Yancha Gal no Anjou-san - Ch. 174 - Inuyama-kun Wants to Graduate

[the_Bear_from_Bearcave]

I think people should understand that the place they're going to isn't an art school the way you think it is.

It's a college prep school.

It's a place where they teach you less about how to draw and more about how to develop work that could get you into your university of choice. Think of it as mock exams for art students, if you fail that "exam" they'll let you know at the critique. Yatomi Painting Class, where both Inuyama and Toyoda came from is an actual art class where they teach techniques and fundamentals. Prep school are more advanced and starts diving into intent and expression. Prep school instructors will tell you what you are lacking, in Inuyama's case it's that his art is bland.

Teachers at prep schools are very harsh because their schools have reputations to uphold, usually on their pamphlets they would list a percentage of successful college entrants from their school. If you're not at a level where they think you might even stand a chance, they would much rather you not come at all and give that spot up to someone else more talented/hard-working. You're paying them to guide you and they're betting on you to deliver.

The teacher is harsh but right, she's not shitting on his work and she even said his composition is fine and details are clear. But she is saying that his work is not up to par for something that could get into college. It's better to weed out people who are phoning it in, save their money, save the teacher's time, and save the opportunity for someone else.

Admittedly she said she's assuming Inuyama is a slacker, but she doesn't know how hard he tries.

On a side note, one way to remedy boring still life is to increase contrast when rendering the objects. If everything is too clean and perfect then it's really not visually striking. One way Inuyama could improve is actually to render only a specific object in clear detail while leaving others more loose (but still accurate). This bias injected into the work tells the viewer what the artist is interested in and what they consider the star of the composition, hence "intention" and "meaning".

That doesn't really make it better, or right, even if it's absolutely believable to me based on what I've seen in manga/anime. The whole "we have reputation to uphold" is such a pure Asian bullshit. Let's give the brown-haired student suspension until she dies her hair black, so people don't think we're too easy on students! Someone resigned from their job from "black" company, that's not loyal and it's bad reputation, we don't hire such people! This teenage model wants to date her boyfriend, what if people start talking?

I remember my reaction to that Food Wars academy and their bragging about very few students managing to finishing it "So they get the best students as first years and they only manage to teach the few of the best of them to the end? What about all the students with potential they kicked?" and later there was that scene with Megumi almost getting kicked out due to bullshit test with not enough fresh produce for students "because in real life you'll sometime have problems with supplies", the same Megumi which later turned out to be one of the best students in the grade. But the easiest, laziest, most wasteful and cruelest method to get few elite students finishing your school is to get as many good ones as possible with bullshit "reputation", and kick them out even if they could fare much better with more guidance, so the best and most hardworking ones that were also lucky enough to not get dropped due to some bullshit are the only ones remaining, and you can tout how great your teaching is, even though hardest part of teaching is polishing rough and hidden diamonds.

The whole "you'll have it even harder later, you need to get accustomed to it" in several comments I've seen is another kind of bullshit, why not slap female students on butt or comment on their tits because they might have to deal with sexually harassing customers later on?

And the assumption about Inuyama being a slacker is just great example how her teaching method is awful, she doesn't know anything about him after few meetings, but after at first refusing to give him and half of class any critique, she's already trashing him because he might not get better later, and school has their fucking precious "reputation" to uphold. Like other people commented, if this was a teacher who already knew him for a while, this could be far better executed, but author decided to quickly turn Inuyama's art into trash, and because it would be hard (but the correct way) to show it to readers, used some random asshole sensei to give him bullshit "harsh truth" instead to tell the readers his art is getting bad.

It's very obvious that most of the people commenting on this are in high school and have no idea what any other type of teaching looks like.

Dumb-ass comment, there were plenty of people with experience with art education in this and previous chapter threads here and on Reddit, some of them did claim this is normal and expected, others said that some harsh critique is normal but trashing someone like that in front of class is some asshole bullshit, yet another folks said that they only met few professors like that and they all were awful assholes whole classes sucked. And that's only counting art education, lots of people commenting have dealt with non-art higher education, for example in STEM, and as far as I've seen, to most of them this looks like pure unhelpful bullshit. Maybe teachers in art departments have it easier to get away with that attitude, especially but not only in Asian countries, we've all seen that "are you rushing or dragging" scene from Whiplash.

 

[Coldlight]

Things got worse than I expected and Inuyama's slump continues, but I kinda hope this is where he bottoms out, so that he has nowhere but up to go next. Both his gf and his teacher's initial advice didn't work, and I feel like he got close to nailing the root of the problem but misunderstood and decided to take the opposite path...

