Teaching the Non-mainframe

I’ve taught art history courses that address the genre of vernacular art environments at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago since 1986. In its current iteration, the class Better Homes & Gardens: Vernacular Art Environments addresses combinations of art, architecture and/or landscapes, including religious grottos, spiritual, devotional and mystical sites, gardens, ephemeral yard shows, architectural inventions, expressions of loneliness and survival, artist-built terrains of conscience, homes fully transformed, artist’s museums, and other created spaces that are site and life specific. The course examines historical and contemporary art environments created by placemakers whose works aren’t directed to a mainstream art audience, but arise from other circumstances. I insist that the works are in no way presented in an “outsider” context, but are shown to be in cadence with work by contemporary artists in concept and execution. Nearly all the artists presented can be considered marginalized by mainframe standards: artists of color, women, economically disadvantaged people, farmers and residents of rural areas, urban and ghetto dwellers, and first and second generation immigrants, among others. For over three decades my students nearly unanimously declare that they're exposed to a realm of contemporary art they had no idea existed, and how important knowledge of this realm has been, to their thinking and their work. I will discuss how art students at a major art school have responded to a vital genre generally marginalized from mainstream discussions, their creative responses to this work, and how they re-navigate issues around art world territoriality.