*corita kent-john cage’s rules & hints for student & teachers . . .

i can’t understand why people are frightened of new ideas.
i’m frightened of the old ones . . .
john cage

one of the greatest blessings that the united states could receive in the near future would be to have her industries halted, her business discontinued, her people speechless, a great pause in her world affairs created . . . we should be hushed and silent and we should have the opportunity to learn what other people think . . .
john cage

*more about sister corita kent, here & below: http://corita.org

cage’s 10 rules and helpful hints for students and teachers

sister corita kent: immaculate heart college art department rules

in conjunction with the re-accreditation of architecture, the iD accreditation process had a rite of passage this past friday, december 19th, with an official visit from the following accreditation commission members:

professor marion digel, dean at folkwang university of the arts, essen, frg.
professor brigitte häntsch, fb asl, the university of kassel, kassel, frg.
mister kevin kuhne, m.a., referent for aqas quality systems, cologne, frg.
professor tino melzer, university of applied sciences darmstadt, darmstadt, frg.
mister tilman ruhdel, director, the construction authority for the state of baden-württemberg, baden-württemberg, frg.

the accreditation venue involved various levels of dialogue with faculty members, students and staff of the oth’s department of architecture, faculty members from the department of machine design as well as the executive administration council.

* about john cage

* an excerpt from the link above:
john milton cage jr. | september 5, 1912 – august 12, 1992 | was an american composer, music theorist, writer, and artist. a pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde . . .

many thanks to kevin lefeuvre for making me aware of this link:
some rules and hints for students and teachers, by john cage

rule one:
find a place you trust, and then try trusting it for a while.

rule two:
general duties of a student: pull everything out of your teacher;
pull everything out of your fellow students.

rule three:
general duties of a teacher: pull everything out of your students.

rule four:
consider everything an experiment.

rule five:
be self-disciplined: this means finding someone wise or smart and
choosing to follow them. to be disciplined is to follow in a good way.
to be self-disciplined is to follow in a better way.

rule six:
nothing is a mistake. there’s no win and no fail, there’s only make.

rule seven:
the only rule is work. if you work it will lead to something.
it’s the people who
do all of the work all of the time who eventually catch on to things.

rule eight:
don’t try to create and analyze at the same time.
they’re different processes.

rule nine:
be happy whenever you can manage it. enjoy yourself.
it’s lighter than you think.

rule ten:
we’re breaking all the rules. even our own rules. and how do we do that?
by leaving plenty of room for | x | quantities.

helpful hints:
• always be around.
• come or go to everything. always go to classes.
• read anything you can get your hands on.
• look at movies carefully, often.
• save everything. it might come in handy later.

* an addendum to the source of the 10 rules attributed to john cage from the website brain pickings & maria popova (thanks very much to designer & educator willy schwenzfeier doing diligence):

buried in various corners of the web is a beautiful and poignant list titled some rules for students and teachers, attributed to john cage, who passed away twenty years ago this week. the list, however, originates from celebrated artist and educator sister corita kent and was created as part of a project for a class she taught in 1967-1968. it was subsequently appropriated as the official art department rules at the college of la’s immaculate heart convent, her alma mater, but was commonly popularized by cage, whom the tenth rule cites directly. legendary choreographer merce cunningham, cage’s longtime partner and the love of his life, kept a copy of it in the studio where his company rehearsed until his death. it appears in stewart brand’s cult-classic essential whole earth catalog (stay hungry, stay foolish), published in 1986, the year kent passed away . . .

for more interesting thoughts like this please take a direct look at brain pickings:

10 rules for students, teachers & life: john cage & sister corita kent

4 comments. please leave your own below.

Matthew, this is great and much help.
Knowing you (a little), of course, the last of the helpful hints brought a biiiig smile to my face…

greetings sabine,

that’s great, i’m glad you enjoy this post . . .

ciao+matthew

Hi matthew, thank you for posting this! I have been asking myself, please pardon my ignorance, what does “x quantities” mean? Is that an expression for chance, or whatever happens spontaneously?

I would love it if someone coul clarify thia for me!

greetings elisa

i’m not quite certain what john cage meant with “x quantities” however i assume the reference is an open ended place holder that allows many individual interpretations; something like “fill in the blank.”

if you’re still interested in know more you might try asking anthony at artsy if he has access to more information on the subject

https://www.artsy.net/artist/john-cage

https://www.artsy.net/

thanks again for your comment and interest . . .

ciao+matthew

posted 21 December 2014

categories education, photos