| From
the September/October 2008 issue of The Horn Book Magazine
Stories Out
of School
Teaching Art in America
by Peter Sis
I grew up in the country of Czechoslovakia, which
doesn't exist anymore. Because of my creative bent as a child, I
became an art student, first at the High School of Applied Arts
and then at the Academy of Applied Arts. Czechoslovakia was a Communist
country then, but art education had a long tradition, and we were
taught in much the same way young artists were taught all over Europe.
Art students lived and suffered for art. The creative process was
not expected to be easy but in fact a sort of sacrifice or torture.
Most artists were creating in pain, working all night long, drinking
cheap red wine, smoking black tobacco, and borrowing money to buy
paints or clay. Art students did not sleep, eat, or wash; male artists
tried to grow beards...
Art students were ready to give their lives for
ART. This is what I grew up with...and then, in 1982, I came to
the United States. My film career in Hollywood did not take off,
and I was lost. What to do? I was offered a job as a teacher of
illustration at what was then the Otis Art Institute of Parsons
School of Design in Los Angeles. Every Saturday morning, as advertised,
the "internationally acclaimed illustrator Peter Sís"
would teach the ART of illustration. Please understand — I
knew nothing about America; California; the notion of taking courses
for "self-improvement"; or, most of all, actually paying
for education. I never paid for any of my education.
I was lucky: twenty-seven students signed up for
my class. We met and introduced ourselves, and I did not focus on
the fact that most of them had full-time jobs, or the fact that
my Saturday class was their doorway to self-improvement. Instead
of concentrating on the way my students drew or painted, I wanted
them to demonstrate to me that they were prepared to sacrifice everything
for ART. For example, I would not give them their homework assignments
in a timely fashion as they requested. I would give them their homework
the day before it was due — so they would have to stay up
all night. This did not go well. They complained. "This is
California, man," they said. After just a few weeks I lost
two-thirds of my class. They complained to the school. I was terminated.
That was a long time ago. While I still suffer
for my art (from time to time — old habits die hard), I believe
that if you can do something with ease during the daytime, it's
much better. It is also better that I not teach again.
Peter
Sis's latest book is The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron
Curtain (Foster/Farrar).
|
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From the September/October
2008 issue of The Horn Book Magazine
More Peter Sis
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