MANUAL LABOUR--THE POTTER'S ART AND BUILDING
Manual labour is distinguished from manual gymnastics by the fact that
the object of the latter is to exercise the hand, and the former, to
_accomplish a determinate work_, being, or simulating, a socially useful
object. The one perfects the individual, the other enriches the world;
the two things are, however, connected because, in general, only one who
has perfected his own hand can produce a useful product.
I have thought wise, after a short trial, to exclude completely
Froebel's exercises, because weaving and sewing on cardboard are ill
adapted to the physiological state of the child's visual organs where
the powers of the accommodation of the eye have not yet reached complete
development; hence, these exercises cause an _effort_ of the organ which
may have a fatal influence on the development of the sight. The other
little exercises of Froebel, such as the folding of paper, are exercises
of the hand, not work.
There is still left plastic work,--the most rational among all the
exercises of Froebel,--which consists in making the child reproduce
determinate objects in clay.
In consideration, however, of the system of liberty which I proposed, I
did not like to make the children _copy_ anything, and, in giving them
clay to fashion in their own manner, I did not direct the children to
_produce useful things_; nor was I accomplishing an educative result,
inasmuch as plastic work, as I shall show later, serves for the study
of the psychic individuality of the child in his spontaneous
manifestations, but not for his education.
I decided therefore to try in the "Children's Houses" some very
interesting exercises which I had seen accomplished by an artist,
Professor Randone, in the "School of Educative Art" founded by him. This
school had its origin along with the society for young people, called
_Giovinezza Gentile_, both school and society having the object of
educating youth in gentleness towards their surroundings--that is, in
respect for objects, buildings, monuments: a really important part of
civil education, and one which interested me particularly on account of
the "Children's Houses," since that institution has, as its fundamental
aim, to teach precisely this respect for the walls, for the house, for
the surroundings.
Very suitably, Professor Randone had decided that the society of
_Giovinezza Gentile_ could not be based upon sterile theoretical
preachings of the principles of citizenship, or upon moral pledges taken
by the children; but that it must proceed from an artistic education
which should lead the youth to appreciate and love, and consequently
respect, objects and especially monuments and historic buildings. Thus
the "School of Educative Art" was inspired by a broad artistic
conception including the reproduction of objects which are commonly met
in the surroundings; the history and pre-history of their production,
and the illustration of the principal civic monuments which, in Rome,
are in large measure composed of archaeological monuments. In order the
more directly to accomplish his object, Professor Randone founded his
admirable school in an opening in one of the most artistic parts of the
walls of Rome, namely, the wall of Belisarius, overlooking the Villa
Umberto Primo--a wall which has been entirely neglected by the
authorities and by no means respected by the citizens, and upon which
Randone lavished care, decorating it with graceful hanging gardens on
the outside, and locating within it the School of Art which was to shape
the _Giovinezza Gentile_.
Here Randone has tried, very fittingly, to rebuild and revive a form of
art which was once the glory of Italy and of Florence--the potter's art,
that is, the art of constructing vases.
The archaeological, historical, and artistic importance of the vase is
very great, and may be compared with the numismatic art. In fact the
first object of which humanity felt the need was the _vase_, which came
into being with the utilisation of fire, and before the discovery of the
_production_ of fire. Indeed the first food of mankind was cooked in a
vase.
One of the things most important, ethnically, in judging the
civilisation of a primitive people is the grade of perfection attained
in _pottery_; in fact, the _vase_ for domestic life and the axe for
social life are the first sacred symbols which we find in the
prehistoric epoch, and are the religious symbols connected with the
temples of the gods and with the cult of the dead. Even to-day,
religious cults have sacred vases in their Sancta Sanctorum.
People who have progressed in civilisation show their feeling for art
and their aesthetic feeling also in _vases_ which are multiplied in
almost infinite form, as we see in Egyptian, Etruscan, and Greek art.
The vase then comes into being, attains perfection, and is multiplied in
its uses and its forms, in the course of human civilisation; and the
history of the vase follows the history of humanity itself. Besides the
civil and moral importance of the vase, we have another and practical
one, its literal _adaptability_ to every modification of form, and its
susceptibility to the most diverse ornamentation; in this, it gives free
scope to the individual genius of the artist.
Thus, when once the handicraft leading to the construction of vases has
been learned (and this is the part of the progress in the work, learned
from the direct and graduated instruction of the teacher), anyone can
modify it according to the inspiration of his own aesthetic taste and
this is the artistic, individual part of the work. Besides this, in
Randone's school the use of the potter's wheel is taught, and also the
composition of the mixture for the bath of majolica ware, and baking the
pieces in the furnace, stages of manual labour which contain an
industrial culture.
Another work in the School of Educative Art is the manufacture of
diminutive bricks, and their baking in the furnace, and the construction
of diminutive _walls_ built by the same processes which the masons use
in the construction of houses, the bricks being joined by means of
mortar handled with a trowel. After the simple construction of the
wall,--which is very amusing for the children who build it, placing
brick on brick, superimposing row on row,--the children pass to the
construction of real _houses_,--first, resting on the ground, and, then,
really constructed with foundations, after a previous excavation of
large holes in the ground by means of little hoes and shovels. These
little houses have openings corresponding to windows and doors, and are
variously ornamented in their facades by little tiles of bright and
multi-coloured majolica: the tiles themselves being manufactured by the
children.
Thus the children learn to _appreciate_ the objects and constructions
which surround them, while a real manual and artistic labour gives them
profitable exercise.
Such is the manual training which I have adopted in the "Children's
Houses"; after two or three lessons the little pupils are already
enthusiastic about the construction of vases, and they preserve very
carefully their own products, in which they take pride. With their
plastic art they then model little objects, eggs or fruits, with which
they themselves fill the vases. One of the first undertakings is the
simple vase of red clay filled with eggs of white clay; then comes the
modelling of the vase with one or more spouts, of the narrow-mouthed
vase, of the vase with a handle, of that with two or three handles, of
the tripod, of the amphora.
For children of the age of five or six, the work of the potter's wheel
begins. But what most delights the children is the work of building a
wall with little bricks, and seeing a little house, the fruit of their
own hands, rise in the vicinity of the ground in which are growing
plants, also cultivated by them. Thus the age of childhood epitomises
the principal primitive labours of humanity, when the human race,
changing from the nomadic to the stable condition, demanded of the earth
its fruit, built itself shelter, and devised vases to cook the foods
yielded by the fertile earth.