"The last supper" by Greg Windsor

April, 2011

Artist’s Statement 

Greg Windsor,
MFA, BA, Fine Arts (Sculpture), Grad Dip Ed.

"The work is foremost about balance;

the co-existence of the student and the teacher...

the duality of ego and obsession and

the harmony of nature.

All these things

shape our lives."

To view the artist's work, see www.gregwindsor.com

the last supper

The poet is summonsed... We gathered for the holy feast and collected at the grand dining table. The gluttonous bounty spills over and onto the marbled floor. The robed guests are indignant and drunk....slobber runs down the faces of all the Disciples and the discourse abounds. “Who has stolen the bread?” cries the baker. “Where is this hidden thief?” The poet is intrigued, sensing mistrust she just keeps taking notes, scribing the event as it unfolds. A butcher is required, there are sheep for the slaughterhouse... Quickly, our leaders and their institutionalised heavy right hand need capital... Education, you will dispense the bounty – from the top down; hence the discourse. “Now just try to pay attention, because this is what we want you 'fools' to talk about...Judas enters the room...JESUS? What's goin’ on?”

.

...so education ( the antagonist speaks) is the guise...

Your community is varied; you have planned accordingly, but have you chosen your curriculum? White comfortable coach. 

How about your outcasts... your artists... your mental health or the native customs of your land? What about the ones slipping through the cracks who aren't consuming? 

An answer comes from the distance... Oh, but they will.

Bowles and Gintis (cited Van Krieken, 2006, p.135) argued education is heading toward the goals of the capitalist; the system as a whole will develop at the expense of society. This focus on a subservient labour force fails miserably, but the statistics will be manipulated to keep the sheep on the grass. Durkheim (Cuff et al, 2000, p 76) suggests the moral - the obligation - of education is to collectively coordinate the activities of students, thereby requiring the individual to be capable of controlling their conduct in specific ways, and in so doing, aligning it closely with others. Durkheim's view limits natural spontaneity and proposes conformity. Where is the zest for creation in this filth? Who nurtures the muse? Are we just producers of products for the consumption of our greed? .

Wow... Disciples...of...Discipline...

Get this... Your dinner is getting cold.

Bowles and Gintis (1976) argued that the measure of intelligence is flawed and IQ testing has little effect:

The intellectual abilities developed or certified in school make little causal contribution to getting ahead economically. Only a minor portion of the substantive statistical association between schooling and economic success can be accounted for by the school's role in producing or screening cognitive skills (cited Van Krieken, 2006 pp. 135-6).

..

What if the system of education started speaking 'out of turn'? “---we'd lose funding!”

In viewing the nation as an integrated collective community, fascists claim that pluralism is a dysfunctional aspect of society, one that justifies a totalitarian state as a means to represent the nation in its entirety (Wikipedia). No fractures - one view and we all work together with one voice… this is your discourse. Of course! One course. No waiver. 

Is this our forced agenda? Is this the product, Minister? 

Education is the institution handed the responsibility to deliver, according to the government, the rules its people should follow. 'The principle of insularity can be invoked to support profoundly conservative doctrines in defence of the curriculum status quo' (Young, 2003, p.100). Through bureaucratic administration the government has the power to dictate the discourse with which it will speak. 

Can we hear Nietzsche screaming?... “Zarathustra speak!”

I hear music in the room...Is that an orchestra? 

(Also sprach Zarathustra, Richard Strauss, 1896).

'Suck the marrow out of life,' John Keating says in Dead Poets' Society, along with the imperative “seize the day”. This teacher called on his students to find the passion, the spontaneity and energy, to stand up to the formulas of the system; to disregard the status quo, fight the path of least resistance, and seek the very thing that inspires them... to explore their youth and live their passion (Latham et al, p 144).

Those left sitting at the table, gorging themselves with the doctrines of their own discourse, vomit on society... their grotesque spectacle is messy... true to life. The current capital based system is without vision; out of control. It is a system designed for the consumers of greed and producers of capital, without creative soul, and who disregard the very health of its’ own people. “Is this our forced agenda? Is this the product you're looking for, Mr. Prime Minister?” 

REFERENCES

Cuff, E, Sharrock, W &Francis, D (2006) Perspectives in Sociology, 5th Edn., New York: Routledge.

Latham, G, Blaise, M, Dole, S, Falkner,J, Lang, J, & Malone, K (2006).Learning to teach; new times, new practices, Melboure, Victoria: Oxford University Press.

Van Krieken, R (2006). Sociology Themes and Perspectives, Frenchs Forest, NSW: Pearson Education. 

Young, M, (2003) Durkheim, Vygotsky and the curriculum of the future, London Review of Education, 1:2, pp.100-120, July, 2003.