From overbearing chaperones to touring solo!

Jen and I had quite the interesting tour this afternoon. Our group consisted of 4th through 8th graders, but a majority of the students were in the 6th to 7th grade range. They were a particularly smart group, but for the first half of the tour, while Jen and I were asking what we thought were interesting and engaging questions, we were met with crickets! They looked interested in what we were saying, but the students seemed intimidated to say anything at all. This was particularly evident when we got to Seurat's Sunday on La Grande Jatte. Not only is this painting one of our most famous pieces, but the teacher/lead chaperone of the group also told us before the tour that the kids were very excited to see the pointilist piece that they had discussed in class.

Jen & I used the same "Technology & Innovation" tour that we blogged about before, and we noticed that the lead chaperone began to hijack our tour towards the end of our discussion of Caillebotte's Paris Street, Rainy Day. We're on a fairly tight 1 hour schedule for student tours, and we normally plan to talk about 6 pieces for about 10 minutes each. When we got to the end of the Caillebotte, and Jen was about to tell the kids to pick up their stools to move on to the Monet painting, the chaperone stepped in with, "I just want to say a few more things about this piece before we move on." My first thought was, "Sure! Why not. Maybe they're learning about something in particular in class." About three minutes later, after a *riveting* discussion of repetitive shapes, we moved on.


When we got to the Seurat piece, all of the kids got excited and took their seats. They sat patiently and listened to Jen talk about Pointilism and innovations in optics during the late 19th century. The students all seemed a bit too intimidated to say much about the piece, even though they had already discussed it in class. I began to notice that the chaperone was looking impatiently at the kids, and leading some of their answers to Jen's questions. Finally, Jen got the kids to open up by talking about the different animals in the painting, namely the monkey on a leash in the front right corner, which a few of the kids had made curious comments about. Toward the end of the discussion, yet again, the chaperone said that she wanted to say a little something. She stood up and asked the kids, "Where does your eye go first when you look at this painting?" One little boy said enthusiastically, "the monkey!" and a few other students nodded. The chaperone then said, "No! Look at the little girl in the white dress. That's where your eye should go first."

Watching this lady tell her students that they were experiencing Seurat's iconic painting incorrectly really upset me. The last thing that we want to do on our tours is tell kids that there is a right and a wrong way to talk about and experience art. Everyone should be allowed to look at things differently, and our discussion of each piece allows the students to listen to each other's different points of view. A little girl next to me turned and whispered in a downtrodden tone, "My eye went to the monkey..." I reassured her (fairly loudly) that everyone sees different things, and that it was perfectly fine that she saw the monkey first. I tried not to belittle the chaperone's comment, so I asked the little girl what she thought about the girl in the painting, and got her to talk a bit about that. The chaperone then proceeded to tell the kids "facts" about the painting that were just plain wrong (ie: "The little girl in the white dress is the only figure painted not in a pointilist style." ...excuse me?). Jen and I looked at each other and mutually understood that we had had enough.

We quickly moved on to the Modern Wing, and discussed the Bonticou and Richter pieces. Since the chaperone didn't seem to know much about either of these objects, she sat back and let the kids talk more. These two pieces, by *far*, were our two most successful pieces of the day. We got the kids to talk about the different materials in the Bonticou, and how its context within the Vietnam and Cold Wars added to its symbolic meaning. We talked about photography and painting in Richter's Woman Descending the Staircase, and got the kids excited about glamorous celebrities and digital photography's role in pop culture today. It's amazing how far these kids pushed these pieces' meanings on their own, without needing much help from the chaperones (or us!).

In these past five weeks, I've learned some valuable lessons. Here are a few of the things that I would like to pass on to future interns about school group tours:

• When you prepare a tour for a group of thirty 5th-8th graders, don't be shocked when a group of forty 3rd-6th graders show up. Flexibility and improvisation are invaluable skills in this job, but they also make it much more fun.
• Be prepared to lengthen or shorten your tour at will. Not only do groups rarely show up on time (sometimes half an hour early, sometimes half an hour late), but you also may end up spending 15 minutes having kids pose as characters from the Seurat painting, and end up with minimal time to spend talking about O'Keefe.
• Note the attention span of the group and go with it. Sometimes kids will think that every word coming out of your mouth is pure gold, and other times, you may as well be speaking Latin. If they look engaged, stick with it. If they look bored, either spice it up or move on.
• When invited to happy hour with the staff....go!
• Make your intern team a collaborative one. I can't tell you how helpful it is to have a group of 7 people to bounce ideas off of!
• Don't let the first two weeks of training scare the crap (and fun) out of you. Touring with real kids (as opposed to your peers and supervisors pretending to be kids) is much less nerve-racking and intense.
  
