Konsthistorisk tidskrift/Journal of Art History

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Drawing Activities as Pedagogical Method in Art

History

Ludwig Qvarnström

To cite this article: Ludwig Qvarnström (2019) Drawing Activities as Pedagogical

Method in Art History, Konsthistorisk tidskrift/Journal of Art History, 88:2, 80-94, DOI:
10.1080/00233609.2019.1624612

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Drawing Activities as Pedagogical Method in Art
History
Ludwig Qvarnström

There is a tremendous difference between communication with students have increased

seeing a thing without pencil in your hand rapidly in recent years. In this age of digital
and seeing it while drawing it.
obsession, when some of us seem to be living
– Paul Valéry
our lives online, it may well seem as if using
From the Enlightenment onward we have an analogue technique such as drawing as a
been moving towards an increasingly visual pedagogical tool is no longer relevant. Why
culture, where visual technologies as well as make a drawing when you can take a photo-
graph? I consider this a mistake, since the
technologies of visualisation itself have
reached deep into our everyday lives, not least increasing circulation of images through
through the digital media. Students of today, digital media is problematic due to its dislo-
cation of the art object and an increasing una-
often referred to as ‘digital natives’, are sup-
posed to be particularly adept at visual com- wareness of the differences between an
munication through the digital media, which, artwork and its reproduction. This has not
always been the case and, based on observations
in conjunction with the increasing availability
made by art historians in the formative years of
of digital reproductions of present and past
art history, I will discuss the problems caused
images, should create an ideal situation for
by this unawareness. Drawing, I will then
teaching art history. Teaching has been facili-
argue, can counteract the dislocation of the
tated with the use of digital projectors, and stu-
art object through its reconnection to the
dents have instant access to an enormous
object by intense in situ studies. I will also,
number of digital reproductions. The study of
with support from recent pedagogical research
artworks in remote areas has also been facili-
and theories based on phenomenological
tated. This development is, of course, not
grounds and ideas of embodied cognition,
unique to art history, and can be described as
point out several other benefits in integrating
a general ‘visualisation of knowledge’, where
drawing activities in art historical education. I
images are integral to all advanced professional
conclude this article with a discussion based
activities. Our use of digital images and online

©  The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
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ISSN 0023-3609 KONSTHISTORISK TIDSKRIFT/JOURNAL OF ART HISTORY 2019

Vol. 88, No. 2, 80–94, https://doi.org/10.1080/00233609.2019.1624612
 DRAWING ACTIVITIES AS PEDAGOGICAL METHOD IN ART HISTORY
on concrete examples of drawing as a pedagogi-
cal tool in art history.
Literature review
The literature on reproductive techniques and
its importance, not only for art history but also
for science, is extensive. Drawings and other
images, used in, for example, geology,
biology, physics etc., have been studied as
scientific illustrations and to a lesser extent
as original source-material. There are numer-
ous historical examples of drawings as an inte-
grated part of the thought process. Horst
Bredekamp, for example, claims that Charles
Darwin’s sketches in the notes that led to the
theories in The Origin of Species are as impor-
tant a dimension of his thought process as his
writing, concluding that ‘the image is not a
derivative nor an illustration, but an active
medium of the thought process.’ Another
example is Omar W. Nasim’s extensive study
of the unpublished notebooks and drawings
of six of the most significant nebulae observers
of the nineteenth century. He convincingly
argues for drawings as a fundamental com-
ponent in the observations and understanding
of nebulae, and in a way also for the general
practice of observation in astronomy. The
probably most studied area from an art his-
torical perspective in the use of drawings is
architectural drawing, both as done by archi-
tects and in its relation to antiquarianism.
What I miss in these primarily historical
studies is the importance of drawing as peda-
gogical tool. I have not found any systematic
studies in the use of drawing activities in ped-
agogical situations. I have found the most
interesting discussion in relation to this
subject in several texts by James Elkins. He
has taught a course at the Art Institute of
81
Chicago in which students try to copy paint-
ings and are then asked to reflect on what
they have learned from copying compared to
reading about the same painting. Elkins
clearly shows that there are things to be
learned from copying; parts of this knowledge
can be placed within existing art historical
narratives, and other findings seems untran-
slatable or meaningless within an art historical
context. Although Elkins’ reflection is very
interesting when it comes to understanding
artistic practices, he never enters into a more
general discussion on drawing as a pedagogi-
cal tool without the aim to copy (in other
words translating art objects into another
media or visualising non-visual ideas without
any particular training in drawing). The
purpose of this article is to contribute to our
understanding of drawing as a pedagogical
tool within art history.
The dislocated art object
Although, with the increasing availability of
digital reproductions and digitalisation of edu-
cation, the above-described situation seems to
be ideal, there are problematic consequences.
With all these images whirling around, it has
become more and more difficult to experience
art objects for the first time in situ. One has
often seen them already in printed reproduc-
tion or more likely online and, as Frederick
N. Bohrer has formulated it: ‘The visit to an
artwork in situ is often framed as an occasion
to confirm information first gleaned from a
photographic rendering (and perhaps look for
a nice restaurant nearby).’ And herein lies
the problem. Although not a new problem,
the works of art seem to be absent more often
than not when art historians are speaking,
writing and reading about art and art history.
