Author Archives: Experiment Station

Just Do It, Hit the Register Button 

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Cicely Ogunshakin, a 7-8th grade Social Studies teacher at School Without Walls at Francis-Stevens, reflects on her experience in the Phillips-UMD Prism.K12 course. The student artwork produced from the course is shared in the Community Exhibition The Virtual Classroom as Artspace.

When I signed up for this course, I really didn’t expect it to be so good. My past professional developments had been kind of dry with few takeaways that I could implement in my class, but I was excited to learn about different ways I could  integrate art into my classroom. There were some other benefits as well—professional learning units (PLUs), a year membership to Phillips, the ability to network with other educators, and the class would be 100% virtual. These all made it easier to hit the register button.

I admit that when I received my art supplies in the mail, I was immediately giddy. Crayons, markers, construction paper, colored pencils, a couple of sharpies, glue sticks and some other art materials made me feel like a kid again.

On the first day, we were thrown into an ice-breaker activity in an attempt to set the pace and tone of the course. It was a strategy called Soundscape in which we had to examine different parts of a painting and make sounds related to the painting. In this picture there were horses, carriages, a pier, an ocean, and a family with a dog. Sounds of Nahhhhhaaa, swooshhhhh, clop clop clop, stomp stomp stomp, ruff ruff, and so on, filled our virtual space. We were grown adults on a Zoom call making these sounds, actually practicing this strategy to be able to bring it alive in our very own classrooms.

Screenshot from Week 1 course presentation.

The foundation of our class was based on the Prism.K12 strategies of Identify, Connect, Express, Empathize, and Synthesize. As we progressed over the weeks, I was intrigued to experience how each lesson was relatable and applicable to all of the teachers. Our Facilitator, Hilary, made it look simple. Each week, I left the virtual class excited and feverishly searching The Phillips Collection to see what I could use to implement this strategy in my own classroom.

Part of the class required that you complete a Core Project. I decided to focus on an upcoming unit, The American Revolution. The goal was for students to use the 7-Word Story Strategy to express their ideas, thoughts, and emotions through art and words. I gathered some historic protest images from the Internet and had students examine one of those images.

As they examined the images, they answered these questions:

  • -What do you see?
  • -What do you hear?
  • -What do you feel?
  • -What do you think?
  • -What do you wonder?

I also had them think about the photographer’s perspective and whether a person could tell a compelling story based upon the image(s).

Here are are some of the 7-word stories that my students created:

  • -Screaming, running, woman distressed, wrong unjust death ​
  • -Preferences respect me, respect you respect LGBTQ  ​
  • -Humans, the Earth’s protection and inevitable destruction
  • -Let me be ​who I want. Free.
  • -Dreamers and believers are dying in sorrow

For the exit ticket students had to add 7 more words that presented a possible solution for the same image. They also had to include a visual. Students had the option of completing this activity on paper or digitally.

Examples of student artworks with their 7-word stories, 7-word solutions, and a visual.

My students enjoyed this lesson. They analyzed and shared ideas through collaboration. They learned about other protest movements through images, reflecting on the artist’s work and purpose. They used key words to describe an image and they added 7 more words to identify a solution, all while expressing themselves through their artwork. My students were excited to share their creations and receive compliments from their peers. Using this activity changed the whole mood in my class, which was great since we were in virtual mode and have been virtual since last year. So if you are wondering whether or not to click register, just CLICK IT! You will not be disappointed.

Examining Our Collection, Piece by Piece

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What happened: We recently used an image of the piece titled Goin’ Fishin’ by Arthur Dove to advertise an upcoming assemblage workshop. We searched for an assemblage in our collection to match the theme of the workshop and mistakenly used this piece without adequate knowledge and therefore without sensitivity to its history. We sincerely apologize for the harm we have caused with this post.

Context: This piece was not always called Goin’ Fishin’. When Duncan Phillips acquired it in 1937, the title was N****r Goes A-Fishin.’ Our records indicate that the artist changed the title to Goin’ Fishin’ before his death in 1946.

