Engage with Art: Take Your Museum Experience to the Next Level

1. Introduction: Are you an occasional or casual museum goer ready for a richer museum experience, but not for an art history lecture yet, then this class is for you. Because it will give you the confidence to go to a museum with little or no art history and start reading an artist's language and understand their creative process right of the canvas. Hi, my name is Marie Trope Zanzal. I'm a New York-based a Museum Educator and Art Program Developer. I was born in Paris and as a professional museum educator, I have taught how to look at art at the Louvre, the d'Orsay Museum, and Versaille. In New York, I created art programs at the Morgan Library and Museum. For the past five years, I've been leading gallery talks and tours at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I have enjoyed teaching diverse audiences of all ages and with all levels of education. These 35 years of involvement in museum education have been fueled by one passion; helping individuals like you to engage directly with the art. Now, I want to bring this passion on line and reach out to an even broader audience, including the folks who may not feel quite ready yet to go to the museums. In this class, you will discover how to engage with the a painting in a personal and meaningful way on your own in regardless of your knowledge of art history. Each lesson will start with questions aimed at guiding your look around the painting. You will learn tricks that will help you structure and direct your look and dig even deeper through focused and prolonged exploration. You will then write or sketch your own discoveries before I offer my insight into the work. For your class project you will apply all the steps of engagement, you just learned, to a painting of your choosing. As you go along, you will share your process with the class, so we can all learn from your insight while I give you my feedback on your progress. Whether a trip to a museum is a source of solitary contemplation or an activity to share with your family and friends, this class will teach you how to make the most out of your museum experience. I cant wait to see you engage with art. See you in class. 2. Your Project: Thank you for taking this class on how to fully engage with art. Before we start with the class proper, I will introduce you to your class project. I will then cover the material that you will need, both for the class and your project, because is basically the same. I will explain the rather unusual structure of this class. For your class project, you will read a painting of your choice and demonstrate to yourself and anyone looking at your project that you are becoming visually literate. First, you will choose a painting among the images that I have made available to you under the Projects and Resources tab right below. You will then apply all the necessary looking time using the method and tools that you will have learned in class. Then you will gather all your findings in worksheets provided in the class material or by sketching thumbnails if you'd like to draw. When you done, of course, I hope that you will proudly post your study worksheets and thumbnail, if you actually drew one along with the photo of the painting of your choice in the project. You can choose to work on your project in three different ways. It will depend basically on how much time, and especially how much energy you have. You can go through the class and do each assignment using the painting I will use to demonstrate how to engage with art and start applying all you have learned during [inaudible] 3. Tools and Materials: You will actually need the same material for your class assignment and for your class project. First and foremost, and you're going to hear me repeat that a lot. You will need looking time. Not long stretches at a time, but 5-10 minutes per assignment. Then you will need one ordinary number 2 or HB pencil, but a regular pen is fine too. You will need four colored pencils or medium-point markers of different colors. You will need one small transparent ruler. If it's not transparent, it's okay too. It's just easier when it's transparent. You will need tracing paper, sometime it's called parchment, it depends on the brand. The size 9 by 12 inches is fine, even smaller, and any brand will do. Then a dozen sheets of all-purpose printing papers size 8.5 by 11, that is the standard US letter. That will be to print the templates provided in the class material. You may want also to have a matte photo paper if you want a good printout of your painting, that's optional. But I really recommend that for best quality, you study your painting from the photo I provide directly from your computer screen. But you can do all your assignments, including your class project directly on a computer or a tablet if you have the appropriate software. In the next video, I will address the somewhat unusual structures of my class outline and lesson plans. See you in class. 4. Class Outline : If you've listened to my intro, you may have picked up on the unusual structure of this class. Lessons will start with me demonstrating a technique or a skill followed by an assignment. As a museum educator, I have based my teaching on two principles. The first one is that a student should be an active learner rather than a passive recipient of information. The second is that a student is not a blank slate. You will soon realize that you always have enough general knowledge by the mere fact that you're a living adult to see quite a lot in a painting. Provided of course, you focus on the right things and you give yourself enough looking time. Following those two guiding principles, I have structured my class to encourage you to be a proactive learner. The class is composed of four lessons that I like to describe as four consecutive encounters with your painting. During your first encounter, you will familiarize yourself with the work with no more information than the