A Vocabulary of Images

In this volume we trace the history of the Child Art in Australia. Through the life and work of Marianne Seemann, we follow the rise and fall of the movement. Marianne Seemann came from Vienna. She worked closely with the creator of Child Art, was a disciple of Franz Cizek (the Father of Child Art), and never deviated from his teachings. In Australia, the Children's Craft and Leisure movement started in 1922 and promoted the idea of children as naturally creative. It was therefore...
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In this volume we trace the history of the Child Art in Australia. Through the life and work of Marianne Seemann, we follow the rise and fall of the movement. Marianne Seemann came from Vienna. She worked closely with the creator of Child Art, was a disciple of Franz Cizek (the Father of Child Art), and never deviated from his teachings. In Australia, the Children's Craft and Leisure movement started in 1922 and promoted the idea of children as naturally creative. It was therefore necessity to protect them from formal art education, lest they lose their unspoiled perception of truth and beauty. It was also a time when children of the poor and the working classes were starting to be included in artistic endeavours. There was a perception that as work practices changed there would be leisure time for all that could be gainfully employed if early education prepared children to grow their creative imagination. One hundred years later, the belief in children's innate creativity is still strong in the early childhood education canon. Many of the ideas welcomed by the progressive educationalists were exciting beliefs about the ideal of education and concepts of progress. Revisiting these ideas in a form that brings into focus the practices of those who supported the 'new education' is an opportunity to evaluate what legacies have not been acknowledged and what ideals have lost relevance for the present.