82 LUDWIG QVARNSTRÖM
Hans Dam Christensen has discussed this as
‘the repressive logic of Art History. It is a logic
which at the same time privileges the presence
of the art object and represses the dislocation of
it.’ Dam Christensen convincingly argues that
the art objects ‘primarily are represented by a
variety of reproductions in the art historical
knowledge system. Art historians mainly
know the history of art through visual and
verbal representation.’ With three cases
from the eighteenth-century to the late nine-
teenth-century, Dam Christensen shows that
the use of reproductions was as important
then as now when it came to communicating
about art and art history, but in the nine-
teenth-century ‘there often seemed to be a
better awareness of the distinction between
the original work of art and its reproduction.’
Of importance here, according to Dam Chris-
tensen, is not the number of representations
or kinds of representation, digital or not, but
the absence of the art object, and the awareness
of the distinction between art object and repro-
duction. Although the awareness of this dislo-
cation of the art object is very important, we
still need the reproduction to be able to com-
municate about art and art history. Analysing
through documentation can also have advan-
tages. In relation to, for example, performance,
Amelia Jones argues that the viewer may seem
to have some advantages in having experienced
the performance first hand, but raises the ques-
tion of difficulties in comprehending the narra-
tive in the moment. But Jones is very well
aware of the differences between the work of
art and the reproduction, not least since she is
talking about documentation. Dam Christen-
sen’s point is, of course, not primarily to com-
plain about the use of reproductions, but to
address the lack of awareness, a problem that
is not only about the loss of contact with the
art object, but also about difficulties in
understanding the mediation of the art object.
Even though the most obvious differences
come with reproductions of sculptures, archi-
tecture and other objects or places you can
move around and go inside, a reproduction of
a painting can be equally problematic. I have
yet to see a reproduction of an action painting
by Jackson Pollock giving even the slightest
impression compared to standing in front of
an original, nor a reproduction of an Yves
Klein blue painting.
This leads us to the question of how to
increase the awareness of the difference
between art object and reproduction. One
obvious way is, of course, to increase the
direct contact between students of art history
and original artworks. But, I think, there is
also another possibility to counteract this dis-
location, which has to do with the art histori-
cal practice and educational methods,
connected to techniques of reproduction. I
refer to something we can learn from nine-
teenth-century art historians. Dam Christen-
sen acknowledges this in passing when
noting ‘that in the premature days of the pro-
fession the art historian normally possessed
some drawing skills as a means to record the
artwork.’ A skill of great importance and
acknowledged in the nineteenth and early
twentieth-century, but not today.
Critical awareness and drawing skill
in the formative years of art history
From a historical perspective, drawing skills
have been an important part of the studies at
European Universities. The Latin word for
the verb drawing designare in the Renaissance
tradition not only means drawing, but also to
mark out as part of a cognitive process.
Giorgio Vasari, for example, called the
academy he founded in  Accademia del
 DRAWING ACTIVITIES AS PEDAGOGICAL METHOD IN ART HISTORY
Disegno. He saw this institution as a univer-
sity, since disegno for him was the vehicle of
knowledge above all. Vasari characterised
drawing as a specific medium functioning as
the visualising connection between the
‘natural’ object and the imagined conceptual
understanding of the object. Many univer-
sities have had, and some still have, training
in drawing as part of the so called exercitii,
including traning in dance, fencing and
horse-riding. But, to my knowledge, most
of these subjects disappeared in late nine-
teenth-century and were never directly con-
nected to the emerging education in art
history.
In the formative years of art history as an
academic discipline, the identification and
classification of the art object as an empirical
material was central. At the same time, pho-
tography and the circulation of photographic
prints greatly contributed to the university
status of the profession, not least for the devel-
opment of connoisseurship and stylistic analy-
sis. The importance of photography for art
history has been so central that Trevor
Fawcett described art history from the late
nineteenth-century onward as ‘the history of
the photographically reproducible.’ Although
we can hardly over-estimate the importance of
photography for art history in its formative
years, the awareness of photographic distortion
was clearly expressed in these early days. John
Ruskin (–) was acutely aware of the
value of photography as documentation, but
he still continued his habit of making meticu-
lous drawings as a way of catching elusive
aspects of his visual experiences. He also con-
tinued using reproductive engravings, since
they could express qualities of the original
that a photograph failed to convey. In the
early days of photography, the medium prob-
ably seemed crude when it first appeared. The
83
light-sensitive material used was not only
colour-blind, but also unequally sensitive to
different colours. Blue areas became white,
yellow areas were heavily darkened and every-
thing red became black. These distortions
made the early photographs most suitable for
reproducing drawings and prints. Another
important factor was the way photography
framed reality as enforcing the Renaissance
perspective vision.
Heinrich Wölfflin (–), who was
explicitly critical regarding photographic
reproductions, ‘denied that photography ever
could replace drawings and engravings in the
study of art,’ and required students seeking
admission to his seminar to be able to draw
until well into the s. In Berlin, he
engaged the industrial designer Peter
Behrens to offer instruction in drawing twice
a week. In a two-part article on ‘How Sculp-
tures Should be Photographed’ in Zeitschrift
für Bildende Kunst in  and , he com-
pares a photography and an engraving of The
Apollo of Belvedere, and concludes:
Obviously, Marcantonio’s engraving derives
part of its success from the fact that the
ground plane disappears. Unfortunately,
the photograph cannot compete in this
respect because a view from below would
distort the proportions terribly. This is one
of the gravest limitations of photography
which, again and again, makes drawing a
superior medium.
