Journal of Applied Arts & Health - Volume 4, Issue 1, 2013

This introduction to the second part of a special issue on ‘Opportunities and challenges in art-based research’ proposes critical examination as a way to advance this increasingly recognized approach to research that nevertheless elicits resistance and hesitation within applied arts professions. Art-based research is defined as the use of personal expression in various art forms as a primary mode of enquiry. These studies may accompany or include the artistic expressions of others but their unique feature is the making of art by the researcher.

Philosophy, art-based research and the various forms of arts therapy have deep affinities. Some aspects of this affinity are to be found in ideas developed by such very different thinkers as John Dewey, Michael Polanyi, and Susanne Langer. Dewey’s reflections on the matrices of enquiry, Polanyi’s on the nature of tacit integrations, and Langer’s on the heuristic fertility of images allow us to develop conceptual tools for understanding constitutive matrices of forms of self-understanding

Artistic improvisation with its emphasis on unanticipated actions is explored as a method of research and as a way of creating new knowledge

This article draws upon the author’s experience of using art-based research to develop historical understanding. It considers how artistic enquiry, specifically creative writing, presents opportunities to explore aspects of human experience that one cannot examine within the disciplinary conventions of historical scholarship. Yet the article also considers the challenges of creating art that is responsible to history, encouraging like-minded artists to reflect upon questions of artistic intent, integrative research methodologies, creative license and the formation of collective memory

This article questions the notions of fiction as truth in research and the role that visual art can play in this enquiry. Grounded in the author’s work, in the context of political violence, the article suggests that there are multiple ways of knowing, and the use of art allows for the possibility of exploring that which may be implicit, largely unspoken, and at times not easily accessible. This potential for images to make explicit that which is not yet understood, and the potential for imagination to bridge between the enquiry and the art form, is explored. In addition, the role that art can play at different stages of research is considered – that is, how the arts can inform the research process, how they can enhance information gathering, data collection and the possibilities of data representation

Within research, subjectivity is viewed as authentic or biased. Similarly, objectivity is characterized as either rational or distant. These descriptions remove nuances within each position. Rather than narrowly adopt either stance, art-based research involves the careful partnering of embracing subjectivity and relativizing objectivity. Examples from the author’s own art-based research illustrate these points

Much of the work of artists relies on tacit or inert understanding of their craft and consequently communicating this knowledge is not necessarily easy or straightforward. This presents many challenges for art-based researchers. It also presents teaching and learning challenges involved in developing appropriate education and training to prepare artists. Arts practitioners have ways of knowing about themselves as ‘artists’ and it is argued in this commentary that these have grown out of their own deep and personally significant experiences. The ways in which this knowledge is rendered also appears to be based in practical experience – that is, in particular communities of practice. Artists may typically express values and concepts that are practice based, are difficult to express in theoretical terms and reflect what is deemed by them as desirable or preferable conditions for the execution of their art form. Socially and artistically constructed ways of knowing are formed in practice and through practice as craft-based meanings. Craft-based ways of knowing are founded on particular meanings inherent in practice that are often difficult to communicate. By drawing upon the author’s own research into practical actor training, this exposition attempts to capture the particular types of knowledge artists possess and why these may present challenges for researchers in using more open-ended methodologies whilst ensuring they provide validity. In doing so, this exposition also examines the fundamental question of what represents ‘evidence’ in art-based research – knowing what is known

This article discusses the potential for learning in organizations with and from artists that lies in engaging with the uncertainty and generativity of experiencing ‘not-knowing’. The organization’s search for answers is engaged by the artists undertaking a search for questions in their process of exploring the foreign physical and social context. Principles and issues related to the broader practice of art-based research are identified by drawing on research into artistic interventions in organizations, where artists are invited into organizations to help develop new ways of seeing and doing things.

This article explores faculty and doctoral student perspectives on using art-based research throughout the research journey. The process of discovery through art is highlighted. Staying connected to art-making and the innate knowing that art-based research holds was fully supported by the mentor as the student deeply immersed herself into this process

Can I really do an art-based study for my dissertation? Will that really count? Will anyone take me seriously as a researcher when I look for a position? How can I make my art-based enquiry fit into a recognizable form that my committee members and colleagues will accept as legitimate research? This article illuminates the challenges faced by graduate students who are inspired by art-based research (ABR), but who are studying at institutions where there are no established art-based researchers to serve as mentors. This article provides a doctoral student’s perspective into the challenges and accompanying opportunities that are present when conducting a dissertation at a research institution

Artistic expression serves to explicate our felt sense – or embodied knowing. This article discusses and demonstrates how both direct experience and artistic expression are necessary to convey dimensions of experiential meaning, not accessible through words alone or others’ authority. The application of Focusing, felt sense and the arts throughout different phases of art-based research is presented, along with the challenge of using self-enquiry, as a research tool

This article demonstrates the challenges and opportunities of engaging art materials as an intimate mode of enquiry. Painting is used to investigate the writer’s biases and resistance towards research itself and to explore the method of ‘response art’. Using images to venture into unfamiliar territory, the writer excavates her preconceived attitudes and gains a deep understanding of her relationship to research. This work helps her reconcile artistic ways of investigation with research, strengthening her ability to understand and engage a range of creative and traditional methods of enquiry

This article explores the combination of artistic enquiry and dance, or as L. Hervey Wadsworth calls it embodied artistic enquiry (2012). The challenges and opportunities to researchers combining the two are discussed. It is argued that this form of enquiry provides creative seekers of knowledge with possibilities for greater understanding of our experience and the world through the arts