Training Artistic Reflexivity in Visual Artists
With over 30 images from her thesis exhibition, Reflex.
A trans-disciplinary artist and educator (in both acting and visual art), Jennifer completed her MFA in the Interdisciplinary Masters of Art and Design program at OCAD University. Her research focus hybridized her theatre and visual art disciplines and adapted improvisational acting techniques into collaborative gestural drawing exercises for visual artists to train them to be more artistically reflexive.

How is the reflexive impulse recognized, valued and taught to the visual artist? Reflexivity is the artistic response to the idea or impulse from the brain. Training reflexivity as a tool is not about training the impulse, but about training the reflexive response to impulse. Acting pedagogy, through improvisation and repetition improves the reflexive response. Using actor-training methods that I have adapted into gestural drawing exercises, visual artists can practice responding reflexively in collaboration with others. Learning and artistry are social processes; they require embodied engagement with others to teach reflexivity and artistic individuality. This research contributes new interdisciplinary language and innovative techniques to visual artist training and identifies artistic reflexivity as a trainable part of a developing artistic process.