Wölfflin is here pointing to the benefits in a
reproductive technique that is visually reduced
and makes it possible to focus on certain
aspects. Even though Wölfflin argues that the
subjectivity in the act of drawing can be used
to make a superior reproduction, this certainly
requires a skilled draftsman, with good judge-
ment. The same subjectivity can consequently
make drawing equally problematic as long as
84 LUDWIG QVARNSTRÖM
we see it primarily as a reproductive technique.
My point, which I will get back to, is to not see
drawing as primarily a reproductive technique,
but as a pedagogical tool.
For the early generations of art historians,
drawing skills seem not only to have been
important, but also something required of stu-
dents. It is clear that they were well aware not
only of the distinction between art object and
reproduction, but also the differences between
photographical reproductions, graphical
reproductions and drawings. This is also a
generation which considered the grand tour
mandatory for the serious student of art
history. In other words, to become an art
historian in the nineteenth- and early twenti-
eth-centuries, you had to travel around visit-
ing museums and collections and study an
enormous amount of art in situ, making draw-
ings and taking notes. The use of a camera was
initially limited on practical grounds, although
small portable cameras, such as the Brownie,
have existed from , and since the s
the Ermanox camera.
Although the examples above suggest that
art historians in the early twentieth-century
were well aware of the distortions made by
photographs, we have to admit that there are
numerous testimonies of art historians’ over-
confidence in photographs. The critique of
photographic reproduction was never wide-
spread and systematic. Bernard Berenson
(–), whose work depended on the
comparison of photographs, argued that iso-
chromatic film finally made the study of art
scientific, ‘[…] almost the accuracy of the
physical sciences.’ But, as Ralph Lieberman
has convincingly argued ‘[p]hotographs do
not show things as they look, but how they
can be made to look.’ His empirical
examples are revealing, not only in pointing
out the photographic mediation but also how
these pictures emphasise certain aspects and
downplay others. Discussing the use in most
books on Gothic architecture of photographs
with long exposure time, he concludes that
‘the pictures one does see tell us a great deal
about what is there, but next to nothing
about what it is like to be there.’ Compared
to Frederick Evans’s pictures of Gothic
interiors, where most details are lost in the
shadows, Lieberman points out that
Evans shows us the effect of the architecture,
but we can find no information to help us
understand the means by which the effect
is accomplished. In an art-historically accep-
table view of the same church, we understand
the means, but we don’t get the point.
Lieberman’s point here is not only that we need
to be aware of the differences, but also that
these pictures can lead art historians ‘to
describe works of art in exaggerated or over-
simplified ways.’ I would add that no repro-
ductive technique based on translation to
other media shows things as they look, but
how they can be translated into another media.
I had no training in drawing, and no teacher
advised me to draw during my time as a
student of art history at universities in
Sweden and the USA in the s and early
twenty first-century. To my knowledge, there
has been no training in drawing or art histori-
cal education advocating drawing as a learning
activity in Sweden for several decades,
although it seems to have been normal prac-
tice in the early twentieth-century. There
can, of course, be large differences in the role
of drawing in art historical education else-
where, and there are certainly courses in art
history still utilising drawing activities. But, I
would guess most universities do not, and
my intention here is not only to address teach-
ing in Sweden but to make a general
 DRAWING ACTIVITIES AS PEDAGOGICAL METHOD IN ART HISTORY
argument. In an article from , Wolfgang
M. Freitag, writing about the nineteenth-
century use of photography, concludes with
the following remark:
This review also makes us ponder the ques-
tion of whether sketching, which in compari-
son with photography is still the superior
tool for many tasks, should not be encour-
aged more and whether bringing it back
into the curriculum might not have a rather
refreshing effect upon the general practice
of art history – just as some training in the
skilful excerpting of texts might improve
the mnemonic faculties of the ‘Xerox’
generation!
This is clearly an indication that students of
art history in North America in the s
did not make drawings, at least at Harvard.
Somewhere along the way from the formative
years of art history, it seems as if drawing skills
have lost their importance among art histor-
ians. When and why this happened is an inter-
esting historiographical question, yet to be
investigated. Even though today’s ‘digital
natives’, and our future art historians, differ
significantly from the ‘Xerox’ generation in
their approach to studies and use of visual
communication and digital media, I do think
Freitag’s remark is still valid.
Digital natives and visual literacy
The situation for the millennial learners is
radically different from that of the student
during the formative years of art history.
They are not only encountering a completely
different educational system, but most of
them also come from a different socio-econ-
omical group, making, for example, the
grand tour impossible for many of them.
They are also living in a society dominated
by visual media. This has, of course, also influ-
enced the curriculums in art history with an
85
increasing use of digital platforms, access to
large image databases etc., a situation clearly
strengthening the repressive logic of art
history that Dam Christensen talks about.