If the root of his slump is him suppressing his horniness, which is implied to be fueling his creative talent, then someone will have to tell him (preferably Toyoda herself) that she already liked him the way he was when they started dating, and not this new prudish guy he's trying to be out of fear she'll dump him for being a perv. Of course that is assuming she has already accepted the "gross" side of him.

They also need to address the possibility they're not on the same page whenever she calls him "gross". Maybe he thinks it's an insult, but she doesn't, in the sense that she's only frankly describing him; if she already accepts the gross side of him, then it's not really an insult (so long as he knows she accepts that side of him). "You're a gross perv, but I also like that part of you" - is something that Toyoda can tell him, but it remains to be seen if that's actually true.

Anyway, Seto already has the prude role locked in in this manga, we don't need another one of him... Inuyama, don't be like that guy.

 

[bigk1ng]

The author really hates him huh? Makes him look pathetic in front of his girlfriend with the only thing hes good at

 

[CookieMonster]

So 17 yo guy is thinking about boobs and sex. Unimaginable, right? What's gross or perverted about it? Even his official girlfriend calls him gross just because virgin teen guy wants sex. No wonder Japan has demographical issues like this.

 

[the_Bear_from_Bearcave]

So 17 yo guy is thinking about boobs and sex. Unimaginable, right? What's gross or perverted about it? Even his official girlfriend calls him gross just because virgin teen guy wants sex. No wonder Japan has demographical issues like this.

Guy suddenly yelling about loving boobs to his freshly-made girlfriend and talking about how putting coins into slot is erotic is pretty weird and can be off-putting, though that's also how he is and how he got his girlfriend, and his girlfriend told him openly before accepting his confession that she's not really much into erotic stuff. They have very different approach to that stuff, but decided to date anyway, so they have to learn to deal with each other in best way together.

Problem with manga is that usually boys (and often girls as well) are either prudes terrified of sex, rarely lechers that are still terrified of sex, or asshole and often rape-y hot guys or gyaru-oh treating girls like free prostitutes. Few manga has couples that treat sexual intimacy normally, and by sexual intimacy I don't mean hand-holding, just, like, steamy making out.

 

[GreenOwlRanger]

The gall of that teacher to berate a guy that drew 2 pictures for you when he clearly feels bad. And blasting him in front of every student on top of that. Fuck her. I bet she'll get away with a "she was just doing it to bring out my potential". Fuck that. She can bite my ass.

 

[Hikineet]

Thanks for the chapter.

 

[Kushikime]

Thanks for the chapter

 

[geogio13]

Growing up is realizing that adults are just big kids playing the role of a grown up. So stand proud and stay horny Inuyama, she loves you regardless of that

“When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.” - C. S. Lewis​

 

[paela69]

inb4 Inuyama just says "fuck it" and becomes the dikko-san of the manga

 

[instant_noodle]

This isn't a technical art class. This is a class to prep you for the entrance exam for a fine art class. You're expected to already have that technical stuff handled. You're not here to illustrate, you're here to make art.

You just talk out of your ass. Even IN college you still have to attend lecture Basic Art 1, 2 and 3 where you draw fruits, vases and sculptures for months. Prep school preparing you for the entrance exam, you don't "make art" there, you gain enough skill to pass the test. Do you think everyone who attend art school gonna make classic art or something? Architecture, interior designing, graphic designing, fashion designing, illustration... all study in art prep school before going to their college as well. The hell you learn to "make art" for, if you want to be architect?

As I said, I WENT to art prep school, I know what's going on in there. Stop using your imagination as reality

THIS is what you draw in college. "Art" my ass lmao

Bonus: Here's what the exam looks like. They literally tell you to redraw a model or sculpture and rate your skill on that. Ain't no college tell you "hey make some random art for us". They grade by skills, not feeling

 

[ColdEnviousOne]

Everyone else is dumb but you're just a shit ass misogynist.

And I bet you have green hair.