title, the name of the painter, and a few dates. With your second encounter, you will begin organizing your look and your thoughts. Your third encounter will introduce you to the artist's language and how it impacts your perception of the work. For your fourth and final encounter, you will have read up on the work. Within the class, each lesson will have two parts. They will each start with an assignment. I will invite you to look at the painting, ask yourself questions, and I will help with that of course, and record the questions and answers on a worksheet. If you don't have the answer to a question at first, you may find that answer later in the course of the class. In Part 2 of the same lesson, I will suggest a few questions, answers, and comments of my own using the class demo painting. That will tell you if you're going in the right direction. At this point, you may wonder why not read the info first and then study the painting based on the info that we have? It looks a lot easier than the reverse. That is actually a very reasonable question. There is a valid argument to make in favor of reading up on a work of art before visually exploring it. In other words, to start with an informed look. But there is just valid and argument in favor of doing the looking first and then the reading. That is what I teach because that is what I do when I start a new painting. What is the advantage of visually exploring before seeking information? In my experience, for myself and for my students, the challenge of looking for clues first is very satisfying on its own. It's like solving a puzzle. Most importantly, it exercises your visual intelligence. If you are a beginner, you will see that when you have started to engage visually on your own with a painting, any subsequent information about the painter, the models, the history, etc come a lot more relevant and relatable. You don't care about the life story of a total stranger, do you? But the moment you warm up to that person, you become curious about their life. In the same way, once you have engaged visually and to a degree emotionally with a painting, you are more open to facts. It will then become a lot easier to absorb and retain any information that you will learn from the labels or other sources. Finally, when you read up on a painting, you see only what the author of the text has chosen to tell you. You become dependent on the author's exploration. It is no longer yours. As I mentioned earlier, I like to think of you as an active learner. Let's get those synapses firing, shall we? I'll meet you in the next video for our first encounter with our painting. 5. Your First Encounter: The Casual Look: The goal of this first lesson is to make the acquaintance of the painting and to just experience it through a casual look without any particular agenda in mind. As I mentioned earlier, we are going to jump right into your assignment. For your assignment, you will need first and foremost, 5-10 minutes of looking time. Then under Projects & Resource tab, go to Demo Painting Image Hi Res and Demo Painting Image Low Res, or if you prefer to do all the assignments with your project painting, go to Project Painting Images HiRes and Project Painting Images LoRes. For best quality of image, I suggest you study the high res version on-screen or better still, if you live nearby, go to the Met to see the real thing. You can print out the low res version, which is formatted to allow room for notes. Go to Links to Worksheets and click on Lesson 1 worksheet. You may choose to print it out or to work directly on an editable Google Doc document. You will also need a couple of markers of different colors or color pencils if you go to the Met because ink is not allowed in galleries. But you can also do all this on your computer or on your tablet if you know how to use software such as Photoshop, Affinity Photo, Clip Studio Paint, Procreate, etc. I will be using some of these programs at times, but this is not a class on digital drawing. If you want to learn how to use digital tools, you will find many excellent classes on Skillshare. Now let's proceed with your assignment. 6. Your First Encounter: Casual Look (b): Make sure that you have a good picture of the painting you've chosen to study in front of you. Relax into the painting, you don't have to prove anything to anyone. Use your general knowledge, personal experience, and your intuition. Remember that you don't come to this painting as a blank slate. You bring your human experience, your general knowledge of life, all kinds of personal expertise and interests, use them all. Type, or write down what comes to mind. If nothing comes to mind, on your worksheet, you'll see a couple of sample questions that you may want to ask yourself as prompts. Let's start with the basics. What do you see? What surprises you in this painting? What is most noticeable? Who are these people? What are they doing? Where are they? That's perfectly fine not to be able to answer all your questions. Keep asking questions until no more question come to mind, and don't worry about the answers. To answer these questions or to ask them, you may use either the worksheet, or the low-res image. When I study a painting for a presentation, I draw a small sketch called a thumbnail. Feel free to draw a thumbnail. If not, the low-res image is a good substitute for you. No need for full sentences, just write your thoughts as they come to you. If you already see a story there, feel free to write it down just in a couple of sentences. Don't beat yourself if nothing comes up, here just starting. The only thing that I'm asking of you is to spend at least five minutes looking at the painting. Now, go to your assignment, take your time, and when you are done, post it on the student gallery. I'll see you in the next video for the second part of this lesson. 