Does anyone have any tips for teaching subjective art analysis to concrete thinkers? They are very confused and overwhelmed when it comes to doing the analysis and so-called free thought that is required for art history and art appreciation courses.

Pertaining to this and your other similar answer, one way of approaching this challenge is to guide the students by asking questions in a way similar to the Socratic method. For example, say we are looking at a large work by Jackson Pollock, where there is practically nothing to see but wild lines and colors. One question to be asked could be _If you were this painting, what would you feel like right now_? If even that is too difficult or abstract, we could be more specific, and say _Would you be crying or laughing right now if you were this painting_? Crying and laughing are more concrete and specific emotions, and can prod the students to consider the painting as if they were in it themselves. By letting the students consider their own emotions or physical feelings (pain, nausea, running, etc.), we have bridged the gap between abstract imagination and concrete, physical imagination, effectively letting the students learn to be creative within the borders of concrete thinking.

Why did the painter paint such a thing?

He painted such a thing to really captivate your imagination.

Main content

Course: The Museum of Modern Art > Unit 1

Lesson 8: MoMA Learning

"Dive Bomber and Tank" by Jose Clemente Orozco, 1940 | MoMA Education

Name: "Dive Bomber and Tank" by Jose Clemente Orozco, 1940 | MoMA Education
Uploaded: 2014-01-23T16:37:01Z
Description: A MoMA educator discusses how she teaches "Dive Bomber and Tank" by Jose Clemente Orozco, 1940. Visit MoMA Learning for more teaching and learning resources.

Google Classroom

A MoMA educator discusses how she teaches "Dive Bomber and Tank" by Jose Clemente Orozco, 1940. Visit MoMA Learning for more teaching and learning resources. Created by The Museum of Modern Art.

Want to join the conversation?

Sort by:

L
Posted 10 years ago. Direct link to L's post “Does anyone have any tips...”
Does anyone have any tips for teaching subjective art analysis to concrete thinkers? They are very confused and overwhelmed when it comes to doing the analysis and so-called free thought that is required for art history and art appreciation courses.
Button navigates to signup pageButton navigates to signup page
(2 votes)
Answer
- Peterson
  Posted 10 years ago. Direct link to Peterson's post “Pertaining to this and yo...”
  Pertaining to this and your other similar answer, one way of approaching this challenge is to guide the students by asking questions in a way similar to the Socratic method.
  
  For example, say we are looking at a large work by Jackson Pollock, where there is practically nothing to see but wild lines and colors. One question to be asked could be If you were this painting, what would you feel like right now? If even that is too difficult or abstract, we could be more specific, and say Would you be crying or laughing right now if you were this painting? Crying and laughing are more concrete and specific emotions, and can prod the students to consider the painting as if they were in it themselves. By letting the students consider their own emotions or physical feelings (pain, nausea, running, etc.), we have bridged the gap between abstract imagination and concrete, physical imagination, effectively letting the students learn to be creative within the borders of concrete thinking.
  Comment on Peterson's post “Pertaining to this and yo...”
  (2 votes)
Indie's point bot
Posted 9 years ago. Direct link to Indie's point bot's post “Why did the painter paint...”
Why did the painter paint such a thing?
Button navigates to signup pageButton navigates to signup page
(1 vote)
Answer
- Indie
  Posted 9 years ago. Direct link to Indie's post “He painted such a thing t...”
  He painted such a thing to really captivate your imagination.
  Button navigates to signup page
  (3 votes)

Video transcript

- We are standing in front of Jose Clemente Orozco's Dive Bomber and Tank, painted in 1940. And my name is Lauren Adelman. We're right by the escalators right now, and the kids, when they come into the museum, they kinda like come up the escalator and see this, whether we're gonna look at it or not, and I would say nine times out of 10 kids are drawn to it, all ages. Probably starting with like fourth grade and up, they're like, "What is that? "I love that, it looks likes graffiti. "Is that graffiti?" So students at first are really interested, in like the first point of entry are these faces. And what does it mean that one of these faces has chains in its mouth? Does that mean that it's losing the right to speak? And then they often talk about this one here that has nails going into the eyes. A lot of students connect that to losing the ability to see the truth. And then they talk about like, this feeling of weight that's underneath everything, and then as we start to discuss the top and how there's actually a lot more space, a lot of students aren't interested in saying, "Oh, that orange thing is this." It's like what do they feel is bearing down? What do they feel is keeping this group of people down? You know, they talk about slavery, they talk about oppression. And then often, like these legs are brought up and people are like, "Is someone getting sucked into it," or, "Is someone getting crushed?" I had a group of students who I was working with and they just were so drawn to the symbolism. They would talk about how you could almost like, feel it. Like, it's one of those paintings that you could almost feel this weight, and you could almost feel like, these chains in you as you look at it.