Freshmen Orientation, Convocation, the Block Party (today), and so much more has made for an already busy but festive beginning to our school year. Be sure to attend Maeda’s great Inauguration ceremony and celebratory party along the River Walk on Friday afternoon/evening (http://www.risd.edu/president/inauguration/index.html).
The Office of Student Life asked me (Will McLoughlin, President, Student Alliance) to give some brief comments to the freshmen class this past Saturday on why it was important to join the organization. I have included below the text of my remarks.
Enjoy. I look forward to seeing you all at our FIRST MEETING OCTOBER 8. 5PM. TAP. Dinner provided.
Hello.
My name is Will McLoughlin. I have the pleasure of serving the undergraduate student body as President of the student government, or what we here at RISD call Student Alliance, or “SA”.
To be perfectly frank, I am speaking before you to put-in a plug for SA in the hope that you’ll come to our monthly meetings to discuss important campus issues, and get free dinner while doing so!
In June of 1969, the Art Workers Coalition distributed a flyer that asked many fundamental questions about the role of the artist and his or her art within society. I’d like to share some of those questions with you:
Does money Manipulate Art?
Do artists manipulate art?
Why do artists allow themselves to be manipulated?
What does the artist want besides subsistence?
Is the artist’s final goal money?
If not, what is it?
Does the artist care what anybody thinks about his work?
Who is the artist’s public?
Is being in museums enough for an artist?
Are artists in galleries making art or commodities?
Should art be sold? Should art be given away?
Should art be free?
Can artists be free?
The Art Workers Coalition was a reaction to the many social issues facing American culture in the 1960s. The organization inflamed counterculture, antiestablishment and antiauthoritarian sentiments, and general outrage expressed through the antiwar movement.
YES, there is a lofty undertone to this excerpt that art, in an idealistic way, can be a moral force on the world. But the questions the AWC were asking 40 years ago will, in some manner, also be asked of you, or asked by you, in your time here at RISD.
That motivating energy — to question everything, and to thereby become an informed and active member of one’s community — is what makes the AWC so pertinent to all of you, the future artists and designers of the world, the freshmen class at RISD.
Months from now, perhaps weeks, or maybe even days, when the sometimes harsh realities of our school’s academic expectations set in; and when you’re breathing charcoal night and day; and when you’re walking from studio to the Quad looking more like coal miners than students; and when you find yourself sitting at the MET with friends long after finishing your meal, and you’re complaining about some problem you’re having on campus — because, as I think you’ll find, our school isn’t perfect — I urge you at that moment to consider what it means to question the situation and the process, and to think about potential solutions, and about how to be a pro-active member of our community.
As artists and designers here at RISD, we have at our fingertips every single opportunity open to us to literally, “make” change, and there are few gifts greater than the education you’ll receive here. As artists and designers, we are inherently engaged members of our community: we are expected to be forces of creation, growth and restoration. So the tacit consent you grant through silence and inactivity is really indefensible.
As a fellow member of the student body, I urge each of you to be an active force here on campus. If you see a problem, or think of a solution, speak out. SA is one of many avenues by which you can do so.
We meet Wednesday, October 8th. 5pm.
Memorial Hall. The Tap Room.
Dinner Provided.
Thank you for your time, and I know you will make the next four years some of the best of your life!