Occupational Engagement: Doing, Being, Belonging, Becoming

http://www.slideshare.net/etankard/arts-and-disability

art/ärt/

Noun:	The expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture,...: "the art of the Renaissance" Works produced by such skill and imagination.
Synonyms:	craft - skill - artifice - science - workmanship - knack

For my fieldwork2 placement I was placed at Studio 2 which  is a creative space in central Dunedin where people with disabilities are supported to create artworks. This week we have been looking at the concepts of Doing, Being, Belonging and Becoming, these tie in with activity of art very well.


 Occupational therapists significantly contribute to increasing an individual’s quality of life. Knowing, doing, being and belonging are all equally exclusive components of human occupation that influence the meaning and value of a person’s occupation. The first four paintings in the slide are ones you have all probably seen before, each of these come from different eras of human history. Art is an expression of a person’s creative skills and imagination, it is a narrative of endless possibilities. Art may be influenced by the environment, society, culture, personal values and beliefs, from which others then draw their own interpretation.  For the entire existence of humanity art has been a tool used to document history.

Street art is a fairly new concept. Artists have challenged art by situating it in non-art contexts. ‘Street’ artists do not aspire to change the definition of an artwork, but rather to question the existing environment with its own language, the next two slides are just a couple of types or street art.

Sculptures, drawings, paper Mache, these are just a few other forms of art. The possibilities are endless when it comes to being creative! The remaining slides are from my fieldwork 2 placement at Studio2. Despite their disabilities and limitations, they too have a story to tell, they have something that they want to express and Studio2 offers a space for them to create and develop their artworks in a range of different ways.

As with anything that goes online, ethical considerations have to be made. In regards to the pictures used on my slide show, all of these were from online sources and did not have any copy right restrictions associated with them.  In using them however it limited the authenticity of the images and meant my slide show was perhaps not so original in that it didn’t contain any images that I had personally obtained. When I was putting together my slide show I couldn’t help but think to myself how ironic it is that the most sought after and famous paintings in the world can so easily be accessed by literally anyone online. We can pick and choose whatever image or information we want and simply copy and paste it to documents, power points, posters etc.; change a few words here and there and put the pictures in a new order and call it our piece of work.