9.06.2017
David Odo
Division of Academic and
Public Programs, Harvard Art Museums
Title: Academic and Student Programs at the
Harvard Art Museums
Abstract:
In November of 2014, the Harvard Art
Museums reopened after a dramatic six-year renovation and expansion, resulting
in a 40 percent increase in gallery space, an expanded Art Study Center, new
conservation labs, classrooms, and a striking glass roof that bridges the
facility’s historic and contemporary architecture. This lecture will discuss
the museum’s work in academic and student programs as it has unfolded during
our first several years of operation, focusing on how students have activated
and invigorated the museums through their substantive contributions. The
essential challenge of our work is to engage students in the museum in a
meaningful way. As such, academic museum work in the twenty-first century
requires a steadfast commitment to engaging with as broad a range of
disciplines as there are students studying these subjects, even beyond the
traditional fields of study with which museums are typically comfortable. The
lecture will further argue that it is also critical to engage students in the
museum outside of their coursework in ways—including and especially using
object-based teaching—that are as important and can be as rigorous as
curricular engagements. Indeed, this co-curricular work with students offers
the potential for some of the most creative, challenging and rewarding
intellectual and other work that students will undertake during their time on
campus. This goes far beyond the important social role campus museums can play,
and the lecture will explore how the museum can be situated as space integral
to student learning on campus, in ways that may connect to but in fact reach
beyond the classroom, and that active students, faculty, and museum
professionals alike to participate.
