Developing an Arts of Living

This paper outlines the necessary aspects of arts-based educational research in a study that probed the nature of caring in an arts classroom. Based on the dissertation that won the Elliot Eisner Doctoral Research Award in Art Education, the author explains how this study is a work of art, a work of education, and a work of qualitative research. This study presents deconstruction as a praxis experienced through the process of art making, wherein the researcher and her middle-level art students employ the tools of the visual arts to achieve an aesthetic space of artful living. Using the methodology of a/r/tography, the author explores how by emphasizing aesthetic engagement, being attuned to moments of lingering and states of flux in the arts classroom, and deconstructing care through art and writing, she was able to engage in a space of transformation.