The background and context of this piece have been explored in scholarly publications, including the museum’s 1999 publication about the collection, as well as in public programs at The Phillips Collection. However, we have failed to provide the critical context and history about this work to our entire staff and on our most accessible platforms, namely our website and in our galleries.

What we’re doing: We have a responsibility to use works like this in a way that sparks dialogue, creates an environment of accountability, and inspires critical thinking. This is an important reminder to us that we need to do better. We are at the very beginning of our DEAI journey, which includes, but is not limited to, anti-racism training and excavating the buried supremacist histories within objects of our collection. We are committed to reckoning with our past and preventing future harm.

Gladys Wik Elder, Indigenous Activist

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Sherman Fairchild Fellow Ariana Kaye on the personal history revealed in Ricky Maynard’s portrait of Gladys Wik Elder 

In my previous blog post, I discussed how photographer John Edmonds transforms traditionally objectified representations of Black people into more empowering and realistic representations. Indigenous peoples have also historically suffered the indignity of objectification. Here, with Ricky Maynard’s photograph of Gladys Wik Elder, we have an example of a powerful memorial to an Indigenous person, Gladys Tybingoompa (1946-2006), who spent her life fighting for equal land ownership for the Wik people in Cape York Queensland, Australia.

Ricky Maynard, Gladys Wik Elder (from Returning to Places That Name Us), 2000, Pigment print on paper, 12 x 16 in., The Phillips Collection, Museum Acquisition, 2017

This photographic portrait was acquired by The Phillips Collection as part of an effort to present a more diverse, inclusive, and globalized perspective of photography. Photography is an important aspect of the collection, originating with Duncan Phillips’s relationship with Alfred Stieglitz. Phillips said Stieglitz had mastered the medium and inspired the museum to continue to expand its photography collection over the years.  

Ricky Maynard, an Indigenous Tasmanian artist, created the photographic series Returning to Places that Name Us in 2000. This portrait of Gladys is one of five Wik Elders portraits that Maynard created for the series to bring attention to the Wik Decision—not just as a matter of current concern, but something that held broader importance for the entire country and its colonial history. The Wik struggle became known as the Wik Decision, or Wik Peoples v. Queensland of 1996, in which the High Court of Australia determined that people who were leasing pastoral land from the government were not the exclusive owners of that land. The court held that the same land also belonged to the Indigenous population. That was a great achievement. However, it was short lived, and soon the Native Title Act, which had given Indigenous populations ownership of land, was modified in favor of government owners and leasers of land. This made it more difficult for Indigenous people to claim land ownership. 

Still from a video by the Art Gallery of New South Wales showing Gladys Tybingoompa sitting for her portrait

Gladys sat for her portrait in Maynard’s backyard. The portrait shows a close-up view of Gladys, emphasizing heightened emotion in her expression. Viewers can even see her crack a smile as she poses for the camera. This smile evokes her full-of-life personality; Gladys famously danced outside of the Australian High Court on the day the court handed down its decision that Indigenous communities should have jurisdiction over their own land. Maynard said this series transformed his photographic practice, stating: “I saw every picture. I looked into the faces of all those Aboriginal people and it was sad. I started questioning the photographer’s role. It changed my life and the way I viewed pictures.” 

Curator Hetti Perkins from the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Australia describes how the texture of Gladys’s face reflects her peoples’ history and their perseverance on the quest for equality. To me, the complex topography of the Wik people’s land becomes visible to the viewer precisely because of Maynard’s proximity to her facial features. As discussed by Perkins and captured by Maynard, Gladys’s face provides us with a map of the privations, confiscations, and battles fought on this journey. By highlighting the geographical topography on Gladys’s face, the photograph reveals the indistinguishable connection between Gladys and her ancestral land. 

This portrait of Gladys Tybingoompa teaches us how much we can learn about a person and their history from a close-up portrait. If you were to get your portrait taken, what would you want people to know about you? 

 

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