Encountering Pedagogy through Relational Art Practices

Abstract Two artists involved in ‘socially engaged art’ practice were invited to work with art education teacher candidates and instructors in an effort to rethink notions of teaching, learning and art. We initiated this residency, which we called ‘The Summerhill Residency’, to examine how learning encounters might create environments for meaningful exchanges between the ways in which artists and secondary art education teacher candidates learn to think about pedagogy and the nature of artistic learning. Drawing upon Bourriaud's theory of relational aesthetics, we consider, yet trouble, the relational aspects of the processes and products of the artist residency, and examine the crisis of imagination that permeated teacher candidates' experiences. Throughout the project, a/r/tography offered a rich form of living enquiry that opened up possibilities for learning within a community of enquirers.