I say, it is all about our minds

Oscar Wilde said, “Art is not to be taught in Academies. It is what one looks at, not what one listens to, that makes the Artist. The real schools should be the streets”.

It is not what one looks at or listens to that makes the artist, it Is the way one expresses what it looks like and listens to.
A person becomes an artist when it gets to put together images in its mind, sounds, feelings and colors and its able to express them altogether in one master piece.

I think both, academies and streets, make up the whole identity of the artist. Not all academies teach the same way and not all the streets necessarily inspire artists to create. I think that the important matter here is the situation in which the artist is involved.
In my personal experience, streets have been great teachers for me. Outside the borders of your daily routine and the street of your house exist thousands of wonders, and I’m not talking about just situations or graffiti, there are people in every corner from who you can learn, hidden artists who I like to call: life teachers, like one that I found at the plant market of Xochimilco.
He was an old man, he had been a bricklayer and now he makes extraordinary sculptures made from concrete. Even though he never assisted a secondary school, he was brilliant, and he was a real artist. I learned so much that day, even when I made my way back home, I couldn’t help to shed some tears of happiness for what that man had taught me: In art, everything is possible and a real artist is humble, selfless. It was just beautiful.

Now, is true that you wouldn’t find this kind of experiences in academies, but I believe that those institutions help you find coherence to those experiences and ideas, they help you get more knowledge and technique, and it gives you the power to create fine art. Academies are made to improve your abilities.

Is the way one expresses what it looks at and listens to that makes the artist.
Streets are inspiration, academies are tools.
But the mind of the people and its expression is what makes up the artist.
The mind of the artist is art itself.