Performing Artwork in Nature: The Praxis of Holism in a Rural Village of Nepal

Abstract

This article attempts to explore how art-based holistic insights could be connected with culture, nature and spirituality. Throughout an art-based ethnographic inquiry it has been tried to construct meaning how a simple but a sample art-based activities, especially collaborative artwork performed by children from different culture and communities and art-based farming, can play a role as a means of combating poverty through generating income. As an art and design teacher in a rural area of Nepal, I have tried to explore epistemological and ontological premises of Eastern and Western philosophies of religious and cultural traditions connecting to nature, culture, fine arts, and human civilizations on the one hand. On the other hand, multidimensional problems of human living can be addressed by knowledge and skills acquired through holistic educational practice from the very beginning of child development. I believe, holistic pedagogical practices may enable every child to reimagine their culture, nature, and spirituality through differently performed nature-and-human-centered artworks illustrating their feelings on culture, nature and spirituality that helps them to reconstruct universal humanity and promotes peaceful living at the end.