Visual art as a communicative cultural narrative in adolescent student artmaking

Post-compulsory secondary Visual Art curriculum in NSW, Australia, informed by postmodern and popular culture perspectives is providing performative sites for the individual to make meaning, explore subjectivities, an ethico-aesthetic understanding and visual performative communicative capacities. This paper investigates the value of visual artmaking to the adolescent beyond the classroom. The findings of a longitudinal analysis of student learning outcomes informed by two case studies reveals how students use artmaking as social inquiry and a meaning-making tool. It demonstrates how visual education can contribute to the development of students' capacities to be active cultural participants with the communicative capacity to interpret contemporary society and the critical and self-reflective skills to understand themselves, others and how society shapes identities towards becoming.