The need to develop a special skill in hand-
ling the differences between art object and
reproduction is, consequently, increasingly
important. This is a form of visual literacy
going beyond the baseline skills (such as the
ability to read) of what we can call ‘visual com-
petence’ – something more specialised, a
trained experience and technique of visual
observation. Different learning styles and
different media exposure define the form of
visual literacy that students are adapted to,
which in turn affects the social construction
of knowledge. This has lead Marc Prensky to
the conclusion that the millennial learners
who were brought up immersed in digital
media, the so called ‘digital natives’, are par-
ticularly adept at visual communication, com-
pared to the older generation, the so-called
‘digital immigrants’, who have had to adapt
to using digital media, and have previously
learned to acquire information through
text. Prensky’s theory has led to an over-
whelming confidence in digital media and
the conclusion that we should adapt our learn-
ing activities to this new generation of stu-
dents. It also indicates that the millennial
learners are especially skilled in handling the
differences between art object and reproduc-
tion; in other words, that they should be
more apt in handling the repressive logic of
art history. However, since the publication of
Prensky’s theory, several empirical studies
have been conducted, examining students’
interpretations of visual material, that refute
the arguments that Digital Natives have any
particular skill in visual literacy. They
consume a lot of digital visual media and com-
municate with the use of photographic images,
86 LUDWIG QVARNSTRÖM
but do not have a critical understanding of the
media. This is also my personal experience
from teaching students of today. The millen-
nial learners’ lack of any particular skill in
communicating about and interpreting
images, despite the increasing exposure of
visual media, clearly indicates the need to be
taught how to interpret visual images. My con-
clusion is that the awareness of the dislocation
of the art object has probably never been as
low as it is among students today. Visual lit-
eracy is something we need to learn regardless
of what kind of art historians we are aiming
for. There are, of course, many ways of
strengthening students’ visual literacy. Study-
ing different artistic techniques, including
reproductive techniques, reading and writing
about art, practicing formal analysis, semiotic
analysis, iconography etc. all contribute to
this visual literacy. Although many methods
we use in art history concern a lot more than
focusing on the art object, looking at art is
essential for what most of us do, and then
we have to know what we are looking at.
Drawing activities in pedagogical
situations
At the division of Art History and Visual
Studies at Lund University, where I am teach-
ing, we have a long tradition of supplementing
the campus education with excursions with
the purpose of studying art objects in situ.
Beyond museums and architecture within the
region, we pay yearly visits to several
museums in Copenhagen and take our first
year students for a four-day excursion to
Berlin. But I seldom see students of today
making drawings when we are on these excur-
sions, although I often urge them to do so.
Instead, I often see them pick up their
mobile phone and take a photograph. These
photographs are probably excellent aides-
mémoire of what they have seen during the
excursions. But, since most students seem to
be content with taking a photograph and go
on to the next art object instead of staying
and lingering over the first work of art, these
photographs easily become a stand-in for the
art object.
Besides drawing as a way to emphasise in
situ studies and counteract the dislocation of
the art object, there are other reasons to
encourage students to make drawings.
Western culture seems to continue to project
a dualistic attitude to the human body. But,
from a phenomenological point of view as
Paul Crowther argues, building on Maurice
Merleau-Ponty, ‘cognition is not simply
mental but is, rather, a function of the body’s
sensory-motor capacities operating as a
unified field.’ Drawing is the result of volun-
tarily sustained gesture – marks placed or
inscribed on a surface. This provides a striking
contrast to photography, where images are
derived from the causal impact of light (regis-
tered upon a light sensitive surface). The
photograph is, as we often say, taken, and
the drawing is made as the result of processes
of gesture. Although we can gain an immedi-
ate impression of a painting, sculpture or
building, a more detailed study takes time.
While observing, the eyes are wandering and
focussing on details freely in an open way.
Making a drawing is a process of looking
back and forward, from the overall compo-
sition to the detail and again, tracing contours,
creating volume with shadings etc. It is in
many ways an exploration of one’s own
visual impression and the object’s formal qual-
ities. Visual information does not typically
come to you, but instead must be sought out.
According to the emerging research field of
embodied cognition, haptic (exploratory
 DRAWING ACTIVITIES AS PEDAGOGICAL METHOD IN ART HISTORY
movement) information is involved in shaping
the brain’s cognitive structure. In other words,
the way we move our bodies shapes the way we
think, and scribbling on a paper can be under-
stood as an extended part of our cognitive
process. Of central importance is so-called
sensorimotor knowledge. A summary of
research in the area of drawing and cognition,
presented at the  symposium of the
Drawing Research Network at Loughborough
University, notes that the ‘drawing process
enhances attention and memory more power-
fully than words alone and may communicate
many ideas better than language.’
There seems to be strong theoretical and
empirical support for drawing as a pedagogical
tool, but it can have many purposes, and
drawing activities in pedagogical situations
can mean many different things. To be able
to discuss this in more detail, I think we
need to make one important distinction, that
is between what can be called perceptual and
a-perceptual drawings. The discussion above
on the dislocation of the art object and the
importance of understanding the difference
between art object and reproduction is all
about perceptual drawings. Drawing is in
these cases basically a reproductive technique
and a way of looking closely at the art object,
observing and translating these observations
into another media. A-perceptual drawings
are visualisations as part of reasoning and
can be used to communicate something that
is primarily not visual. This could be done in
the form of, for example, mind-maps, flow
charts etc. Both kinds of drawing are part of
our sensory-motor capacities and conse-
quently greatly enhance attention and
memory. But, in a pedagogical situation, the
perceptual drawings should not be judged as
a reproductive technique, since that would be
a judgement of skill. Their pedagogical
87
function is to enhance attention and
memory. Even though I encourage my stu-
dents to draw, I have not yet, for that reason,
introduced perceptual drawing as a mandatory
exercise. However, I have used a-perceptual
drawing activity as a mandatory learning
activity in my teaching since .
