What types of considerations are appropriate for selecting artists to represent key themes in the history of art? How do minority artists in the United States fit into this selection process? Previously, most art history courses and texts emphasized the highlights of significant creative expression as evolving in the Western world antiquity. In such ancient worlds the idea of art for art's sake or art for visual pleasure was promoted. Today in the United States many people do not lay claim to such roots. Modern minority artists may make art work for the purposes of social unrest and outcry, outweighing aesthetic concerns. Gradually they are being lauded for their efforts to use art as a change agent through increasing consciousness. But students, and especially mainstream students, may be alienated by the methods of these artists' messages, especially if they use art to radically describe their minority experiences. Thus, how to present such artists is a challenge which trial and time might eventually meet. During a course, an educator gave the art history students an informal survey in the form of written response exercises and also made notes of their verbal comments when applicable. Students were also asked at the end of artist coverage to pose a question they would ask artists if they were the guest speaker. Artists covered in the course were I. Robert Colescott, Jean Michel Basquiat, Kara Walker, Guillermo Gomez-Pena, Masami Teraoka, and Adrian Piper. Cites 12 works and five videos used. Attached are student responses to artists. (Author/BT)