My mother was a math teacher. She was kind of famous in the county where she taught. Some folks told me she probably taught over half the kids in the county over her lifetime. It seems they either loved her or hated her. There was no in-between with mom.
I, myself, didn’t do really well in math. At least not like my brother who was a math whiz. He ended up going to MIT and worked for a couple of years after college at the Artificial Intelligence Lab at Stanford.
I didn’t get interested in mathematics until a couple of years ago. It turns out that math is pretty fascinating when you get into it. It seems to be much about relationships. And, get this, mathematicians have an easy solution to unsolvable problems … they make stuff up.
Math as Language
What fascinates me now about math is that it crosses boundaries of language and culture. A mathematician in India can communicate with a Chinese mathematician. Math is their common language.
Music is like that, as is dance, as is almost any creative discipline. Art is like that. Art, by its very nature, should reach into the viewer’s soul and communicate an idea that you have in yours.
Express yourself
That’s why we teach you to paint. It’s not so you can create another fir tree or mountain landscape. We teach you how to paint, so you have another way to express yourself to others.
Let’s say you have an idea in your head. If you want to communicate your thought to another, the first thing you have to do is verbalize it. Boy is that fraught with peril. As words pass between people, it’s as if the words change meaning between mouth and ear.
A new science developed around the principles of understanding language. Linguistics is the scientific study of language and its structure. It includes the study of morphology, syntax, phonetics, and semantics. But it doesn’t stop there.
Specific branches of linguistics include sociolinguistics, dialectology, psycholinguistics, computational linguistics, historical-comparative linguistics, and applied linguistics.
Whew! Is it any wonder we’ve been at war with one country or another for, pretty much, the entire history of humankind? It gives you a better appreciation for those who take a vow of silence.
Recalling memories
One of our Master Class graduates painted a picture recently of a scene from her childhood. She recalled growing up on a farm as a child. I imagined playing in the old barn while guineafowl chirped and squeaked outside. It was as if I returned to my childhood — to those hot summer days when we’d play until it got too dark to see.
The wonder of art is communication without words. Art cuts through the confusion of everyday conversation. You learn a new language. But it’s a lot easier to learn.
Bridging countries
We have a student in Master Class from Italy. His English is much better than our Italian. We used Google Translate to communicate with him. In spite of the language barrier, his paintings continued to improve through all three parts of the course. We are very proud of what Sergio accomplished in the course. We can’t wait to see his next creation.
Art is an international language. There are no boundaries with art. Let us help you learn a new language. Let us help you master the language of art.
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