The Art Teacher
| "The Art Teacher" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Song by Rufus Wainwright | ||||
| from the EP Waiting for a Want | ||||
| Released | June 29, 2004 | |||
| Length |
4:00 (Waiting for a Want) 3:51 (Want Two) |
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| Songwriter(s) | Rufus Wainwright | |||
| Waiting for a Want track listing | ||||
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"The Art Teacher" is a song written and performed by American-Canadian singer-songwriter Rufus Wainwright. It originally appeared on his EP, Waiting for a Want, released by DreamWorks Records in June 2004 as a preview of his fourth studio album, Want Two, which was released by Geffen Records in November 2004. The lyrics in the piano ballad describe a middle-aged woman's recollection of an unrequited love for her teacher. The song explores gender and sexuality, and its music has been compared to work by Philip Glass.
"The Art Teacher" has received a generally positive reception, and appears on other releases in Wainwright's discography, including Live at the Fillmore, a concert film accompanying Want Two. The song also appears on Vibrate: The Best of Rufus Wainwright, a greatest hits album, and the live album Rufus Wainwright: Live from the Artists Den, both of which were released in 2014.
"The Art Teacher" was written by Wainwright. According to the singer, the song was inspired by a heterosexual male teacher who spoke of his infatuated female students. Wainwright recalled:
It's a song about a guy I met at the gym who of course was straight. He'd tell me stories about his female students who were ravenous for him. So I put myself in their shoes to write the song. I played it for him and it went totally over his head!
The music in the song has been compared to Philip Glass's work, with Wainwright's "round vocals [leaping] from deep lows to piqued highs". According to The Guardian, "melodically and harmonically it's very minimal, an ostinato song that sounds like a Philip Glass composition."Pitchfork's Stephen Deusner described "The Art Teacher" as "a woman remembering her first love, the instructor of the title who turned her on to Romantic painter J. M. W. Turner", with the story told "over a Philip Glass prism of piano chords, a plaintive horn, and a slightly sped-up tempo". Youa Vang of City Pages described the song as melancholic, with a "rumbling" piano.
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