«The cultural rucksack»: passive presence or active formation?

Abstract

Based on the experiences from ”Den kulturelle skolesekken” (The cultural rucksack) – a national effort which ensures that every pupil in Norway gets the opportunity to experience professional art and culture of various kinds – this article takes a closer look at art as aesthetic experience. Based on texts by the philosophers Jacques Rancière and John Dewey, the article examines the educational potential of aesthetic experience as reception. From a political and, respectively, an evolutionary perspective, both Rancière and Dewey emphasize the aesthetic experience as an inner activity which is both creative and critical. The art experience is characterized not only as harmonious moments, but also as a process involving a certain tension due to the reconstruction and interpretation of what is sensed and experienced. In this way the role of the audience at school performances is understood as active formation more than passive presence.