 

[Gogglesluxio]

The two most egregious parts of the teacher aren't even being talked about really. Telling a student they're phoning it in is fine when you think they can be putting more of themselves into their work is fine, she could probably also communicate better. In my opinion the parts that are more important here are her telling him that "you don't need to create art to live" and that he should "stay home if you don't actually want to be here." There are two things that are implied here to me, at least in English (so if it's offbase for the Japanese tell me). The first, "you don't need to create art to live," implies that Inuyama's art does not have enough worth to validate giving his life to it. By telling him that he can live without art so he should leave if he's not actually about it, this teacher is also invalidating whatever worth and value Inuyama gave to his art. The second, "stay home if you don't actually want to be here," implies to me that the actual message "you don't want to be here, I can tell, go home." This has the teacher positing Inuyama as a slacker student who is here because of other people, despite the fact that he really isn't, meaning that the teacher has now also invalidated his efforts. Together, she has invalidated both the value of his work and the value of his effort, completely invalidating the future he saw for himself. He has now implicitly been told that no matter how hard he works, he will ultimately be nothing more than a facsimile of an artist who pretends to work hard even though his heart isn't in it and will only ever produce lackluster work. He has been told that no matter what he is a failure of an artist.

To me, these are the parts that Inuyama actually cares about. He doesn't see as being told that "apparently, I suck at drawing," he sees it as being told "apparently, I can't draw anymore." The problem, as it was put to Inuyama and as he took it, was not that his work was lackluster and subpar but that he is lackluster and subpar. Inuyama is proud of himself, he loves himself, and even if nobody else accept him he could always accept himself because he was drawing. Inuyama can only be himself because he draws but he has now been told that he is somehow unsuitable to drawing and that he doesn't need it. If Inuyama doesn't need to draw and is in fact fundamentally bad at it, then he shouldn't be himself because drawing is what he shouldn't be doing but it is also what lets him be himself. The teacher was wrong; Inuyama needs to create art to live as himself. He is giving up on what makes him himself because those are things that only deserve to exist as long as he creates, which he shouldn't do. The teacher had already told a motivated but struggling student that his work is wholly worthless and gotten him to stop wanting to create, which is already terrible, but had also, without knowing (because she doesn't know these people), told a young person trying to live that his worldview and way of life are worthless and gotten him to stop wanting to live as himself.

Even if, for some reason, this should be counted as a teaching success, this teacher is a failure of an adult for making a child believe that he is worthless and fundamentally wrong on a basic level, even if it was on accident because she was an overly critical know-nothing.

 

[CaptainSteele]

see me personally, I ain't gon let some random ass art teacher speak to me like that...

 

[story645]

I called this from the start of the arc. He can be fixed when they fuck

Like his problem isn't really that he's horny & not getting any, it's that his default is to be pervy & he thinks Toyoda isn't ok w/ that. So like even if they start messing around, he's still gonna try to tamp down his pervy about all the things side if he thinks that's what Toyoda wants.

Which flip side, like he can get his groove back w/o em screwing around if he's reassured that no really she's cool with it - which I think she is given her expression when saying "you're gross" was happy smiley. Basically the parallel to when guys are calling Anjou a slut for how she behaves/dresses, Seto always defends her in a non-judgemental "I think she's awesome and she owns this look" kinda way.

 

[CaptainSteele]

It's very obvious that most of the people commenting on this are in high school and have no idea what any other type of teaching looks like.

its more a cultural thing, i don't think most people here even have access to college prep stuff

 

[Callidus]

I wonder, if I entered the art exam and I painted the nude model in a very bizarre way, like Van Gogh or Picasso, or even worse, like StickDeath(TM) will I be accepted?

StickDeath

Ahh, another old soul.

 

[TestAddress]

So 17 yo guy is thinking about boobs and sex. Unimaginable, right? What's gross or perverted about it? Even his official girlfriend calls him gross just because virgin teen guy wants sex. No wonder Japan has demographical issues like this.

You don't say....

 

[TestAddress]

its more a cultural thing, i don't think most people here even have access to college prep stuff

I thought that college was actually a tyranny to milk parents more of their hard earned income.

 

[TestAddress]

You just talk out of your ass. Even IN college you still have to attend lecture Basic Art 1, 2 and 3 where you draw fruits, vases and sculptures for months. Prep school preparing you for the entrance exam, you don't "make art" there, you gain enough skill to pass the test. Do you think everyone who attend art school gonna make classic art or something? Architecture, interior designing, graphic designing, fashion designing, illustration... all study in art prep school before going to their college as well. The hell you learn to "make art" for, if you want to be architect?

As I said, I WENT to art prep school, I know what's going on in there. Stop using your imagination as reality

THIS is what you draw in college. "Art" my ass lmao

Bonus: Here's what the exam looks like. They literally tell you to redraw a model or sculpture and rate your skill on that. Ain't no college tell you "hey make some random art for us". They grade by skills, not feeling

They are grading you to copy a Polaroid camera... and when you use a Polaroid camera 📷 you fail? Art school, indeed.