• Use your lesson plan as a loose guide. Don't be upset if you've created a series of elaborate open ended questions meant to uncover the great ideological mystery behind Hinoki's tree...and you just don't get to it. Adjusting to the types of things that seem to interest the group and making sure that they take something valuable away from it is much more important.

Now that we all have our 2 weeks of training and 3 weeks of partnered touring under our belts, I think that I can speak for all of the interns when I say that we are all equally nervous and excited to start touring solo. It's been pretty nice having a right-hand-(wo)man who can keep track of time, help corral the little ones and, of course, make sure to jot down the ever-entertaining comments from the kids.

Here are some photos of the interns from the past few weeks:

David, Maya, Meghan, Adrienne & I at the Taste of Chicago

Natalie, Sandy & David at lunch in the Lurie Garden

Jen & Maya enjoying lunch in the Lurie Garden

The "lazy river"/"best place to eat lunch ever" in the Lurie Garden.

Maya getting comfy and researching in the docent room

Jen & I hamming it up for the camera

Sandy, Me & Natalie at a Caribou concert @ Pritzker Pavillion

Major (Okay, Minor) Fail

After three false starts, Mary H. and I (Jen) still have not completed our Art from Many Places: Ritual and Celebration tour as initially intended! The game plan for this tour has been to start at the Mummy Case; then on to the Persephone Plate, which is officially - and creatively - titled Knob Handled Dish (one of our personal favorite titles, by the way - right up there with Millet’s Peasants Bringing Home a Calf Born in the Fields. Really, Millet? Really?!).

Coffin and Mummy of Paankhenamun, c. 945–715 B.C.


Knob Handled Dish, 1864


Jean-Francois Millet, Peasants Bringing Home a Calf Born in the Fields, 1864

American Gothic comes next, followed by the lovely dancing Shiva. We then fast-forward a few (thousand) years to Robert Watts’s Auto Series from 1971 - 3, ending at On Kawara’s Oct. 31, 1978.

Grant Wood, American Gothic, 1930


Shiva as Lord of the Dance (Nataraja), Chola period, c. 10th/11th century




*imagine Robert Watts's Auto Series here*

On Kawara, Oct. 31, 1978, 1978

Last week was our first attempt at this tour, and it began without a hitch. Soon, however, we began to notice a trend: dragons. The kids were wanting dragons. A lot. They had been studying Asian art, and dragons in particular, and had been hoping to see one or two on their trip to the Art Institute. Well, far be it from us to stand in their way. Luckily, I had an ancient Chinese dragon plate lesson handy from our Animals in Art tours, so we quickly revised our plan. But as a result, both of our contemporary pieces - Auto Series and the On Kawara date piece - got the shaft.


Later that week, we eagerly awaited the arrival of our Ritual and Celebration tour-goers... We waited... and waited... Unfortunately for all of us, the group didn’t show up until 11:30! The time that the tour is supposed to end! Well, they were forced to tour themselves around the museum (sorry, guys!) and we were forced to wait another week to give our much-anticipated R&C tour.

Today we got our third (and probably final!) chance to give our elusive tour. Everything was going great until we marched up the American wing stairs to find Terrah - AIC's Kress Fellow - surrounded by an eager group of her own at American Gothic. It was ours no longer! Major fail!

The good news is that we finally made it to both of our contemporary pieces. We started with the Watts Auto Series photographs, which were initially met with some sideways glances. As the kids began to talk about what they saw, however, it was clear that they could grasp the ritual content of the piece. The celebratory aspect, however, was a bit trickier.

Heading up to the On Kawara date painting, I was pretty worried that we would have a rebellion on our hands. And not to disappoint, the first question I got was, “How is this art?” Good question, kid. Let’s talk about that... We discussed the artist’s process of daily creation, and the group, again, was able to see the ritual aspect rather quickly. More than with the Watt’s piece, I wanted to impress upon them the celebratory aspect of this work, so I pushed a bit harder with my questions. All of a sudden, their faces lit up with recognition and they seemed to see it: the work is a celebration of living, of the simple act of being alive one more day.