7. My First Encounter: I hope that you have given your painting plenty of looking time and that you have the time to write down what you saw and what questions you had. I'm now going to tell you how I saw this painting the first time I encountered it at the Met. In the late 1980s, I wrote a pre doctoral thesis on French group portraits at the Sorbonne. But all I knew of the painting was a five-inch tall, black and white photo. The same five-inch tall, black and white photo that was used for the article I published the following year. A few years later, I was visiting the Met, when I suddenly saw it for the first time in the flesh, my jaw dropped. You may have noticed that I have an expressive face. When I say that my jaw dropped, it is because it did. I looked at it with the mouth and eyes wide open for minutes on end. It took my breath away. It's a big painting. That was the first thing that came to mind. The figures are almost life-size. Then the dress, the texture of that dress, the silky feel. Yes. You know how it feels just by looking at it. You almost feel the sound of the taffeta. That hat, she's indoors and she's wearing a hat indoors. Not a little [inaudible] like the other figures. A big straw hat. Speaking of texture, what a beautiful skin. It seems to be the lightest color in the painting, almost glowing. Is she fluttering herself or was she that beautiful? She must have been around 30 at the time. How can she be painting with oil in such a dress? Not just small painting, a huge painting of that. That really doesn't make much sense. Is she [inaudible]? The two students are not as fancy, a bit in the shade. They are not working either. One is looking at me just like Adelaide, and the other is looking at the canvas with a broad smile, admiring. They are standing behind her chair. Adelaide wants no competition, especially not from younger women. Adelaide is looking at me as if she was painting me. So is the young woman in the back looking at me, the painter is painting someone who would be sitting where I am. Strange feeling of being part of that painting. Of being in the same space as the characters or is she looking at a mirror? There's no way to know what is on that canvas that she's working on. Let's see, what narrative do we have here? Maybe Adelaide, the painter, represents herself in a very unlikely fancy outfit, and she's working on a large painting. She is looking like she's ready for a reception of all or some kind of very important event. Based on the way they are dressed, the two students are not going to that event. They all looking non admiringly, but there is a distance between the painter and the younger women. I could keep rambling for a lot longer. I'm pretty sure that some of you felt that once you get started and past five minutes of looking, you saw more and more and felt that you too could keep rambling for a lot longer. That is what casual looking time does. We see a lot, but we don't necessarily focus on what is going to give you the keys to the painting. That is why in our next lesson, we are going to encounter the painting for a second time with a different kind of look, the deliberate look. I'll see you in the next video for Lesson 2. 8. Your Second Encounter: Deliberate Look: During your first encounter with a painting, you used your personal experience or your intuition, your general knowledge to try to make sense of what you were looking at. In a relatively short time, you were just scanning the painting randomly. The goal of the second encounter is to apply an organized and focused look to your painting. This more deliberate look will lead you to clues, which in turn will bring you closer to understanding the painting. We'll still be using your intuition and your general knowledge, but you will also start making significant connections between the various elements of the work for a deeper understanding. For your second assignment, you will need more looking time. The high res image of the painting you started to work on, the low res image of the same. Then you will need Lesson 2 worksheet. At this point, you might be tempted to start researching your painting and reading up on it. That is very exciting and I love to hear it, but I will ask you to please hold off or running to the library or to use search engine. Because for the moment, we are trying to understand a work of art or without the knowledge of its historical context. Later in the class, we will start incorporating more info and I promise that you will give free range to your curiosity. For your assignment, you need to spend time looking at the models, then the props, then the space, and how they all relate to each other. I suggest that you don't do all that looking in one straight a time. Take it five minutes at a time. Look for five minutes, give your eyes a rest, and then look again for another five minutes, etc. You may think that your eyes are fine, but your eyes are doing only 20 percent of the looking. It's your brain that is doing the heavy lifting here. It's your visual intelligence that we're exercising, not your eyes. Give your brain a breather to keep your visual intelligence fresh and sharp. What are we looking for in the models? Who are they looking at? What are they looking at? What is their facial expression? What is their body language? How do all these inform the story or the situation depicted in the painting? How do they relate to each other? How do they relate to you as far as the props are concerned, first of all, let's see what kind of prop we have around here. What kind of object you see. What do the prop tell you about the characters, about the story, about the situation? The space. What kind of space are the models in? How do they fit in that space? How does the space inform the story or the situation? Would you like to give a narrative another try? If you still haven't answered questions about the painting, write them down. Write your answers in the Lesson 2 worksheet. Take the time you need to do your assignment. I now meet you in the second part of this lesson, when you are done. 9. My Second Encounter: Welcome back. I hope that you've had time to take