The 2010 Summer Teacher Institute will investigate history and memory through an interdisciplinary approach to the museum’s exhibits, with an emphasis on the work of Luc Tuymans, whose paintings will be on view at the MCA in fall 2010. With a combination of viewing artworks, discussion, visual journaling, and painting, we will name the issues and defining moments of our time that will become part of the personal and collective history for our students and for ourselves. What will our students see as their coming of age stories? How can we use Tuymans’s work to talk about the challenges of our time and the roles that educators play in facing these issues together with students? What literary, visual, and popular sources do our students turn to in building their own sense of personal history? Using words and images culled from those histories, we will begin to explore what the role of artists and educators can play in relation to these defining moments.
During the Institute we will explore these ideas through direct encounters with artworks that are currently on view at the museum: through an exploration of influence and legacy in Alexander Calder and Contemporary Art: Form, Balance, Joy; highlights from our collection such as Alfredo Jaar’s work that deal with the continuing impact of colonialism and globalization, and the work of 12x12 artist Carrie Gundersdorf, who will visit with our group in person and discuss her process of distilling visual source material to construct illusionistic space. Visual artist Laura Mackin and dance artist Jenna Deidel will lead us in further exploration of the themes of our Institute. Mackin will focus on memory and imagery through painting while Deidel will lead several projects that connect play and fear with the creative process. With daily experiences in art making and visual journaling, each participant will develop an integrated body of imagery and writing.
The curricular development goal of this Institute is to understand how we, as artists and educators, can use our understanding of history and memory to inform our teaching and art-making practices. We will consider how our shared experiences with our students become a part of our personal and collective histories, and how this aspect of our time with them can inform classroom planning. Participants will be invited to collaborate and exchange ideas for how artworks can be used as part of an interdisciplinary approach to explore these issues in the classroom. Through visual journaling, discussion, and reflection, participants will continuously examine how their own experiences and personal histories relate to the classroom and will work together to create a shared resource of ideas to take directly into practice.
Guiding Questions:
o How can we reflect on Luc Tuymans’s approach to find new ways of looking at history and memory?
o What are the historic moments in our own pasts that inform who we are and the world we live in?
o What will the history of our time look like?
o What legacies influence our work as artists and educators?
o What will our students see as their coming of age stories?
o What will our students remember about the world around them from the time we spend with them?
o What are our personal histories, and how do they inform our teaching and creative practices?
o How can images help us to capture artist, educator, and student voices about the situations and events of our time?
Reading List:
Beam, Lisa Sonora. The Creative Entrepreneur: A DIY Visual Guidebook for Making Business Ideas Real. Setting up Your Visual Journal. Quarry Books, November 2008.
Desai, Dipti, Jessica Hamlin, and Rachel Mattson. History as Art, Art as History: Contemporary Art and Social Studies Education. Curriculum as a Creative Process: Interview with Artist-Educator Thi Bui. Routledge, October 2009.
Grysztejn, Madeline and Molesworth, Helen. Luc Tuymans. Luc Tuymans: Painting the Banality of Evil. San Francisco Museum of Modern Art ; New York : In association with D.A.P./Distributed Art Publishers, 2009.
Spears, Dorthy. Putting the Wrongs of History in Paint. The New York Times. February 7, 2010.
Warren, Lynn. Alexander Calder and Contemporary Art: Form,Balance, Joy. Alexander Calder and Contemporary Art. Thames and Hudson, September 2010.
