Blog #13

If only eating my own words was such a pleasant experience................

On the day I videotaped lesson 3, the internet was down. Which would have been fine, except I had not downloaded a big enough file for the image I wanted to VTS. As it were, I had a back up image already loaded into my Keynote presentation. I ended up VTSing a panel of Romare Bearden's The Block.  This image was already in slide format because I knew I was supposed to talk about it with all four of my kindergarten classes to support common core curriculum. I didn't want to use it for video #3 because I thought it would be a flop.  

As it turns out, it did produce limited conversation and interpretation with the other three classes. Each VTS session was 8-10 minutes long. My VTS class, though, talked for 20 minutes about the image.

 

Romare Bearden panel from The Block, 1971

Source: http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/1978.61.1-6

Critically evaluate the work of art you selected 

 In my previous post I stated " On one hand, the images are like a "Where's Waldo?" book. For a student that interested is in looking at an image for a long period of time, these pictures are eye candy. On the other hand, the concept of time between the artworks would be incomprehensible to a young child. I also think the comparing of two artworks in kindergarten is a bit much, since they are learning how to look at artwork. Both images lack in accessibility also. To understand the Breugel on even a surface level, one would need to know about rural life and the name of most of the objects in the painting. I think a lack of perquisite knowledge would prevent them from getting the overall feel of "community," even though  they would be fascinated with it. The Beardon has lots of colors, but it isn't easily readable.  Even on a large screen, the collaged black and white images are hard to see. The students would have to be right up to the image to see some of the figures. It would be hard to VTS. I think that both artworks, though interesting, may be better suited for a second grader who has the capacity to "read" an artwork or book."

Reflection

Based on Yenawine's guildelines for beginning viewers, I think this image was off because of the lack of personal experience this group of six year olds have had with the subject matter: big city life and a funeral. On the other hand, I knew most students attend church with their families and would recognize some of the religious images. They also know what cities are, though the community that feeds into this school does not have apartments - students live in houses, mobile homes, or multiple family homes. Also, given they are stage 1 viewers, they are open to art that isn't realistic, and don't pass judgment like a stage 2 viewer would. I do have two students that do list unrealistic characteristics of the images they discuss, and they find it funny.

I have contrasting results from my K VTS class and the other three K classes at the same school. In summary, the other classes that have only VTSed once before spent the discussion listing items they saw in the picture, such as rectangles, doors, people, buildings, and colors. A few students in these classes started narratives about the image, such as a person falling, and the people below were there to catch them. Out of these 3 classes, one student stated that the picture was of a city, and another student seemed to be figuring out movement in the space of the image, saying the people went in the door on the left and came out of the door on the right.

By comparison, the VTS class listed items less, and made more narratives. They listed actions such as a bomb exploding, a person in the door placing a bomb and running away, a robber, a robber pushing someone off the building and the crowd below would catch the person with a trampoline, etc. One student did state that he couldn't see the faces of the people in the picture, but I think this group was comfortable enough talking about artwork that the challenge was just right. There was a variety of opinions and stories offered, and the class discussion lasted 8 more minutes than it usually does!

Features of the artwork that the students focused on were the people, the angels, the large face in the upper right hand corner of a building, and people in the space of the stairs and doorways. They interpreted gestures of the figures, perhaps since they couldn't read the faces.

The surprise was that they were so intrigued by the image - I would have saved it for an older group of students.  If I were to VTS this image with kindergarten students again, it would be after the students had VTSed at least 6 times, so as to not frustrate a newbie who had very little experience looking at art and talking about it.

This is the project we are doing following the VTS session, to help them understand the type of image they were looking at.