a good look at your painting and that you have started to draw connections between it's various elements. Now let's look at our painting. I had already noticed that Adelaide, and one of the girls are looking in my direction at me, or rather at a person who would be in my position or the looking at a mirror maybe which would mean that she is painting this self-portrait. Adelaide looks more like she is posing, than actually observing. She is very satisfied with herself. She's probably proud of herself as a painter. The student in the back, on the other hand, is truly looking in my direction with her mouth a bit pinched as if in deep concentration. The first student is in motion as if she was moving towards the painting and looking at it admiringly. There is enthusiasm, excitement, action, even that admiring student is certainly flattering to the teacher. This is the only knowledge that we have of that painting. We only know it is worthy of admiration. The fact that the two girls are holding each other, indicates that they are close, but I would say also of one mind. One is looking at the model, me, us, and the other at the painting, two actions that one person would do to compare the model and the painting or her student present only to flatter her? Adelaide is clearly imposing herself in that space. She occupies the center and she stands out with her dress and her hat. If she wants to be so obvious, I'm still wondering why she wanted to show her students as well. All the objects around the room have a function. The large canvas, not particularly pretty and yet very present in the painting. The palette and brushes, the chalk on the stool. Clearly, they all define her as a painter. As well, the furniture, it looks very fancy with a velvet and the gilded wood. Is she telling us that she has money? The room, on the other hand, is not fancy at all, and it is very dark in the back. But we see two sculptures maybe because she is in her studio, but why so dark. The narrative that comes to mind is that there is a huge emphasis on her person that indicates that this might be a promotion for her as a painter. The fancy dress would show that she makes enough money to buy such a fancy outfit. She can also afford fancy furniture, meaning that she has a successful painter. I'm still wondering why she also included her students in the painting. She wants to show that she's a teacher, but I have seen other self portraits of painters, they all had students and yet the students never appeared with the painter in the self portrait. You may have reached a point in reading the painting where you may be satisfied that you now know enough, or on the contrary, you may think that you are still missing a few things or a lot and that you still haven't answered questions. Whichever the case may be, I can assure you that you are not finished. During your first, and second encounter with the painting, you have only used your intuition and your general knowledge. Maybe you're a seamstress or a costume designer and you got a lot just looking at these dresses and the quality of the fabric and the laces. You may have a passion for antique furniture, and you may have recognized the Louis the 16th style in the stool and the chair. But we still haven't addressed the formal tools that the artist used to make you see all those elements. In Lesson 3, we will start a formal analysis of the painting in order to understand what the artist did, to guide you look and to make you see this painting the way you did, you are going to start reading the painting at a whole new level. See you in Lesson 3. 10. Your Third Encounter: Literate Look: After completing lesson 1 and 2, I hope that you are satisfied that with enough looking time and focus, if you organize your looking, you can get a lot out of a painting, especially if you have the title. In 99 percent of the cases, a museum will display the name of the painter, a title, and a date or two at the very least. The goal of the third encounter is to go beyond what you could observe just by watching. With this third encounter, I'll introduce the artist process. You will start recognizing the visual means that she is using and to learn how to read this language. In other words, the goal of this third encounter is to introduce you to visual literacy. For your third assignment, you will need more looking time of course. The HiRes image of the painting you started to work on, the LoRes image of the painting you started to work on, plus tracing paper, a couple of color markers, and the ruler, and of course Lesson 3 worksheet. This time before you dive into your assignment, I need to discuss the visual means the artist applied to her painting. Some are rather obvious. Some are a bit more subtle and need an introduction. The artist can use a great many numbers of means, colors, shape, lines, texture, movements, and many more to communicate with you, the viewer. To remain within the scope of this class, I will look at just a few of these techniques. We will look at composition, light, and contrast. We'll see there is really an overlap between light and contrast. Composition refers to the way the artist is grouping or connecting the various elements in the painting. We're going to look at three examples. Looking at Madam [inaudible], she fits in a triangle. Her whole volume fits in a pyramid actually. What is this conveying? This is conveying solidity, stability, strength. She's asserting herself. This is reinforced by two more triangles here at the bottom. There is a second pyramid that includes the first one, but includes also the students. I will let you figure out what that may mean. 11. Your Third Encounter: Literate Look (b): Another way of composing your painting is by following the rule of third, that's a very commonly used composition in all the visual arts, painting, illustration, comics, photo, movies. You may recognize it now. Using tracing paper, draw two vertical lines so as to divide your painting in three equal columns. Then