The
Hidden Sphere
(of Artistic Concerns) Cecil Orion
Touchon
17
When the master teaches the students hardly notice his
wandering around.
The next best teacher is one that the students admire
and imitate.
After this is the teacher that imposes his authority
upon the students,
forcing them to become what he believes they should be.
The worst is one for whom teaching is only a job.
His lack of interest causes the students to feel cheated.
The transmission from the master to the student
is as delicate as a gossamer thread.
If the proper relationship is not established
the deepest teachings will not be passed on. (1)
The master is subtle in his teaching method.
With his harmonious presence and intuitive clarity,
He reveals to his students the nature of their own hearts.(2)
He nourishes them as they establish themselves
in the creative harmony.(3)
footnotes
(1) There is a delicacy in friendship, in all kinds of relationship;
there is delicacy in meeting people. If that delicate thread is damaged
or moved out of place something goes wrong. There is no more delicate machinery
than the spirit of man... What happens, very often unconsciously, is that
there are friends who are very devoted to each other, and then there is
something in the machinery that goes wrong. Perhaps neither of them knows
this, but unconsciously the spirit of their friendship is destroyed; and
it is most difficult to mend it. Then there is no joy of friendship any
more. Friendship lasts only as long as that delicate thread exists, as
long as the machinery is in proper order.
(2) Teaching cannot be repeated in its most valuable
moments - when we succeed in touching a students innermost core and strike
a spiritual light.... The tone, the rhythm, the sequence of words, place
and time, the mood of the students, and all of the other circumstances
which make for a vital atmosphere cannot be reproduced; yet it is the ineffable
which helps form a climate of creativity. My teaching was intuitive finding.
My own emotion gave me the power which produced the student’s readiness
to learn. To teach out of inner enthusiasm is the opposite of a mere pre-planned
method of instruction.
My best students are those who found new ways through their own
intuition. Mere outward imitation and repetition of my procedure is without
sparking power. Yet I am well aware that my teaching did not always embody
something new; it was also a revival of what had been the fundamentals
for artists of the past.
Johannes Itten, Design
and Form - The Basic Course at the Bauhaus, 1964
(3) There are three faculties which the teacher considers
essential to develop in the disciple: deepening the sympathy, showing the
way to harmony, and awakening the spirit of beauty. One often sees that
without being taught any particular formula, or receiving any particular
lesson on these three subjects, the soul of a sincere disciple will grow
under the guidance of the right teacher like a plant which is carefully
reared and watered every day and every month and every year. And without
knowing it himself he will begin to show these three qualities, the ever-growing
sympathy, the harmonizing quality increasing every day more and more, and
the expression and understanding and appreciation of beauty in all its
forms.
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