Okaz/Saudi Gazette RIYADH — Shoura Council members Dr. Moudhi Al-Khalaf and Dr. Latifa Al-Sha'laan have presented a proposal to the education committee calling on the ministry of education to urge Saudi universities to set up independent colleges of fine arts and expand sending Saudi students on scholarship abroad to study artistic expression and visual arts. It is learnt that the recommendation was based on several justifications, including expansion in the specializations of artistic expression and visual arts, cinema, theater, music, sculpture, among other arts that are in tandem with the ongoing updating of specializations in the scholarships program to enhance cultural development and the needs of the society and labor market. The reason is that the percentage of scholarship enrolled in these specializations during the past five years is barely one percent of the total number of scholarship students. Apart from this, the recommendation props the vision that supports culture in all its forms and entertainment, and encourages various forms of art. The recommendation stressed that the establishment of fine art colleges would boost the cultural movement and creativity activities in all fields of art and its specializations. This will contribute to enhancing the quality of life programs for the citizens, expatriates and those coming to the Kingdom for tourism. This will also contribute to enhancing the sources of "soft power" for the Kingdom in the long run by boosting its Arab, regional and global presence in external occasions, events and festivals concerned with creativity, artistic expression and visual arts, and raising the efficiency of the university system in the Kingdom by meeting the lack or nonexistence of colleges of fine art with their various specializations.