two horizontal lines so as to divide your painting in three equal rows. What do you notice about the lines? Between the lines and especially on the line? What do you notice about the way the elements are organized in reference to the columns and the rows? There are other important lines in this painting. They are called implied lines because they're not really contour lines, but they are lines that create a pattern. When you see many hands in a painting, for example, it is always a good idea to follow them and see if they are forming a pattern. Gesture or hand position is often quite significant. After composition comes light. This one is easier because you probably have already seen most of it. Ask yourself, where does the light fall the brightest? Where does it not fall? Where is it in-between? Where do we have midtones? What does the arrangement and the intensity of the light tell you about the characters, the story, the situation? Using a black and white photo with heightened contrast, if you can, will help you a lot in this exercise. After composition and light, you'll move on to contrast. Contrast are the most expressive tool in the artist's toolbox. By contrasting two elements, she can tell an entire story. The most obvious contrast is all from light and dark. This time forget about midtones, look for the brightest lights and the darkest dark. How do they interact with each other? How do they inform the narrative and the situation? There are other contrast, of course, that you may find. Lines that can be straight or curved. Colors, they can be bright or muted and dull. Textures, it can be complex and rich, or plain and simple. It can be smooth or rough. Shapes, they can be voluminous, or flat, or round, or angular, geometrical, organic. Now go back to your worksheets of Lesson 1 and 2. Review all your observation and for each of them, ask yourself, what tactic did the artists use to make me see that? The answer could be in the composition, or in the light, or in the contrast, or in any two or three of the above. This may look like a lot, but you don't need to go through all your notes in one sitting. You may also choose to address only what is most interesting to you in the painting. What struck you first. When you are done, you will have started reading the artist's language. Make a note of how knowing the artist's language increased your understanding of the painting. Do you think it's time to add or modify your narrative? What questions remain unanswered? When you have completed your assignment, join me in part 2 of this lesson. See you in class. 12. My Third Encounter: Welcome back. Congratulations, you have completed your assignment, you have begun your journey into visual literacy. You are now fully engaging with art. In the first part of Lesson 3, I gave you a lot of pointers regarding the way the artist guides your look to help you read her message. I'm now going to offer some conclusions. I will focus my reading of the painting on what I see as the two main topics; the enormous focus that Adelaide put on herself and the presence of the students. What visual tools did the artist use to bring so much emphasis on herself. As I already mentioned in the first part of the lesson, she is included in a pyramid which evokes balance and power. We see that she is asserting herself. Again, assume that she's asserting herself as a painter. The role of the light is paramount here too. It falls on her face, her neck, her chest in a very flattering way. It also falls on her painting hand and on her brushes. She's not only imposing herself as a painter, but she's also emphasizing her femininity; her skin glows, her dress shines, vibrates in the light. The lace seems to be dancing in the lights so does her mini ribbons, she is literally dazzling. The contrast between dark and light here is easy to figure out. She stands out against a pretty dark background. We saw the light on the painting hand and the brushes. We can notice that this painting hand is standing against the dark box in the back, and in contrast with the dark palette in front. We will see that she accumulates the means to emphasize that painting hand. She is hammering her status as a painter very loudly. But also look at the textures. You can compare the rich texture of her dress against the rather dull texture of her first student's dress. We don't even see the second student. The laces here are very delicate and complex, while that student is wearing a simple musillin with a few ruffles. Notice how delicate the sadden of her shoe is in contrast with the dark wood of the easel. Even most striking is the contrast between the finery of the dress and the roughness of the canvas seen from the back. It's really the least decourse part of that canvas with no attempt at making it look neater than it actually is. The canvas also creates a contrast in lines because look at the very strong straight lines, the geometrical lines, and how they contrast with the curves of Adelaide over her whole person and that of her urn, her dress, her hair. Notice also the angular box lid right behind her. It's probably a painting box and it is in direct contrast with her lace, her [inaudible] and all her ribbons. You may start thinking that she is not only advertising herself as a painter, but as a female painter. Another prominent aspect of a painting where I feel there might be some interesting narrative is the presence of the students. How does she create that narrative with her visual tools? Once again, let's go back to the composition and we just saw that Adelaide occupies a pyramid, but the entire group occupies a bigger pyramid. We've seen that. There are two pyramids in there. The bigger pyramid includes the three fingers and present them as a unit. While the smaller pyramid sets Adelaide apart from the two younger women, they are unified and yet distinct. 