Inspired by James Elkins’ ‘Intuitive Stories’
in Stories of Art (), I have in several
courses in art history at Lund University and
Linnæus University in Växjö asked students
to imagine their own art history, suited to
their own preferences, knowledge and sense
of the past. They are given the task of
making a drawing of their own intuitive art
history. In a subsequent seminar, the students
are asked to present their drawings followed
by a reflection and discussion on the relation
of the drawings to their background, edu-
cation and expectation as a student in art
history and visual studies. I have used this
exercise on different levels from first-year stu-
dents to postgraduate students (since 
more than  students have done this exer-
cise). My experience is that the subsequent
seminar is more productive with students
who have studied art history for more than
one year and when I have the possibility to
hold seminars with a small group of students.
Three years in a row I used this exercise as the
start-up of the course ‘Histories of Art
History’. Since the exercise was mandatory
on that course, I have a good documentation
of the drawings and notes from the seminars,
making it a suitable, although quantitively
very limited, empirical material. It is a histor-
iographically oriented course at an advanced
level with only very few students each year.
The exercise has functioned as a great way of
starting a critical historiographical discussion
about art history as an academic discipline.
But, it has also given me a fairly good idea
88 LUDWIG QVARNSTRÖM
about these students’ preferences and under-
standing of what art history as an academic
discipline means to them. The use of drawings
in this situation is consequently a way of
visualising a-perceptual ideas in maps, land-
scapes, etc. Of the eighteen students on this
course who have done this exercise, the map
or mind-map is totally dominating with ten
drawings while three of the students have
made landscapes. The similarities between
the different visualisations, the map or mind-
map and landscapes can partly be explained
by the fact that it is this kind of intuitive
story Elkins exemplifies in his book and of
course this has had an influence on the stu-
dents. Four of the students have drawn book-
cases filled with books on art history and one
student has drawn the exterior of a museum.
I first understood the museum as the place
where students encounter art and study art,
but the student in question explained that
she had drawn the museum from the exterior
since it contained old art, an art she had diffi-
culties in connecting to. Her preferences were
primarily contemporary art. Her undergradu-
ate education was in aesthetics at a Danish
university, making her rather unique on my
course. The four drawings of bookcases were
made by students from our own undergradu-
ate education, and I understood them as
being a clear indication of the textual basis of
our education, an interpretation confirmed
by the students. The drawing in Fig.  was
made by one of these students. The inscription
on the book cases clearly indicates a rather tra-
ditional art historical narrative based on style
with a special interest in architecture. Studying
art history for this student seems to be done
through books and models. Besides that, this
is a student who obviously has more than
average skills in drawing. Her interest in archi-
tecture and her drawing skill can partly be
explained by the fact that she had also
studied to become an architect. This is, of
course, a very limited empirical study, but I
find it a strong indication that, despite our
emphasis on in situ studies, many of our stu-
dents seem to experience art history as some-
thing they read about and do not directly
experience for themselves. In this case, the
drawings have functioned as self-reflections
for the students as well as productive starting
points for seminar discussions on art historical
narratives and how to relate to the art objects.
But, for me as a teacher, they have also func-
tioned as an analytical tool to evaluate the edu-
cation. My drawing exercise has encouraged
me to further emphasise the importance of
in situ studies and encourage students to
sketch and make drawings as part of their
studies.
Although my example above testifies that
drawing is beneficial in learning situations,
it also suggests that drawings can have
many different purposes and should be used
with specific pedagogical aims. Shaaron Ains-
worth, Vaughan Prain and Russell Tytler con-
sidered in a review of current research in
Science several reasons to introduce drawing
‘alongside writing, reading, and talking as a
key element in science education.’ They
classified these as () Drawing to enhance
engagement; () Drawing to learn to rep-
resent in science; () Drawing to reason in
science; () Drawing as a learning strategy;
() Drawing to communicate. All five cat-
egories Ainsworth, Prain and Tytler argue
have support in empirical studies. Although
they are primarily discussing learning in
science, the categorisation is also relevant
for the humanities. Of these categories, I
find ,  and  to be the most important in
art historical teaching, although all are rel-
evant. The discussion below is my reflection
 DRAWING ACTIVITIES AS PEDAGOGICAL METHOD IN ART HISTORY 89

Fig. 1. Drawing of a ‘Intuitive art history’ made by a master student in art history and visual studies, Lund University.
This student not only found her studies in art history to be primarily textual, but also had a special interest in archi-
tecture. She had not only studied art history, but also architecture.

