The Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art:
The cultural critic Tony Bennett has said that museums do not arrange objects so much as they arrange the relationships between things and the people that come to view those things. Considering Bennett’s assertion, this worksheet is designed for you to think critically and objectively about what a museum actually is and what it actually does. In this case, the Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art. We are extremely fortunate to have an institution of the quality of the Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art on the USU campus. We are equally fortunate to have staff of such high quality and expertise to run it. You should take advantage of their expertise and experience not only for the purposes of this exercise but throughout your time at USU. Museums – and art museums are no exception – are in many the ways the cornerstones of culture: they determine knowledge; they identify what is appropriate and legitimate for archiving; they function as repositories for history. But it is important to keep in mind that these are not random or neutral processes. There are always ideological (as well as spatial, financial, historical, cultural etc.) implications in deciding what should saved, archived, protected, and exhibited. In this sense, we are revealed by both the things we save and the things we throw away. Museums do not only reflect, but also define who we are.
The worksheet is designed to help you achieve the learning objectives for the course by allowing you to identify different styles and periods as you analyze and critically evaluate the exhibitions and work that is held by the Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art. As you respond to the questions and issues raised try and keep in mind the ways in which visual art is always the creative expression of a living dynamic culture. Keep in mind that in order to answer the questions as fully as possible it is necessary for you to undertake some independent research around the issues raised.
Please answer/respond to all of the following questions and issues. They all relate to the Black Mountain College: Shaping Craft + Design exhibition located in the Lower Gallery.
1. How are we directed around and through the space of the museum? How does the available space determine how and what we might see?
2. There is a great diversity of objects in the show – painting, sculpture, ceramics, craft, furniture etc. – and on display in the museum generally. What sorts of considerations must curators take into account when they are arranging objects for a show such as this?
3. What is the difference between “art” and “craft”? How does an object’s function (and context) change how we think of it? What objects in the Black Mountain College show could be considered both “art” and “craft”?
4. To what extent is the didactic information presented along with the displays useful to gaining a broader understanding of the work? How would you respond to the argument that an art object should ‘stand alone’ and that if it needs explanation it has somehow ‘failed’ in its mission as art?
5. Which is your favorite piece of art on display in the Black Mountain College show? Describe and critically analyze the piece and explain why you find it particularly compelling.