Metabolic Studio Public SalonLinda DukeFriday, May 28, 2010 @ NoonFree Admission

The Museum of Wonder

This program explores the idea of museums, especially art museums, as places to have extraordinary experiences. More and more, museums are measuring their success in terms of facts or information remembered by people after a gallery visit. Are there other take-aways that, while harder to measure, hold more value for people or even empower them? Could schools learn something from these less-recognized museum take-aways and be inspired to enlarge definitions of “learning”? What value lies in attempts to find words for the ineffable or for what, at least at first, seems to lie beyond language? We will look at images, listen to visitor voices, and share perspectives as we consider wondering as a positive experience, far from the right-answer paradigm.

Linda Duke studied and taught Asian art history before art museum education became the locus of her work. She has led education and public program efforts at Krannert Art Museum at the University of Illinois, the UCLA Hammer Museum, and the Indianapolis Museum of Art. She is especially interested in different learning, including what is sometimes called learning disability, and the relationship between visual experience and language.

Above: Ole Worm's Cabinet of Curiosities from Museum Wormianum, 1655. Smithsonian Museum.