13. My Third Encounter (b): Let's talk about the rule of third. The rule of third can tell us more about the relationship of the teacher to the students. We have those three equal columns and the three equal rows. What do you notice about the lines? How is Adelaide at the painting using the rule of third? First of all, the division in thirds creates a central rectangle in which all the upper body of Adelaide fits. A summary of all she is in this painting, you see the palette, you see the woman and you see the teacher with a hand of the student. Second, on the left vertical line she places the painting hand, another privileged position in the painting. On the other vertical line, she positions the face of the admiring students on the upper third and her hand onto the second third; two defining element of that student. What we also see is that the hand of the student is on the back of the chair. The back of the chair is an effect, what separates the students from the teacher. Once again, there is a double emphasis on what separates the back of the chair and what connects the hand. Well, there's more about these hands. They create two repetitive curves. A first curve's following the hand of the students that ends on the chair, and that accompanies the movement of the admiring student. A similar curve, a rhyming curve, as we would say, that starts from Adelaide's shoulder down her arm to the palette and the painting hand. That motion is somehow prolonged by the brushes pointing towards the canvas. While her students are admiring and looking at the painting, Adelaide in effect is pointing at the painting, emphasizing again what she did. With the light, she creates a hierarchy between the two students, and then another hierarchy between the students as a group and Adelaide as the teacher. Adelaide is getting most of the light, of course, and the first student is getting light on one side of her face and on her arm and her hand. The second student is receiving the light just on her forehead. The difference between the two student doesn't seem fair. The second student is hardly visible, she is hidden in part by the first one and what we can see or her is in the shade. I'm sure there is a narrative there. This has to mean something. It is too odd not to mean something. What have we learned so far from just reading the canvas? First, intuitively, second, with some knowledge of the artist visual language. We can see that Adelaide is forcefully promoting herself as a painter. The large pyramid and globing the three women tells us that they are close. The first student's reaction and motion towards her reinforces this feeling of closeness with the teacher, but the separation sense of hierarchy also reveals respect. The teacher inspires admiration, closeness, and respect. That is part of the promotion of course. But there's more to this. You don't need to know a lot about art history or history in general, to be aware of that in the past women were not treated by men as equals. If you can come up with that many names of great female artists, it's because the field, at least until the 20th century, has been largely dominated by men. We can safely infer from all the elements at our disposal in the painting, that Adelaide is trying to impose herself as a woman doing a men's job in a men dominated society. The self-portrait resonates as a very strong societal statement. You see that after three encounters with the painting and a lot of looking time, we have managed to get quite deep into the meaning of the painting and the artist's process. You should be very proud of yourself to have acquired the ability to read a painting on your own. I hope that on your next visit to the museum, you will be able to apply all you've learned in this class and give more looking time to the paintings that interest you. But there are still a couple of questions that remain. To whom did she address her message? Where would she have exhibited this painting? How does this message fit more particularly in 1783 when she painted the self-portrait with her students. I think it's quite obvious that to answer these questions, we need to shift our exploration beyond the painting. We need to do research into the context in which the painting was created. In other words, we need a little bit of art history. This will be our fourth encounter with this painting in lesson 4, which will conclude our exploration together at least. We'll approach our painting with an informed look. I'll see you in class. 14. Your Fourth Encounter: Informed Look: Whereas in lessons 1, 2, and 3, we studied the form of the painting which required a lot of patience and a few tools, with the informed look, we move on to the field of art history. If you have a background in art history, you know the great satisfaction there is in applying your knowledge of history and culture to a painting. With art historical exploration, there is a process that goes way beyond the scope of this class and which requires its very own set of classes. Nevertheless, in this lesson, I want to offer you the possibility to complete your understanding of your painting with easily accessible information regardless of your background in art history. Where do you find information on a painting? The most obvious, of course, when you are in a museum or the labels. There is a wide variety of labels in museums. Here are two labels from the Met. One is limited to the basics. The name, the title, the dates, and the collection it belongs to. The other one gives you a little bit of context. Some museum will give you a short text. Some of the museum will give you a longer text. In addition, some museum will have a general panel for the entire gallery. You're seeing that a lot on the walls of special exhibitions. If there isn't enough on the labels, you can always check if the museum has a node you tour. You can also go to the museum's website. Museums like the Met, the National Gallery, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Getty Museum to name just a few, often offer various levels of information. It can start with a short blurb, a bit like a label on