieder, Southern Connecticut State University, New Haven, CTMary Wyrick, Buffalo State College, Buffalo, NY The Journal of Social Theory  in Art Education    EditorKaren T. Keifer-Boyd Texas Tech UniversityErnest C. BoydRoy PearsonEd CheckKaren Keifer-BoydGayle M. WeitzConnie M. LandisKenneth MarantzDrea HowensteinGayle M. WeitzArthur Guagliumi & Robert SaundersEditorial Consultant Book Review EditorCaucus CoordinatorCoordinator ElectPast-CoordinatorTreasurerNewsletter EditorColumnistDelegate ArchivistsREVIEWERS 2    The Journal of Social Theory in Art Education (JSTAE) is a publication of the Caucus on Social Theory & Art Education (CSTAE), an affiliate of the National Art Education Association. Its editorial policy is in compliance with the CSTAE's constitutional mandate:to promote the use of theoretical concepts from the social sciences—which include, but are not limited to, anthropology, sociology, and political science—to study visual culture and the teaching of art; to inform art educators about theory and practice in the social sciences, thus acting as a liaison between social scientists and art educators; to encourage research into the social context of visual culture and teaching art; and to develop socially relevant programs for use in the teaching of art.The theme for volume 18 will be Community-Based Art Education. October 15, 1997 is the deadline for submission of articles, images, and reviews of books, video/films, performance/action pieces, and exhibitions. Images and visual research may be submitted. Membership is not a precondition for submittance. Please send black and white or color images no larger than 8" x 10" in either photographic, original, digital, or slide form. Original manuscripts, including an abstract, should be prepared according to the APA (4th ed.) style. Please place your name on a separate paper to help facilitate anonymous review. Please send images and/or four paper copies to:jan jagodzinski341 Education SouthDepartment of Secondary EducationUniversity of AlbertaEdmonton, Canada T6G 2G5© Copyright by the JSTAE 1997JSTAE 17 has been published through support from Texas Tech University. The Journal of Social Theory in Art Education is a benefit of membership in the Caucus on Social Theory & Art Education. Membership in the Caucus is $20.00 U.S. The journal is published annually. Individual copies of JSTAE are $20.00 U.S./$25 Library(add $5 for outside of U.S.)               ISSN 1057-0292          Subscription Rates:Connie Landis, Treasurer 3200 Wendimere LaneBillings, MT  59102-6536Karen Keifer-BoydTexas Tech UniversityArt Dept., Box 42081Lubbock, TX, 79409-2081KarenKB@ttu.eduKen Marantz2056 Middlesex Rd.Columbus, OH,43220-4642 Newsletter contributions should be sent to: CSTAE Website contributions should be sent on disk or via email to:Inquiries concerning membership and past issues should be ad-dressed to:3Contents              JSTAE    Number 17   19975    Editorial                                   10    Photography(s) and Cultural Invisibility: Symptoms and Strategies23   Televised Gender Roles in Children's Media: Covert Messages40   Living the Discourses71   Art, Education, and the Bomb: Reflections on an International Children's Peace Mural Project98   A Mountain Cultural Curriculum: Telling Our Story117 The Perception of Non-Perception: Lessons for Art Education with Downcast Eyes (Part One: Trompe-L'Oeil and the Question of Radical Evil)Karen T. Keifer-BoydMichael J. EmmeGaye Leigh Green  Ed Check, Grace Deniston, & Dipti Desai Tom AndersonChristine Ballengee Morrisjan jagodzinski4    See pages 144 - 146 for artists' statements concerning their artwork.      Prisoners            1996           By: Robert Bersson(Front top) Mixed Media, 8.5" wide x 17" heightVessels of Reciprocity            1996           By: Drea Howenstein(Front bottom) Sassafras prunings & boats, 55' high x 35' oval x 15' heightGlobal Unity/Peace Angels            1996           By: Kim Finley-Stansbury(Back) Digital IRIS print of mixed media (oil pastels, graphite, & colored pencils) collage,     7" wide x 9.75" heightOn The CoverON THE COVER144 Vessels of  Reciprocity Prisoners            Global Unity/Peace AngelsBOOK REVIEWYvonne Gaudelius 141 Cahan, Susan & Kocur, Zoya (Eds.). (1996). Contemporary Art and Multicultural EducationCONTRIBUTORS147 Drea HowensteinRobert BerssonKim Finley-Stansbury 5EditorialKaren T. Keifer-BoydThe group of six articles in this volume explore the theme “invisible in plain sight.” The authors examine the structures that enable or disable cultural visibility. They question: Who creates the visions of the world? Whose  views are pre-empted?Emme argues that cultural invisibility happens to anyone who does not contribute images to the world or who does not vigorously critique pictures. He discusses the photographic work of Jo Spence and Judith Golden who expose the invisibility of those considered plain (i.e., old and female). “Invisibility in plain sight” in some instances may concern perceptions and biases against plainness. My recent professional sojourn from my former home beneath the canopy of Douglas Fir in the forests of the Northwest to the open plains of West Texas, has made me acutely aware of how one's invisibility or visibility within one's environment affects one's culture. The canopy of the Northwest blocks the sun, and I have discovered, frightens some people who are accustomed to a “plain”view. The trees and mountains hide what lies beyond or beneath them, and the people who inhabit these private spaces are the most xenophobic and reticent people that I have ever encountered. In West Texas there is no place to hide. The open expanse and plain terrain exposes everything and everyone to open scrutiny. Name places reflect Invisible in Plain Sight6    this, with towns such as Plainview. These people who live in plain view are the most open and friendly that I have met. Several authors, in this volume, ask readers to re-examine institutionalized structures that devalue the aesthetics of “plain” folk in other respects. Morris concurs with Emme in her study of developing  and implementing a six- week curriculum that exposed denigrating Appalachian Mountain Culture stereotypes and supplanted them with images that children created after they had investigated their West Virginia Mountain Cultural history of oppression and rebellion. Morris’s article will be useful reading in undergraduate pre-service curriculum courses as an example of social reconstruction pedagogy. It utilizes both Sleeter (1989) and Banks’ (1993) conceptions of multicultural education as foundations for developing curriculum. The issues that Deniston, Desai, and Check raise encourage us to re-evaluate notions of excellence, racism, and histories and compliment Morris’ article on social reconstructive pedagogy.   