I started working in the art industry in 2014.
At that time, I wasn’t teaching yet. I was working in the art industry, first as an archivist, then as a gallery manager. At the same time, I was painting, exhibiting, curating and writing. If I wasn’t making work, I was involved in exhibitions one way or another.
That was how I understood art.
Not through textbooks, but through doing.
Fast forward to September 2022, I started teaching.
And that shift, moving from doing to teaching has changed the way I look at art entirely.
Because suddenly, it was no longer enough to just know how to do something.
I had to explain it.
Simple things that I used to do spontaneously like mixing colours, building composition, making decisions in the middle of a painting have become harder to articulate than I expected. There were moments in class where I caught myself pausing, trying to break down something that, for years, I had just done without thinking.
That was when I started to realise something.
Knowing how to make art and knowing how to teach art are not the same thing.
But at the same time, they continuously shape one another.
The more I teach, the more I find myself going back to practice. Revisiting techniques. Rethinking processes. Not just to improve my own work, but to understand it better so that I can share it better with my students.
And that’s where the idea of being a practitioner started to feel important.
Not as a requirement written somewhere, but as something I experienced myself.
When I first started teaching, I relied too much on references, slides, images, even online tutorials. They worked, to a certain extent. Students could follow. They could produce something.
But something felt missing.
It felt distant.
The moment I started demonstrating, actually painting, actually showing the process in front of them, I felt the dynamic changed.
The students responded differently. They paid attention in a different way. There was a sense that what was being taught was not just information, but something real.
Something lived.
And I think that’s the difference.
Especially for a subject like art.
You can explain composition, colour theory, or technique through slides. But the moment things don’t go according to plan, the paint doesn’t behave, the composition feels off, the idea doesn’t work, that very moment, you need something else.
You need experience.
You need to have gone through that moment yourself to be able to react accordingly.
Teaching made me realise how important that lived experience is. Not just for the students, but for me as well. It keeps the teaching grounded. It keeps it honest.
Being in the industry also shaped the way I approach the classroom.
Instead of only referring to international artists, I found myself bringing in Malaysian artists. People I’ve worked with, exhibitions I’ve been involved in, situations I’ve experienced. It made the conversation feel closer. More immediate.
The students begin to see that art is not something distant or abstract.
It exists here.
Around them.
And maybe that is what shifted most for me.
I used to think that being involved in the art industry and being a teacher were two separate things.
Now, I see them as connected.
Teaching is not just about delivering content.
It is about sharing a way of working, a way of thinking, a way of experiencing art.
And that can only come from having gone through it yourself.
Not perfectly.
But honestly.
And perhaps that is where being an art worker matters most in teaching.
Not because it makes you a better teacher on paper.
But because it gives you something real to stand on when you step into the classroom.
Because in the end, teaching is not only about passing down information.
It is also about passing down experience.
Happy Teacher’s Day.
Comments
Post a Comment