line, all the way to a full bibliography if you want to go deeper into your research. Many museums have published catalogs of their collection. This is where you are the most likely to find the best info on a painting. But before you go buy a catalog, check your local library. If you live near a museum, chances are, they have their own library where you can have access to the collection catalogs. Some museum even generously publish their collection catalogs online and you can download them for free. If all else fails, you can always do a Wiki or a Google search, but be careful because that may not always yield historically accurate info. For your assignment, you will need the usual, including lesson 4 worksheet, but mostly you will need your computer. I'm going to ask you to do your own research. Then you can read as little or as much as you wish. Then go to your worksheet for lesson 4 to answer the question. How does the info you gathered on your painting fit with your own narrative? Did it answer the question you still had? Did it reveal some misinterpretation on your part? If it did, don't feel bad. Even art historians misinterpret artworks at times. Overall, how did your reading enriched your exploration of the painting? Once again, you don't have to do a ton of reading if you are not inclined to do so. Read just as a little or just as much as you please. When you are done with your assignment, I'll see you in the second part of this lesson. See you in the next video. 15. My Fourth Encounter: Welcome back. If you are doing your assignments with Adelaide's painting, you found the info on the Met website. On the same page right under that blurb, you will find the segment of the audio tour related to this painting. If you scroll down, you'll see a button labeled catalog entry. If you keep scrolling down under perspective, you will find a wonderful presentation by Kathryn Galitz from the Met under painting and its context. There's really no point to my repeating what you can read there on your own. But I will relate some of this information to observation that I have made earlier just looking at the painting. How does this connect with what I read in my painting? Adelaide was one of the four women allowed at the Royal Academy. The academy counted a total of 50 members. That explains why she put so much emphasis on her femininity, but also why she is showing to her students. She is advocating not only for herself, but for more women painters. She's also presenting herself in her studio. It is not an elegant space. It is dark and plain but it indicates that she has a studio, that she's a true professional, and she has a room of her own so to speak. The painting was done in 1783 and exhibited at the Salon in 1785. The Salon was the most important venue of exhibition for an artist. It attracted all the critics and all the potential clientele. She had to present herself at her best. This was part of the etiquette of the time. The size of her self-portrait as well as the size of the painting that she is working on in her self-portrait are both significant. Men did not object to women painting. In fact, it was part of a well-rounded young woman's education. But first of all, women of the upper classes were expected to paint as a pastime and mainly flowers. Second, they were expected to paint miniatures and in pastel that is in small formats. Adelaide on the other hand, is demonstrating that she can work bigger, much, much bigger. Not only that, but she can paint full figures in various positions and with various facial expressions. She was actually so successful in demonstrating that she could do as well as the men that some critics claim that her husband, Francois Andre Vincent, a prominent artists of the time, that her husband actually painted the portrait. Others didn't go as far as accusing her of being a fraud, but they had to say things such as this woman is a man. Of course, that was meant as a compliment, meaning that she painted only as a man can paint. I hope that you can see that by adding just a little bit of information allowed our observation to congeal in one coherent and a richer narrative about the condition of women painters in the 18th century. I will end this investigation into the context of the painting now, but feel free to continue to read and explore and then look again at your painting to see it in a whole new light. We have reached the end of our class. You now know that to engage with art, you first need looking time, you need some discipline to organize your look and you need some knowledge of the artist's language and a bit of background on the work of art. My first hope is that you will complete your project following those steps, and show the results of your investigation in the project gallery. I can't wait to see your visual thinking process at work. My second hope for you is that you'll soon go to a museum and engage with art. Better still, you'll go with your family or your friends and read a painting for them then come back to the conversation folder and tell me how it went. I would love to keep hearing from you. Enjoy your museum visit and don't forget always engage with art. 16. Parting Thoughts: We have reached the end of our class. You now know that to engage with art, you first need looking time, you need some discipline to organize your look, and you need also some knowledge. You need some knowledge of the artist's language and a bit of background on the work of art. My first hope is that you will complete your project following those steps, and show the results of your investigation in the project gallery. I can't wait to see your visual thinking process at work. My second hope for you is that you'll soon go to a museum and engage with art. Better still, you'll go with your family or your friends and read a painting for them. Then come back to the conversation folder and tell me how it went. I would love to keep hearing from you. Enjoy the museum visit, and don't forget, always engage with art.