The Arts, More Than Skills
For Li Feng, head of the Hefeng Arts Foundation, promoting an arts education represents more than just teaching children a new set of skills. “The arts grant people an insight into the best of humanity’s cultural achievements. For those who practice a discipline, the arts improve their work ethic and aesthetic perception. Confidence is boosted, and creativity is fostered. There’s no downside, and the experience of learning lasts a lifetime,” Li said.
“Our Hefeng Arts Foundation is initiating a basic program calling for more attention to arts education. We aim for its promotion and development and to push forward the ‘spiritual progress’ and prosperity of the nation.”
“I have been asked by many people why we lobby for the arts in rural areas, where some people still experience food shortages and other basic livelihood issues. I tell them that the arts could be an elixir to the problems. As Mother Teresa said, people’s lack of hope is the main reason for poverty. The arts can endow the unfortunate with an optimistic attitude, and can fill a society with hope for the future,” Li added.
“Whenever I have time, I rent a minibus and take my city friends to Duancun. I want them to know and understand what I am doing, what my career means.”
Even the parents of children who attend arts classes have had misgivings about the point of it all. Under the program, children get free musical instruments. But their parents worry about other costs of their participating, like metronomes and oil for wind instruments. Some want their children to give up instruments because of such factors. To ease parents’ worries, a committee was set up to take on board their concerns and solve financial issues with support measures.
Teachers from Beijing have tried many methods to arouse the artistic passion of Duancun’s children. In ballet class, for instance, practicing flexibility is always a start, but the dullness and pains it brings always scare children away. Guan Yu, the secretary of the Ballet Dancing Department at the Beijing Dance Academy, introduced children to the rules of ballet etiquette for his first class, rather than making them do contortionist-like stretching exercises. He taught them that ballet originated in the royal court in France, and hence there are strict standards concerning dancers’ gestures, dress and general behavior. From the third lesson, Guan started rehearsals for a performance of Dance of the Four Little Swans from Swan Lake. Staff were amazed by the children’s progress. A month later the budding ballet troupe held its first performance. Needless to say, the production wasn’t world class, but it was nonetheless a special occasion – and a wild success –for all involved.
Furthemore, Guan had achieved his aim. “I want them to be interested in ballet and enjoy it – nothing more.” Later when Guan began to introduce stretching exercises, no one “pulled out” of the class. On the rare occasion that Guan couldn’t hold class, one of the students would step up to lead it. Guan says that as long as ballet in Duancun continues to promote art for arts sake, as well as beauty and values, the skills are unimportant.
Painting teacher Li Ping says he was excited about his time teaching in Duancun. “I was completely new to teaching rural children,” he adds. He tried new ways to teach them and asked the kids to draw whatever they wanted instead of adopting the traditional “sketch and lines” approach. Baiyangdian Lake, close to the town, is full of lotuses, and many of the children drew the lotus for their first painting. Li then taught the children that art can be interpretation – distinct from real life – and that their lotuses could be perfectly round, or square, or in any other shape.
The rural children’s powers of imagination surprised Li Ping. So impressed was he that he helped organize a showcasing of their paintings on a school wall. It marked the first art exhibition ever held in the town. Many visitors came, and parents whose children hadn’t attended the class before quickly signed their little Michelangelos up.
Of the exhibition, Li Feng said, “When the wall of a rural school becomes a space for children’s artistic imaginations to run wild, the metaphorical wall between the countryside and the city falls.”
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