The Interrelationship of Identities: How Artistic Practice Informs Teaching in the Visual Arts

This research is an investigation into the relationship between artistic practice and art teaching in secondary art teachers. After an examination of various perspectives on this relationship that have appeared in scholarly journals over the last several decades, some of which argue that artistic practice is essential to the quality of an art teacher\u27s teaching, and some of which regard the two practices as separate, I interviewed five secondary art teachers to find out more about this relationship. I conducted the interviews in a semi open-ended fashion, asking questions that invited participants to discuss teaching preferences and priorities as well as thier own work and processes as artists. I considered the interviews through a lens of both phenomenology and Arts-Based Educational Research. The interviews with these five art teachers, all of whom identified themselves as practicing artists, revealed that there was a great deal of consensus on the importance of continued artistic practice and the many ways that this continued practice led to being a better art teacher