"Power of Pictures" and what not

Regarding the “Power of Pictures,” Robert Schwartz discusses Picasso’s portrait of Gertrude Stein. Initial reaction to the portrait was that it didn’t even look like Stein. Picasso’s reaction, however, was simply, “Everybody thinks she is not at all like her portrait, but never mind, in the end she will manage to look just like it.” What’s really being said here is that the portrait will literally change the way Stein looks, or at least how she looks to us. This is accomplished by accenting certain features that are typically outside of our typical perception of Stein, and ignoring others that are typically a subject of greater focus. Features aren’t being actually created here, nor are some features being erased. All of these features are always present in a physical sense. What is happening is that Picasso is shifting our focus. And since we come to determine and understand reality through our perceptions, this shift in focus seems to actually change reality.

            Schwartz also mentions that he may also argue that scientists and theorists are also makers of reality. For example, theories of the sun inform our perception of it and essentially shape our personal realities. And it’s this point that weighs very heavily for the philosophy of education to me. How much power does an instructor really have regarding the education of his or her students? My initial inclination was to view the instructor as being a conduit to knowledge and reality for the student, but now it seems impossible to ignore the power to create reality that an instructor may have.