In Living the Discourses, Deniston, Desai, and Check explore the invisibility of elderly women’s art due to an aesthetic preference for originality.  They also discuss racism as an institutionalized system, and the invisibility of discourse concerning homosexual worldviews embedded in gay and lesbian art.  Cultural, political, and economic systems elevate some images above others. Deniston criticizes the perpetuation of value systems that esteem orginality and denigrate the handwork of elderly women. Desai recognizes the invisibility of racism since literary sources and discourse often equate racism with stereotyping, prejudice, and ethnicity.  Desai disagrees with these definitions and concludes that racism is a socio-cultural construct rooted in historical events. She argues that racism is institutionalized to such a degree that without careful scrutiny it becomes accepted practice due to its invisibility. Check posits that most histories of art exclude certain types of life experiences in their portrayals of art.  He provides examples of the invisibility of gay and lesbian perspectives. He argues that the specific vision of the world by a gay artist may provide an understanding of the individual artist’s intent, as well as an analysis of humanity’s interwoven similarities and differences.    Anderson finds that social change may be evident in the absence of an image. He discusses how the murals that Japanese and North American children painted fifty years after the bombing of Hiroshima 7and Nagasaki do not depict “the bomb,” but he argues that “the bomb” pervades the murals. Perhaps the events of Chernobyl and Three Mile Island make the threat of nuclear power plant accidents far more real to children than nuclear weapons. However, when I showed prints of the two murals (reproduced in this journal) to my husband and asked him to guess which one the children from the United States had painted, his reading of the images indicated that the invisible “bomb” was clearly present. In the United States children’s mural, North American children are flying over the Pacific with gifts. This seemed to him a re-enactment of the bombing sortie itself. The mural includes a setting sun over Japan, and this seemed like a reference to the bombing as well. In the early days of atomic power, nuclear fission was often referred to as “unleashing the power of the sun.” Of course none of the participants intended that the mural’s peace flights were analagous to a destructive bombing strike. But the viewer who juxtaposes the mural’s imagery with the events at Hiroshima and Nagasaki can readily visualize the invisible bombs in the image of children flying over the Pacific in formation. Although Anderson discusses the “copy cat” aspect of the Japanese children’s imagery, it seems that the inspiration derived from Faith Ringold’s Tar Beach and her quilt motif is a similar form of selective imitation. Anderson and his Japanese colleagues also found similarities between themselves as they tried to define their differences. In order to analyze how cartoons present the female gender Green surveyed television toons that pre-school children watch.  She finds that the infant, shrew, eccentric, maternal, frump, vamp, and twin dominate as role models and she argues that these stereotypes limit children from imagining other possibilities. Invisible are female roles of intelligence and self-assertion. When a character, such as The Little Mermaid, does seem intelligent and inventive, she also tends to typify the Madison Avenue/Playboy image of beauty. The repertoire of female characters seems to have become, like our congress, more conservative. During the early 1980s characters such as Punkie Brewster, very plain but very assertive and in control, began to appear in cartoons for young children. According to Green, however, TV toons seem to have reverted to stereotypical representations of females. Green cites research that posits that children do not easily distinguish between reality and fantasy.  Thus television portrayals may severely limit conceptions of possibilities for females in the real world.  jagodzinski in his article, Perception of Non-Perception, argues that 8    illusion is the separation between belief and knowledge.   Trompe l’oeil works by delaying knowledge so that belief supersedes. He presents five lessons in his article. The first two lessons concern trompe l’oeil, as symbolically holding both a power to deceive and to make us feel whole. These lessons concern the public’s high regard and need for art that presents believable illusions. jagodzinski examines the psychological foundations of this need. The last three lessons build upon the first two but emphasize illusionism, film, and aesthetics in relationship to morality. The journal concludes with a book review and On the Cover which presents stories by the three artists featured on the cover of this journal. In Vessels of Reciprocity Drea Howenstein rededicates Herr's Island to life by commemorating the spirits of the animals that were once killed and prepared for consumption on this island. The second story by Bob Bersson concerns the invisibility and visibility of prisoners. The final story by Kim Finley-Stansbury involves visions of unity through a cross-cultural art exchange. Together, the eight authors and three artists in this volume make visible the invisible.Hopefully you will find connections or contradictions to your own beliefs as you read volume 17. Write your comments or visually respond as you read this journal and send these to KarenKB@ttu.edu so that I can place them on a Caucus for Social Theory in Art Education (CSTAE) Website. Send an email in the fall of 1997 to find out the URL website address. I plan to initiate monthly real-time virtual chats using either a WebBoard or virtual site as well as place the text and images sent by CSTAE members in the website. 9ReferencesBanks, J. A. (1993). Multicultural eucation: Development, dimensions, and challnegess. Phi Delta Kappa, 74(1), 22-28.    Sleeter, C. E. (1989). Multicultural education as a form of resistance to oppression. Journal of Education, 171(3), 51-71.

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