China: Art education goes online

China/Junio de 2017/Fuente: The Nation

Resumen: El reciente lanzamiento de la L-Art University en China promete dar acceso a personas a cursos impartidos por profesores de todo el mundo. L-Art University se puso en marcha el 20 de mayo para ofrecer capacitación a profesionales del arte y la cultura. También atiende a los amantes del arte y coleccionistas que visitan regularmente museos. Cualquier persona interesada puede inscribirse y seguir un curso en el sitio web de la universidad, LArt.org, o descargar su aplicación. Se ofrecen 10 cursos, incluyendo animación 3D, cine, diseño de exposiciones, arte europeo del siglo XX y gestión de museos.

The recent launch of the online L-Art University in China promises to give people access to courses taught by lecturers around the world.

L-Art University went live on May 20 to provide training to professionals in art and culture. It also caters to art lovers and collectors who regularly visit museums.

Anyone interested can register for and follow a course at the university’s website, LArt.org, or download its app.

On offer are 10 courses, including 3D animation, filmmaking, exhibition design, 20th-century European art and museum management.

Young people take art courses offered by LArt University, a new online-education institute, taught by lecturers around the world. Photo/China Daily

Each course involves seven to 14 classes, each of which is a 30-minute video uploaded weekly. The course prices start at a few hundred yuan.

The lecturers – in Hong Kong, Paris, London and Los Angeles – are experienced teachers at art schools. Some are also artists.

The curriculum is to be enriched as more courses on design, architecture and the art market are composed, filmed and produced.

About 180 courses will be available by the end of 2018, says Lyu Peng, the art historian who heads L-Art University.

Lyu, who teaches a 12-session course on the history of modern Chinese art, says more lecturers teaching in art schools in Germany, Italy, Spain and Russia are expected to join the institute’s faculty soon.

“The curriculum zooms in on various elements of the art world – how an artwork is produced, consumed, marketed and collected,” says Lyu. “We’re trying to build a knowledge repository of how the art world operates.”

The courses are filmed in the cities where the lecturers are based and feature local scenes to give students a more holistic learning experience.

One of the lecturers, Paul Gladston, a professor at the University of Nottingham in England, taped his courses on contemporary visual culture and critical theory earlier this year.

The videos shot in London show viewers the city’s street art and architecture.

“What I teach is theoretically difficult,” says Gladton, “so I hope to encourage students to think about interesting ideas and how one film connects to another. We do that by making them cool and visually engaging, and London is an extraordinary place.”

This is Gladston’s first experience teaching online and he finds the video-making process “very hard” but “very rewarding”.

Not only does it force him to think about how to say things in a way that people can understand, but it also makes him reflect on his teaching methods.

“Young students today are so used to consuming things online,” he says. “So the filming process makes me think about how to restructure the information and communicate.”

Frank Vigneron, who lectures on Western art theory and philosophy, says a truly globalised education spreads the “voice” of art to every corner of the world and “make it louder”.

Fuente: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/news/life/art_culture/30318254