Utilizing University Museums and Collections to build critical-contextual frameworks for assessing 3D art/artifacts

University collections and museums are an underutilized resource in teaching undergraduates critical skills. The performance of art and artifacts within university spaces (museums, collections, department and library displays) is mediated by multiple factors —the acquisition histories, who is curating the objects, the placement of the objects within larger real and ideological spaces and display and interpretive strategies. This presentation will be based on a critical exercise with undergraduate students in a Core Ceramics class at the University of Delaware in which the goal is to explore the key question of how 3D art objects (contemporary or historical) perform within an array of spaces on the university campus and to what ideological ends these performances serve. Within the confines of the class project, each student will choose an exhibit of art/artifacts to visit. One to one discussion with peers, a group reflection time and a design project will integrate field study within a larger pedagogical framework. The goal is to expose beginning art students (artists/makers, future curators, art historians, art appreciators) to a critical-contextual model in which to read objects for the layers of information contained within and around them. Student observations and feedback, images of student projects, project rubric, assessment of the goals of building awareness of the critical-contextual embeddedness of objects will be presented.