on Ainsworth, Prain and Tytler’s categoris- most effectively counteract the dislo-
ation in relation to learning situations in art cation of the art object. One
history. problem, though, is the differences in
drawing skills among the students
and the resistance some students can
() Drawing to enhance engagement is
feel in a situation where they are
based on the idea of the benefits of
forced to draw. This, I think, is
advocating interactive, inquiry-based
especially problematic when it comes
learning. What makes it especially
to perceptual drawing, even though
interesting for art history is the situ-
what is important is not the students’
ations when the drawing activity is
drawing skill, but their engagement
in situ, directly in front of the
with the subject. This poses a chal-
artwork. Engaging with the artwork
lenge for the teacher in creating an
with direct and intense observation, I
inclusive learning milieu. When it
find to be one of the most important
comes to a-perceptual drawing, the
aspects of art historical studies. I
situation is completely different. My
think it is this kind of direct engage-
experience of a-perceptual drawing
ment with the object that can possibly
90 LUDWIG QVARNSTRÖM
exercises, as described above, is that it
is less restrictive for the students than
advocating peer-to-peer exercises in
connection to oral or written assign-
ments. In these situations, the stu-
dents can be very free in adapting
their drawings to their own ideas
and drawing skills.
() When discussing representation in
science, Ainsworth, Prain and Tytler
are mainly referring to the specific
conventions of representation in
different fields of study, as the use of
line graphs and diagrams. This can
seem irrelevant, since these kinds of
illustrations are rarely used in art
history. But, it is relevant in relation
to the importance of images as an
integrated part of an argument,
although drawings made by the
researcher or student are seldom
used in these situations. Interestingly,
if we look at other related fields of
study such as archaeology or architec-
tural history conducted by architects,
the use of drawing to represent is
much more prevalent, indicating that
we are primarily dealing with tra-
ditions within the different fields of
study. In other words, I would encou-
rage the use of drawings as part of an
argument, giving, for example, the
opportunity to emphasise specific
visual aspect etc.
() Drawing to reason in science is exem-
plified by Ainsworth, Prain and
Tytler with the understanding of
sound waves with the help of drawings
focusing on specific features in the
process. This is mainly a-perceptual
knowledge conceptualised visually,
which can of course be applied to any
academic field with the need to under-
stand complex structures, regardless of
whether they are physical or historical.
From this point of view, all kinds of
mind-maps and flow charts could be
beneficial in learning situations for
students in art history.
() Drawing as a learning strategy is often
exemplified, as do Ainsworth, Prain
and Tytler with learners drawing
what they have understood after
having read a text. This is, of course,
an excellent task, matching the
visual-spatial demands of much of
science learning. But this could also
be used as a strategy to develop the
art historian’s visual literacy by them
making drawings of artworks. Just as
the biology student makes drawings
of cells so as to be able to visually
identify different cells, the student in
art history should make drawings to
be able to identify artworks, style
element, compositional schemata
etc. This is the area where I think
our student in art history has the
most to benefit from making draw-
ings, although we have to admit that
drawing has its limitations as a
medium, emphasising the line, the
contour, and the contrasts between
light and darkness. For practical
reasons, the monochrome pencil
drawing is the most suitable technique
when making sketches of art works in
museums. Compared to polychrome
painting, a pencil drawing does not
have the same range of possibilities
to create depth. Some colours seem
to draw closer to us whilst others
seem to recede from us, creating
levels of virtual animation. In
 DRAWING ACTIVITIES AS PEDAGOGICAL METHOD IN ART HISTORY
comparison, the drawing is usually
perceived as flat. The linear effect of
drawing has the same characteristic
as the linear style identified by Wölf-
flin as opposed to the painterly style,
and thus clearly has its limitations.
In relation to artworks, including
mobile objects, film or interactions
between artist and audience, a
drawing is also problematic as a
reproductive technique. These limit-
ations tell us that the making of draw-
ings is beneficial in reproducing
certain aspects of art, most of them
formal and focusing on the linear
effects and composition, but not in
the same way as other aspects. But, I
understand these limitations as pri-
marily being in relation to pencil
drawing as a reproductive technique
and not in the same way when it
comes to making pencil drawings in
order to observe and develop the art
historians’ visual literacy. For compo-
sitional analysis, the pencil drawing is
clearly suitable. The benefits in the
detailed observation when making a
drawing I believe overshadow the
limitations in reproducing the
artwork in a drawing.
() Drawing to communicate is not only a
way to externalise private knowledge,
but also a way to make the students’
thinking explicit and specific. Accord-
ing to Ainsworth, Prain and Tytler,
this opens for the opportunity to
exchange and clarify meanings
between peers. In other words, draw-
ings can be used in pedagogical situ-
ations where students learn by
critiquing each other’s drawings, but
can also be used to help teachers in
91
assessment. This private knowledge I
understand as primarily concerning
a-perceptive knowledge, but I still
find it highly relevant for art history
in connection with, for example,
drawing to reason. Here again, we
should consider the potential
problem with the difference in the stu-
dents’ drawing skills discussed above
in connection with drawing to
enhance engagement, especially
when used in a peer-to-peer situation.
The example I described above with the use
of drawing in my own practice as a teacher is
in line primarily with the first and third of
Ainsworth, Prain and Tytler’s categories:
Drawing to enhance engagement and
Drawing to reason, but also, to a lesser
extent, category two and the subsequent
seminar, discussing the students drawings, is
clearly in line with category five. When I first
introduced drawing activities in my teaching,
I did not have great expectations of the stu-
dents’ engagement in these activities, but I
was wrong. All my students have so far
taken the drawing tasks very seriously. I do
not make this judgment based on the quality
of the drawing (some of the students’
drawing skills are obviously much better
than others), but based on their engagement
in the task and ability to reason about their
own drawings. If students also make sketches
of artworks during excursions, we could prob-
ably enhance the direct engagement with the
artefacts and consequently counteract the dis-
location of the object at the same time as they
are recording what they see with close
observations.
