The "Quality" of Child Art

I often hear concerns about the "quality" of student artwork in TAB classrooms. Just today, a student turned in a piece (below) that I think perfectly highlights the difference in quality between "show-ready" products of project-based art rooms and the work that comes from process-based TAB rooms.

Before reading beyond this paragraph, I recommend first looking closely at the photo of the student's work. Allow yourself to have an honest first opinion: what do you assume or think of it?

Once you have done that, read the student's artist statement (copied and pasted below).

"I made my piece “Wrinkled” because I wanted to make the piece a metaphor for what's happening to the world. My piece started out as a perfect sheet of smooth, silver foil. That’s the world before the pandemic. I crumpled the foil into a ball. That’s the world when we went into our houses and didn’t really leave. Next, I flattened it out again. That is us becoming more familiar with the situation, and finding out ways to adapt to the situation. It was left all wrinkled, and it was ripped, and a large part of the corner just fell off while I was flattening it. That’s the world recovering from all the bad things that have happened. I also colored some of the wrinkled sections with different colors, purple, red, orange, and yellow. Those colors represent the vaccines coming out, people being vaccinated. In the end, my piece was still the same piece of foil, but it wasn’t the same. No matter how hard we try we will never be able to fully erase the wrinkles and lines left by me crumpling my foil. But the crumpled foil is beautiful even if it isn’t the same."

The ideas, process, symbolism, and execution as evidenced in this student's artist statement leave no question that this is a quality artwork. For me, THIS is what quality looks like in art education. It is unconventional but powerful, and worth fighting for. This is why I am a TAB educator.