The study and practice of the visual arts function as a keystone for understanding and analyzing the content areas of science, math, history, and language at the Stevens School.  Humans have created visual art at least since they organized into groups.  Whether by scratching hieroglyphics on stone, building temples, painting murals, telling stories, weaving tapestries, sculpting images or decorating the tools used in daily life, people have expressed their values, hopes, and fears through art.

            Over the centuries art and artists have provided work that both affirms and questions the values of the society from which they come.  Students examine the work and analyze it with regard to the time and events that produced it.  Working with art in this way adds a rich layer of understanding the political and social movements that shape nations.  Students connect the visual image to the poetic image to the historical image and circle back again, broadening and deepening their perspective of the world around them.

            The academic impact of deep art experiences is revealed in the study entitled Critical Evidence:  How the Arts Benefit Student Achievement commissioned by the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies and the Arts Education Partnership.  Joining art study with other core content areas allows for what cognitive psychologists identify as “transfer”:  the notion that “learning in one context assists learning in a different context.”  Our students have distinguished themselves in contests, in classrooms, and in community service.  We believe that it is the systemic integration of art and art history that has developed their thoughtful response to school and society.

            The sketch program asks students to create a drawing per week based on the classical principle of using light to create form, continuously developing and applying techniques passed down from the old masters."