Reaction to 2026 Leaving Certificate Art, Visual Studies (Higher Level) by Declan Kelly, Art teacher at The Institute of Education.
- A thoughtfully contemporary paper that allowed students to wax lyrical
- While many questions were lovely, there were challenges placed in the most popular essay topics
The subtitle of Section is “Today’s World” and the array of questions lived up to that moniker. While the questions were short, each offered a snippet of ongoing discussions around the position of art is society. Many students will have recognised Banksy’s 2025 mural “The Royal Courts of Justice” as an act of real-time social commentary. Elsewhere questions on the Basic Income for the Arts Scheme which becomes permanent in 2026 asked students to think about the arts place within the social fabric and how we as a society want to ensure it is preserved. One aspect of this paper I particular like is how it seems aimed at making them reflect on conversations that ripple out of the classroom or exam hall. Whether as producers, consumers, or simply appreciators of art it is important that these students have the tools to advocate for the value of this human endeavour amidst deepening discourse on A.I.
In the later stages of the paper, the SEC seems to have listened to some of the criticisms of last year’s paper. That is not to say that all questions were easy, but students will have found relatively cloud-free vistas into their studied fields. Section B on Europe and the Wider world will be viewed as positive by most students. The Baroque question was beautifully open-ended and the prompt to discuss “grandeur” will have let them wax lyrical. Opportunities abounded in many of the other topics as Romanesque and Gothic question was generous while the option for Realism, Impressionism and Post-Impressionism could be approached five different ways and still make sense. The final question on Post 1960 art will challenge students to think on their feet and craft a definition for “social issue” that fits their studied pieces, but many will have been able to do so adroitly. However, many teachers and students tend to gravitate towards the Renaissance which was the toughest question in this set. While the topic covers a huge range of material, the question zoomed in on sculpture exclusively. Students should still know their artists and key works but constrained as painting tends to loom large in their memory.
A similar phenomenon occurs in Section 3: “Ireland and its place in the wider world” as the exam setter places the most difficult question in the most popular topic: The Georgian Period. Rather than been able to simple discuss the works of this period, the question directed the students to the influences upon the art and architecture, thus funnelling them into a very strict approach to the material. In contrast the other questions were very comfortable in how they allowed students to shape their responses. The Pre-Christian question was as an accessible as it has ever been and students will have been able to cover every aspect they revised. Last year the question on Post 1960s art was tricky in its restrictive focus on “lens-based” but this has been replaced with a discussion of identity, a universal theme that can be adapted in a plethora of ways.
While some might feel the topics that they covered in class proved trickier than others, the questions were laid out in such a manner to lead the students to fully coherent essays. There was nothing obscure or obtuse in the questions. A student who really thought about how art relates to the human experience and in particular the experience of the modern person will have found this paper a gift.