Our leaders don’t value art enough to support it because they don’t think it’s for everyone. Opera for the truly cultured; football for the plebs. (Miranda Sawyer, The Observer,14.12.25)

NAFNET is a free member-focused forum for debate around important aspects of Fine Art education in the current climate. NAFNET takes place on Zoom and sessions are recorded and can be accessed by NAFAE members afterwards

Our April session will be presented by Jackie Goodman, Director and Founder member of Feral Art School in Hull, who will be considering why arts education is being devalued at the current time.

Arts education emerges as a central element of learning at different points in time for different reasons: Classical and Medieval; Renaissance; 16th and 19th centuries; post war (1950s and 60s); 1980s (Gulbenkian Arts in Schools Project). So why is it so difficult to embed the argument for its inclusion as an essential element of the school and higher education curriculum? Considering issues including funding, research, government values, and education priorities and structures over the last 50 years or so, how can we work towards an educational context in which the contribution of creativity and the arts to many different contexts of life is recognised and acknowledged?

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