Well, with a success like that, I think we can both live with a little bit of tour-giving failure. I, for one, would take that compromise any day!

Rising to the Challenge

Yesterday, Jen and I (Mary H.) gave a very different (but very fulfilling) kind of tour. We worked with a group of college-aged kids with special needs, who functioned at a 6th-8th grade level. When we heard about our audience for this tour, we also heard that they had been studying a bit of Art History, and that they wanted "an industrial and contemporary" tour...what this means exactly, we still aren't completely sure. We used these guidelines to the best of our abilities and created a "Technology & Innovation" tour, which included 16th century Milanese armor, Monet's Arrival of Normandy Train--Gare Saint-Lazare, Caillebotte's Paris Street; Rainy Day, Seurat's Sunday on La Grande Jatte, Bonticou's Untitled wall relief, and Richter's Woman Descending the Staircase.







While Jen has a background in special education, she has only worked with younger students, and was fairly nervous about working with this population. I had never worked with special needs students before, so needless to say, it was an adventure for us both.

We had initially planned a "brilliant" activity that involved splitting the students into two groups, and having each group present one painting to the rest of their classmates. Upon explaining this activity to one of the group's chaperones, our idea was quickly and politely rejected. The chaperone thought it would be best to stick with a more linear tour, and to cater to the short attention span of the group.

Our flexibility and improv skills proved invaluable during this tour. After a slightly-too-long discussion of the armor, we adjusted our timing and realized that the most important thing was picking up the pace and keeping the students engaged. We were pleasantly surprised by the group's insightful comments about the Caillebotte and Seurat pieces. One woman raised her hand and said, "Look at the people...they're walking together, but no one is talking to each other." I saw Jen's face light up, knowing full well that the woman's comment was the perfect segue to Jen's discussion of Caillebotte's lonely Parisian boulevard.

The tour ended with a lively discussion of the group's favorite celebrities in front of Richter's painting, which ranged from Faith Hill and Jennifer Lopez to Miley Cyrus. I must admit that when I asked for words that they associate with Jennifer Lopez, I was silently praying that the word "booty" did not come up. Luckily for us, the group found JLo's singing voice much more memorable than her derriere.

Overall, we found this tour to be a great success and a fantastic learning opportunity. Essentially, "We are rockstars." -Jen

(Written by Mary H. & Jen)

Tour de Force

Today I paired up with Margaret Farr, an AIC senior lecturer, for my first adult tour! Together we tackled Manet's Modernism, a topic which - quite frankly - I found a bit scary. Manet is the man, as far as art historians are concerned, and I wasn't sure I was quite ready to explain why to a large group of over-eager knowledge-seekers. (As Margaret has since divulged, the noontime crowd tends to be of the more informed type, and as such are ready and willing to share their own thoughts and opinions on any given subject. This can make for lively discussion, but also means that the pressure is on!)

Now, I am normally a "go first and get it over with" type of person, but the Manet piece I was presenting made the most sense in the middle of our tour. Margaret kicked us off with Jesus Mocked by the Soldiers followed up by Beggar with Oysters (Philosopher). I fully expected to feel completely nauseous during this portion of the tour, as I *eagerly* awaited my turn. However, I found myself so engaged by Margaret's discussion that all nervousness fell to the wayside.... until it was my time to talk, that is.

I began my portion of the tour by introducing an academic painting: Jean Leon Gerome's Chariot Race from 1876. This painting was made 10 years after my main piece - Manet's Races at Longchamp - but it clearly demonstrates Manet's break with the academy (which then made Longchamp way easier to talk about!). Using this piece as a contrast was Margaret's idea, and a brilliant one at that!

Jean Leon Gerome, Chariot Race, 1876

Edouard Manet, The Races at Longchamp, 1866

As soon as I began talking and asking questions, my nerves calmed once again, and I was off to the races! (I know, I know, I'm an awful punner; I just can't help myself!) Seriously, though, it felt like second nature. I supplied interesting info, gathered ideas from the group, and fielded all sorts of questions - only one of which I couldn't answer! (Turns out, the tall bar with a circle on it is the finish line. Thanks, Margaret!) Best yet, after my tour one of the more ornery regulars congratulated me on a job well done and told me my projection was so good he could "hear me all the way in New Jersey." Well, sir, I will take that as a compliment! Faaantastic!