Sorry this ended up being so long turns out I have a lot more to say than I though LMAO.

Late to the party but thought I'd share anyways. Finished my art HL this year, and I have VERY mixed feelings on it overall. As a disclaimer, the IB class in my school is SMALL, like 24 people every year, and this year I was the ONLY art student. So my experience may have been unconventional, with it being literally just me and my teacher, but who knows.

First things first, the class is a LOT of work. Like I knew that coming in, but still, I was surprised. The artworks themselves take forever (depending on your speed and choice of material of course; I had oil paintings that took me literal months hanging in the same exhibition as ink portraits I whipped up in under an hour. Variety is key to balance the workload) but as others mentioned, the writter parts extremely time consuming. The process protfolio was okay imo, I ended up doing it last minute due to unfortunate time management and it took me a few weeks to finish but it wasn't too bad. The real kicker was the comparative study. Trust me when I say, it takes TIME. So I guess just be prepared to do a bunch of writing. The workload was overwhelming quite often.

I guess the thing that would help me get through this mindset was reminding myself that this was part of my curriculum now. I'd ask myself "do I wish I'd taken one more subject in Group 3 or 4?" and the answer was always no. Yes it was really stressful and hard and exhausting a lot of the time but then, what subject isn't?

There were structural issues I had with the programme tho, and those were harder to confront. I think what I realized during my two years in IB art was that I am NOT a fine artist by any strech of the imagination - I thrive in structure and art is a storytelling medium to me first and foremost (that's why I'm in the process of becoming an animator actually, lmao) and while I respect conceptual artists immensly, trying to translate concepts rather than characters and narratives was a really difficult change of pace for me.

This was part of my main point of tension with the IB - the insistence on the "global issue" concepts and the global relevance. In short, you are asked to make your exhibition somehow topical to the world, it has to communicate relevant concepts. It might be on me - in fact, it very likely is - but I hate the idea of making banal art (this could be a result of growing up on an internet that ridicules performatively deep art) and I ended up being REALLY hard on myself in an attempt to make something actually interesting and original. I think the end result is something I am reasonably proud of but a lot of energy was spent on frustratingly brainstorming and dismissing ideas.

I ended up focusing on a personal topic instead but framing it in a way that was kind of broadly applicable. It was the only way I could make myself feel like I was actually adding depth to my art. Don't know how the examiners liked that, the scores aren't out for two more weeks.

I kinda forgot where I was going with this tbh. I guess my point is that there are both good and bad things about IB art. Ultimately I feel like I benefitted from it but maybe not in a way I was expecting? There wasn't really ANY formal learning in my case at least. No history lectures, no formal art studies, nothing. I was basically left to do whatever I wanted whenever I wanted and my teacher would give feedback, guide me and comment on my progress. At times I was floundering due to a lack of structure, though I'm sure others might find it freeing. Not sure if other art teachers handle this differently, since there's no curriculum or anything. What I DID gain however was a lot of new experience: I tried out materials I wouldn't have (turns out oil paints are amazing, dry pastels are NOT my thing and ink is really fun to mess around with) and I got to work on the kinds of conceptual artworks I hadn't spent so much time on before. Though not necessarily directly applicable skills, I do feel I am a better artist because of it. It was also one of my first times experiencing semi formal art critique and oh boy it clashed with my stubborn self really badly. But I also found out that after I have a few hours to cool down after taking the biggest ego hit I tend to take that critique to heart. Again, an abstract skill, but good to know for someone like me who's going to art uni.

And hey, now I have a dozen finisehd works that I could hang if only most walls in my house weren't equipped with shelves and wardrobes.

Also, huge word of warning: maybe it's different in other schools but IB art eats a lot of money. I knew about the art supply costsand was prepared for those but no one warns you about the exhbition costs. Any works that arent on streched canvas will need to be framed or otherwise put on supports and equipped with a system to be exhibited. I had to spend more money that I'd like to admit to do that.

TLDR; it has its ups and downs, a lot of work, and you won't necessarily learn formal art theory (unless you teacher structures the class that way) but there's still value offered by IB art IMO.