Writing is painting with words.
Using descriptive details in a style uniquely their own, artists write clearly and vividly about what the art school at Palm Beach Atlantic means to them.
In paintings, the artists blend specific colors to evoke a specific feeling or suggest a mood.
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In an artist bio, word choice is used to provoke a certain sentiment. Words are chosen carefully to suggest certain imagery that the author wants the reader to experience.
Vivid details bring readers to the frame of mind that the author is trying cause them to have. Alliteration adds substance and impact to a piece of writing in the same way that repetition creates emphasis in a piece of art.
The bios that the Seniors wrote demonstrate that clear and concise thoughts add clarity and insight into a person’s character in the same way that perspective adds depth to an image.
If one knows a writer well, one can read a bio and feel as if it was read in the voice of the author. This is exemplified in exactly the same way an artist’s personality can sometimes be perceived in his or her visual art.
The more atypical the person, the more unique the style. For example, one does not even have to know Samantha to pick up on some of her character qualities exhibited in her writing and her painting.
By looking at her self-portrait, one might observe that she is a fun and quirky individual. One might discern from both her writing and her painting that she has a carefree personality.
She is very lighthearted and doesn’t take things too seriously, and yet, by her attention to detail in both her visual art and her writing the audience will note that she is skilled at both fine art and prose.
Painting and writing are both unique art forms that use very different mediums, and yet, both mediums are used for a similar purpose.
They are both used to send a message. Both writing and painting can be used to send a superficial message or a message that is more profound. Though the forms and media are both tangible and intangible, the result can be the same. If executed well, both writing and any form of visual art can have an irrefutable impact on the human soul.
Visual Storytelling
Graphic Design, drawing, painting, ceramics, pottery, sculpture, and other forms of fine art are all forms of visual storytelling. Nikita Schoenwald describes the similarities between writing and visual well when she writes,
“Art is really just a story being told. Art over time tells the story of human existence, and my personal art tells a story of what I see…What I express in my art work reflects what I find important…A lump of clay becomes a three-dimensional narrative, a canvas becomes a storyboard, and my art comes to life.”
Both visual art and writing are similar in that they “can mediate deeply engaged dialogue[s] that wrestle with the core issues of humanity.[1]” In a Christian environment, that is what we should be teaching students to do with their art.
Students should be specifically taught that all art (and writing) sends a message, one either positive or negative (why advertisers hire graphic designers and copy editors). Our art tells the story of what we see.
Our art indicates a worldview. Students should be taught that all art tells a story, a story that can be superficial or profound. Students can and should create art that requires the audience to consider the core issues of humanity.
Christian artists especially should create excellent art that requires the viewer to contemplate the origin of art and the Designer of the world, the Creator of the universe.
[1] Makoto Fujimura, Refractions
