Talent
Passion, Love and Empathy
The ArtEZ Fashion Design Master's programme in Arnhem has been radically renewed under the leadership of Pascale Gatzen. Since 2017, Gatzen has been working on a curriculum that offers students as much freedom and support as possible to shape their own education. What are her views on talent development, what roles do education and she herself as a teacher play in it?
The aim of the new curriculum is to allow participants in the master's programme to function as autonomously as possible, so that they can continue to develop and practice independently after completing their studies, says Pascale Gatzen. 'We aren't focused on results. There's no need for anything to be finished by a specific time. However, the students have to give two public presentations every semester. But there aren't any predetermined quality criteria for these either. The content must primarily be relevant to the goal they set themselves at the time.'
'The only criterion that truly matters is the willingness of the participant to surrender to their own learning process, to shape it themselves and to develop autonomously. And I have to say that this is going really well.'
In the early spring of 2019, two students at the Open Air Museum in Arnhem will plough a field where they will cultivate flax. One will sow a 25m2 field in the shape of a T-shirt, which will yield enough flax to produce one T-shirt. He will document the entire process. The other student will investigating natural methods to process flax, which is a somewhat unmanageable material. She is currently experimenting with a fermentation process. Yet another student is working with children between the ages of eight and thirteen, the life-phase when they begin to form their own identities. Her project is about self-expression: the children learn how they can dress themselves by making their own clothes instead of buying them.
The experience of autonomy that Gatzen wants to give participants in the master's programme is not intended to be a purely individual and self-centred process. It's important to her that the students have the desire to make a positive contribution to the world. Under the name _Fashion Held in Common_, participants are invited to approach fashion as a means for social, cultural, ecological and economic change. When it comes to accepting students, it isn't the quality of their portfolio, but their research proposal that is the deciding factor, says Gatzen. 'We consider whether someone can think from a broader perspective. It is especially important for us that everyone we enrol is willing to use their talents and qualities not only for their own development but also to benefit others. Additionally, we expect the participants to be willing to engage in an unconventional learning process.'
Naturally, questions arise when one determine one's own learning process: how do I structure my practice if there are no deadlines, how do I find my flow, how do I motivate myself from within? To help students find their way in this, Gatzen introduced the method of Nonviolent Communication (NVC). 'This method assumes that everything we do comes from a certain need,' she explains. 'That need is by definition beautiful and good, but its expression, the strategy to satisfy that need, can be negative, even aggressive. By looking for those underlying motives, you can create understanding and connectivity. Together with the participants, we examine the needs and values on which they act.'
This approach means that talent development in the master's programme has a very different character than in the bachelor's in fashion design at ArtEZ, which is still focused on training fashion designers. 'In the bachelor admissions committee you mainly assess whether a person has the potential to become a good fashion designer,' says Gatzen. 'You are looking for a certain virtuosity in relation to a specific medium, which applies just as much to graphic design or playing a musical instrument as it does to fashion design.'
'But not everyone who chooses a fashion education has the potential to become a successful fashion designer. Some may have a very different skill that doesn't suit a training aimed at delivering the next great fashion talent. Maybe that person is much better at making clothes, or more of a performer.'
That's why Gatzen mainly focuses on the underlying motives of students in the master's programme. 'Everyone has a gift, something that is a part of you, that you want to share with the world. Where and how this plays out doesn't really matter. My experience with teaching is that if I can get someone to make contact with their real passion, the learning process actually happens automatically.'
Through her participation in the 'friends of light' cooperative, which produces clothing on a small scale and in a sustainable manner, Gatzen has experienced the value of a collaboration in which different talents work together on an equal footing: the farmer who produces wool or linen, the spinner who makes yarn from it, the person who handles the administration, and Gatzen herself who brings in her design experience - together they determine the quality of a jacket. One cannot do without the other, which is also what Gatzen wants her students to experience.
Pascale Gatzen left the art academy as a promising talent. Together with a group of fellow students from the Arnhem fashion school, including Viktor&Rolf, Saskia van Drimmelen and Lucas Ossendrijver, she presented herself under the name Le Cri Neérlandais in Paris. 'I've done my utmost to live up to the image of an ambitious fashion designer - and with success.' That is, until the end of her twenties, when she ran out of ideas. 'I spent a year in New York and had to prepare two collection presentations, one in Paris and one in New York. But I experienced a block, my body refused completely. For a while I had already been feeling that the mantle of the successful fashion designer no longer suited me, that I had grown out of it. But I also encountered a narcissistic mechanism within myself: the need to prove time and time again how good and special I was. If I wasn't the best, I really wouldn't know who I was.' Eventually she discovered that she primarily wanted to contribute by collaborating with others and found her true calling in education. Before coming to Arnhem, she worked at the Parsons School of Design in New York for ten years.
This personal experience does not mean that Gatzen will discourage students from entering the world of fashion. 'In the beginning there was some speculation that I wouldn't like fashion anymore. That's absolutely not the case: I love fashion very much! We have a student who really wants to work at a major fashion house. I would never hold someone back. I want the students to discover the energy to move on. There should be no moralistic judgement in a learning process. We're not focused on a fixed value system, because it doesn't lead to innovation. It's just that I acknowledge and value very different qualities in fashion than those that currently prevail in our society. I view fashion as an inspirational phenomenon that takes place between people, I appreciate the beauty of a well-designed garment. I still make clothes with "friends of light", but that has nothing more to do with proving myself on an international catwalk. If a jacket is a good product by virtue of its material and design, it will benefit all the people involved in its creation and the ecosystem as whole.'
It grieves her that people in our society are always expected to meet a standard. 'My nephew was diagnosed with an autistic disorder. He is such a beautiful, wonderful young man, but at school he is constantly confronted with his limitations. My wish is for everyone to be appreciated and to be able to contribute in their own way. The tragedy of our society is that we have established institutions that determine the standards that people have to comply with. People are different, each of us is beautiful and wonderful in our own way, and that's the most precious gift we have. Here in Arnhem, I try to facilitate a world in which this is possible. This is all about connecting, with yourself and with others, about passion, love and empathy: if we become aware of our needs, we will better recognise the needs of others.'
Interview: Lotte Haagsma