Within art history and visual studies, the
emphasis on understanding art as signs
within a social system, an art world or more
92 LUDWIG QVARNSTRÖM
generally a network of artistic practices, dom-
inates. Especially the more semiotically
oriented understandings, based on linguistic
models, pay very little attention to the
medium and the making. My intention here
is not to question this emphasis, but to
remind us not to forget the medium and the
making and the importance of the direct
encounter with the object. Even though I do
not think images can be adequately described
in words on the level that pictures always
possess residue of ‘meaningless’ marks that
cannot be apprehended as signs, a plea for
close observation with a pencil in your hand
does not necessarily lead to that path – we
do not have to go that far. My emphasis on
the direct encounter with the art object and
close observation is, in other words, not a
plea for an anti-semiotic approach. Herein
lies no contradiction, as making drawings in
conjunction with textual notes would, for
example, be very beneficial in the study of ico-
nography. I would also like to make clear that,
although I believe that drawing is essential for
our understanding and conceptualisation of
art history (or any other academic field), I do
not claim it to be the only exclusive data col-
lecting tool of importance, but there is rather
a need for a better understanding and more
pedagogical research in the field. Science edu-
cation researchers have long recommended
triangulation of multiple methods and
sources of data collection in order to offer
the best possible way to understand what is
happening within a given context, although
visual literacy is seldom emphasised. I conse-
quently think we should treat drawing as an
equal part in a multimodal discursive practice
alongside reading, writing and speaking about
art, and to do so we need to encourage our stu-
dents to make drawings.
Acknowledgment
This article was written as part of the research
project ‘Skissen som konstvetenskaplig metod’,
which has received support from Erik Philip-Sören-
sens stiftelse.
Funding
This work was supported by Erik Philip-Sörensens
Stiftelse.
Endnotes
. Paul Valéry in ‘Seeing and Copying’, cited in David
Rosand, Drawing Acts: Studies in Graphic Expression and
Representation, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
, p. .
. Marc Prensky, “Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants Part
”, On the Horizon, No. , , pp. –.
. Barbara Maria Stafford, Good Looking: Essays on the
Virtue of Images, Cambridge & London: MIT Press, .
Especially chapter  ‘The Visualization of Knowledge
from the Enlightment to Postmodernism’.
. Se for example Brian S. Baigrie, ed., Picturing Knowledge:
Historical and Philosophical Problems Concerning the Use
of Art in Science, Toronto: Univ. of Toronto Press, ;
Eugene S. Ferguson, “The Mind’s Eye: Nonverbal
Thought in Technology”, Leonardo, , No. , .
. Horst Bredekamp, Darwins Korallen. Die frühen
Evolutionsdiagramme und die Tradition der
Naturgeschichte, Berlin: Wagenbach, . English
translation from Keith Moxey, “Visual Studies and the
Iconic Turn”, Journal of Visual Culture, , No. , , p.
. https://doi.org/./.
. Omar W. Nasim, Observing by Hand: Sketching the
Nebulae in the Nineteenth Century, Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, .
. Se for example Dana Arnold and Stephen Bending, eds.,
Tracing Architecture: The Aesthetics of Antiquarianism,
Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, .
. James Elkins, Our Beautiful, Dry, and Distant Texts:
Art History as Writing, University Park, PA: Pennsylvania
State University Press, , pp. –; James Elkins, What
Painting Is: How to Think about Oil Painting, Using the
Language of Alchemy, New York: Routledge, , p.  f.
. Elkins, , p. .
. Frederick N. Bohrer, “Photographic Perspectives:
Photography and the Institutional Formation of Art
History”, in Art History and Its Institutions: Foundations
of a Discipline, ed. Elizabeth Mansfield, London &
New York: Routledge, , p. .
 DRAWING ACTIVITIES AS PEDAGOGICAL METHOD IN ART HISTORY
. Hans Dam Christensen, “The Repressive Logic of a
Profession? On the Use of Reproductions in Art History”,
Konsthistorisk Tidskrift, , No. , , p. .
. Dam Christensen, .
. Dam Christensen, .
. Amelia Jones, “‘Presence’ in Absentia: Experiencing
Performance as Documentation”, Art Journal, , No. ,
, https://doi.org/./.
. I am here comparing with reproductions in other media as
in art historical texts books and other kinds of
photographical reproductions as digital projections in
lectures etc., and not for example a full-scale copy.
. Christensen, , p. .
. Torsten Weimarck, ed., Design och konst: texter om
gränser och överskridande. Del I. Texter före , Kairos,
:, Stockholm: Raster Förlag, , pp. –.
. Many of these educations continued until late th and
early twentieth-century, but only few of them are still active
today. Uppsala University, Sweden, still has a drawing
master (ritmästare) but the drawing exercises at Uppsala
University has never been part of the education in art
history. For the history of the exercitii in drawing at Lund
University in Sweden see Johan Cederlund, Ritmästarna
vid Lunds Universitet, Publications of the new society of
letters at Lund , Lund: Lund University Press, .
