Teaching in the Art Museum: Interpretation as Experience

by Rika Burnham, Elliott Kai-Kee

At the heart of all good art museum teaching is an effort to bring people and artworks together in meaningful ways. But what constitutes an experience of a work of art? What should be taught and why? What kinds of uniquely valuable experiences are museum educators alone equipped to provide? This book—unlike any other publication currently available—addresses these and myriad other questions and investigates the mission, history, theory, practice, and future prospects of museum education. Every critical issue that has preoccupied the profession throughout its hundred-year history is considered, including lecture- versus conversation-based formats; the place of information in gallery teaching; the relation of art museum teaching to the disciplines of art history, curation, and conservation; the use of questions to stimulate discussion; and the role of playfulness, self-awareness, and institutional context in constructing the visitor’s experience. The book will prove invaluable for all professional museum educators and volunteer docents as well as museum studies students, art and art history teachers, curators, and museum administrators. The essays distill the authors’ decades of experience as practitioners and observers of gallery teaching across the United States and abroad. They offer a range of perspectives on which everyone involved with art museum education may reflect and in so doing, encourage education to take its proper place at the center of the twenty-first century art museum.

Genres: Art, Nonfiction, Museums, Education, Textbooks

192 pages, Paperback

First published April 19, 2011

Reviews

[Defne Doğan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely might not be everyone’s cup of tea but throughout the book I’ve gained an incredible amount of clarity on what I want to do/keep pursuing. It really nurtured my wounds from my uni classes for sure!! On my top 2/3 so far <3

[Kimberly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a book I read with my book club. Unlike other books I know one of the authors, Rika and highly respect her. Her experience and philosophy shines clearly through in an engaging and inspiring way. The group had a lively discussion about how to make the book ideas practical to school groups visiting museums with teachers who have a specific agenda. The book guides the reader through possibilities of providing an aesthetic experience- having a conversation, discussion or perhaps a dialogue about a work of art for about an hour- not a current norm in museum ed. Many of us struggle limiting it to four pieces when for many students and teachers they want to see it all. How to balance philosophies with expectations of museum visitors especially school age was debated.

I recommend this read for all museum educators especially those in art museums. Also, I recommend it for art educators and teachers who bring art and aesthetics to their curriculum.

[Nathanael Greene Slater · Rating 5 out of 5]

“At the heart of all good art museum teaching is an effort to bring people and artworks together in meaningful ways. But what constitutes an experience of a work of art? What should be taught and why? What kinds of uniquely valuable experiences are museum educators alone equipped to provide? ... “ Google

[Fae · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this for a class and it's super insightful. I will say it often assumes the best or worst case scenario in a tour and doesn't always give realistic examples of modern problems. I want a job giving tours so this will hopefully help me become better!

[David Lewis]

Very informative and useful in determining a career in museum education.

[Marti Martinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

OK, I'm a newly hired docent at a museum. I am more a humanities kind of queer (10 poems published), but they hired me.

I was amazed at how eloquently AND elegantly that they write together. Bordered on genius in parts. Some of the paintings do not speak to me as they spoke to the authors, but that's OK.....That was something I learned.

The ONLY drawback is that while I do agree art is a personal experience, the "organic" conversational examples are just NOT going to happen here. I think the docent must allow free interpretation and expression, but WE are time constrained. The docent has GOT to take charge of the direction/movement of the dialogue. Period. Maybe that's the dregs of 6 years in the Navy, I don't know.

I'll probably continually refer back to this superbly produced book. (Hey, my employer bought it.)

[Adrianna · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a wonderful wonderful resource for museum educators, art historians, students, docents, etc for teaching people about different ways to look at art in museums. I chose to read this book for a museum education class this semester and I found it 150% more helpful then I thought. It touches on every topic you can think of...history of museum education, VTS, using dialogue, questions, and discussions to talk about art, different examples with various artworks, and even the future of education in museums.

If you ever find yourself teaching in a museum, this book is your bible. It is that helpful. Even if you are struggling with how to talk about art this book is for you as well! It totally changed my perspective on how to teach about art in museums.