Lataa ilmaiseksi - Taideteollinen korkeakoulu

275
Abstract
The Forbidden Images
A comparative study of the forbidden themes of young
people’s visual expression in Finland and Estonia.
The present research is for a doctoral dissertation addressing the
meanings and special nature of young people’s requested drawings in
a process of research. I focus on a visual entity constructed via research
question. I asked all the participants in the study the same question:
What are the forbidden images of art teaching in school? The entails the
forbidden subjects of art teaching as defined by young people in the
research situation. My approach is constructed with reference to theories
of symbolic and sexual representation. The empirical material of
requested drawings consists of pencil drawings by 186 pupils and
students of the upper-comprehensive and high-school level of the selected
schools from Finland and Estonia, in addition to interviews
with 7 art teachers. The drawings made by the young people in the
research section are of bold and open-minded expression. They tell of
forbidden themes in a partly caricaturistic and provocative manner.
The underlying theory and method the study are based on the following
focuses: the concept of representation in visual expression,
gender differences and their visual representation, and the specific
nature of drawings by young people. In art teaching, discourse and
visual expression can be understood with reference to the concept of
representation. It can be comprehended as presenting an absent object
or concept with the aid of an image or sign (language). As a process,
representation also entails the transformation of an existing
phenomenon through thought processes to be presented to the senses.
Art teaching entails the fact that teachers and their pupils interact
with the aid of various representations employed in culture, e.g.
through symbols and language, and that they react to them. The images
provide a good starting point for studying the views of young
people regarding the forbidden images through their own concepts.