. Trevor Fawcett, “Visual Facts and the Nineteenth-
Century Art Lecture”, Art History, , No. , December
, pp. –; Wolfgang M. Freitag, “Early Uses of
Photography in the History of Art”, Art Journal, , No. ,
Winter / , pp. –.
. Trevor Fawcett, “Graphic Versus Photographic in the
Nineteenth-Century Reproduction”, Art History, , No. ,
June , p. .
. Fawcett, , p. ; Freitag, , p. .
. Ralph Lieberman, “The Art-Historical Photograph as
Fiction: The Pretense of Objectivity”, in Fictions of Art
History, ed. Mark Ledbury, New Haven and London: Yale
University Press, , p. .
. Freitag, , p. .
. Elizabeth Sears, “Eye Training: Goldschmidt/Wölfflin”, in
Adolph Goldschmidt (–): Normal Art History Im
. Jahrhundert, ed. Gunnar Brands and Heinrich Dilly,
Weimar: Verlag und Datenbank für
Geisteswissenschaften, , p. .
. Cited in Freitag, , . My italicizing.
. Sears, , p. ; Hans Pettersson [Hayden],
“Konsthistoria som universitetsdisciplin”, in  kapitel om
konsthistoriens historia i Sverige, ed. Britt-Inger Johansson
and Hans Pettersson [Hayden], Stockholm: Raster Förlag,
, p. .
. Cited in Lieberman, , p. .
. Lieberman, .
93
. Lieberman, .
. Lieberman, .
. Lieberman, .
. I have not made any systematic inquiries through
questionnaire and base this proposition on my own
experience and my meeting with students and teachers
from several different Universities in Sweden and abroad
over the last  years as student and professional art
historian. I have not either found any documentation of
the use of drawing as pedagogical method in recent years.
. I am here specifically discussing educations in art history
at Universities. Compared to art historical education at
Fine Art educations or at educations in Architecture the
situation is probably different.
. Freitag, , p. .
. Hypothetically I would say this happened in the years of
the large educational reforms in the late s and as a
result of the expanding student groups since then in
combination with the emergence of New Art History in
the s and s. But, this requires a lot more
investigation than can be done here.
. W. J. T. Mitchell, “Visual Literacy or Literary Visualcy?”,
in Visual Literacy, ed. James Elkins, New York & London:
Routledge, , pp. –.
. Prensky, .
. Justine C. Bell, “Visual Literacy Skills of Students in
College-Level Biology: Learning Outcomes Following
Digital or Hand-Drawing Activities”, Canadian Journal for
the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, , No. , ,
pp. –, https://doi.org/./cjsotl-rcacea...;
Eva Brumberger, “Visual Literacy and the Digital Native:
An Examination of the Millennial Learner”, Journal of
Visual Literacy, , No. ,  January , pp. –.
. Paul Crowther, What Drawing and Painting Really Mean:
The Phenomenology of Image and Gesture, New York;
Routledge, , p. .
. For a critical appraisal of the research field embodied
cognition see Lawrence A. Shapiro, Embodied Cognition,
New York: Routledge, . See also Margaret Wilson,
“Six Views of Embodied Cognition”, Psychonomic Bulletin
& Review, , No. , , pp. –.
. Angela C. Brew and Michelle L. Fava, “Drawing
Connections: New Directions in Drawing and Cognition
Research”, in DRN Conference Presentation. ..,
, , https://www.academia.edu//Brew_A._
Kantrowitz_A._and_Fava_M.__Drawing_
Connections_new_directions_in_drawing_and_
cognition_research.
. Shaaron Ainsworth, Vaughan Prain, and Russell Tytler,
“Drawing to Learn in Science”, Science, , No. , 
August , pp. –, https://doi.org/./
science..
. Incorporating proper drawing exercises, as Heinrich
Wölfflin did, could of course make the students more
94 LUDWIG QVARNSTRÖM
confident in drawing and encourage drawing activities on
excursions. For this, we, as teachers in art history,
certainly have a lot to learn from teaching in fine arts and
the pedagogical development at Museums in recent years
(not the least when it comes to museum pedagogy for
schoolchildren).
. For an empirical study of the benefits of drawing
compared to the use of computers among biology students
see Bell, .
. For a very compelling and interesting argument against the
assumption that images can be adequately described in words
see James Elkins, On Pictures and the Words That Fail Them,
Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, .
Summary
In recent years the availability of digital
reproductions of present and past images has
increased significantly, in many ways
facilitating teaching in art history. Students
of art history of today live in a society
dominated by visual media and are supposed
to be particularly adept to communicate
through digital media. This seems as an ideal
situation for teaching art history, and the use
of drawing as pedagogical tool for students
therefore seems to be irrelevant. This article
describes the situation as more complex and
problematic, due to the dislocation of the art
object within the art historical knowledge
system. In the article, the author also argues
for the integration of drawing activities in art
historical education as an important part in
the multimodal discursive practice that art
historical studies should be, alongside
reading, writing, and speaking about art.
Ludwig Qvarnström
Department of Arts and Cultural Sciences,
Division of Art History and Visual Studies,
Lund University, Lund, Sweden
E-mail: ludwig.qvarnstrom@kultur.lu.se