In Touch with Art
Liz Porter catches up with several visually impaired art professionals and learns about visual imaging at a conference on Art, Museums and Visual Impairment, held on the 28th and 29th November 2007 at the V&A, London.
Organised by St Dunstan’s in partnership with The Victoria and Albert Museum and Goldsmith’s University. This two day conference brought together an impressive list of delegates from the UK and further afield. Liz Porter, visually impaired arts professional, is passionate about the visual arts. She got to talk to some of the speakers.
St Dunstans - a residential centre based just outside Brighton, East Sussex - is known for its work with service men and women who have become blind or partially sighted as a result of war or in later life. They now provide a wide range of services for over 600 beneficiaries, including arts and crafts. People are encouraged to explore their own creativity not only through leisure pursuits but also with a view to developing their own businesses. Given that over 20% of the population over 60 is likely to have some degree of visual impairment, St Dunstans realise the importance of accessibility in museums and galleries
I asked Sarah Jarron, St Dunstan’s craft workshop supervisor what the main aims of the conference were.
Photograph of a large, cast piece of tactile sculpture made in the St Dunstan's craft workshop.
We wanted to talk to museums and galleries to encourage them to make their collections accessible to blind and visually impaired people. We hoped to address the issue of teaching arts and to raise the standard of good practice. We also wanted to look at art and visual impairment in terms of the psychology behind it. Through the conference we are making links with visually impaired artists to work with us in our education programme. From a personal point of view this is a great opportunity to link with all the speakers and to find out how we can continue to learn from them. We’ve begun work with Fabrika Art Gallery and Brighton and Hove Museum and hope that the conference will create opportunities for new initiatives.
Level access
The conference was chaired by Caro Howell, from The Whitechapel Gallery. A good choice as Caro’s work includes developing the i-map online art resource designed specifically for visually impaired people with a general interest in art, art teachers and their visually impaired pupils. Caro gave provocative and succinct summaries at the end of each session. One theme was the need to understand the different approaches to interpreting the visual arts. Given that responding to art is an individual experience, what do we mean when we talk about providing access that puts us on a level playing field?
The programme of speakers and workshops was very varied. However there were too many lecture-style presentations and I did wonder, at times, who the event was for? Many delegates would have already had a good understanding about access and were involved in exciting projects engaging with visually impaired audiences. We did get to hear about good practice, and groundbreaking online resources.
Visually impaired artists
There was a good representation of professional visually impaired artists such as Lynn Cox, Sargy Mann, Mark Ware and
Sargy Mann came across as a dynamic presence and an excellent role model for visually impaired artists. He talked about how his work changed as he became more visually impaired. He explored the need to discover different techniques to aid him in his composition such as working from photographs or descriptions given by his family. What struck me was how his use of colour became more vivid.
Lynn Cox talked about her use of space and tactile art. She also played an interesting soundscape, in which she had five different people describing the same pieces of art to illustrate different approaches to description. This work was overlaid with muffled sounds to give a multi-layered approach. Lynn has a positive attitude to how her visual impairment informs her arts practice. She talked about the importance of having inspiring and imaginative teachers and cited John Everret as a great influence on her going into the creative industries. A sculptor and multi media artist himself, John was present on the panel. He taught at RNC Hereford for over 20 years. The experience had a direct influence and impact on his own creative practice using sound and video.
Teaching art
John explained that he felt responding to what people ‘can do’ and want to explore was key in teaching. I couldn’t help feeling how liberating this must have been for those who went to RNC compared with my own experience of the restrictive environment of the institutionalised special school. The ethos there was to ‘normalise’ rather than to encourage ‘free expression’. And yet isn’t the idea of ‘can do’ too simplistic within today’s education structure – especially now that we thankfully have a more inclusive system? And how realistic is this approach in a university environment when you might be the only visually impaired person.
I spoke to Pádraig Naughton (Director of Arts & Disability Ireland and visual artist) who made some interesting observations.
I was frustrated with John's egalitarian approach because you have to accept that people are different. We are never going to have a level playing field. Going through college at the time I did was difficult because I was surrounded by nobody that understood my visual impairment. It was only in my third year that I was able to start to express myself in terms of touch.
I think the conference is a landmark in that it is happened. However for a lot of visually impaired people who are active in the arts, it is largely irrelevant. That is not to criticise what's been done, because in my role as director of Arts and Disability Ireland a lot of our work is about audience development - so we've got to respond to that need. If you are going to encourage blind and visually impaired people to interact with art and to use the education system, then it is important that they keep one step ahead of the debate.
The one thing that struck me about the conference is that networking has been difficult because of the venue. It was only actually after I had spoken today that most of the other conference members at the hotel came up and introduced themselves to me.
What I would love to see would be visually impaired artists involved in a critical debate. I have been making touch sculpture since 1993, but have yet to engage with an artist about the practice itself. I'd love to go ahead and do and MA and refine what I've done at degree level - but I wouldn't know where to take that piece of research - and I'm damned if I'm going to put myself through the experience of going through college to be have people supervising me who kind of go "well if it looks good, we'll tell you." If your engagement is at that level, then you are on your own. I believe there are enough of us out there now to construct something more meaningful than that.
Visual art and science
Professor of Psychology Linda Pring, Goldsmith’s University and Dr Alison Eardley, Birkbeck College presented research around the psychological characteristics of visual impairment and how we imagine the world with or without sight. This hour was provocative. In the ‘medical model’ language and general tone, visually impaired people were presented as experiments. I was miffed this topic got more time than the personal stories of visually impaired artists. However, this is one of the talks that got people thinking and challenging ideas. Where science meets the arts seems to be the ‘flavour of the month’, so perhaps it’s no bad thing that the conference placed such significance on this topic.
It was no surprise that visually impaired people’s response to memory is surrounded by multi-sensory layers using descriptive language. Nor that sighted people rely mostly on visual information. I got lost around the scientific references, but then we were having to look at a powerpoint presentation with limited audio description. I hope that visually impaired artists will be able to enter into the debate or even be part of the Disability Art and Science project that DAO and Ithaca Oxford are working on.
Verbal imaging session
The highlight of the conference, for me, was Rebecca McGinnis’ (Educator in Access coordinator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York) tour exploring the art of description. I’ve been to many Art galleries and experienced enjoyable, informative hand held audio guides and guided tours. However this was personal and far more engaging. What I liked about Rebecca’s approach is that she enabled the tour group to enter into an active dialogue building the picture, and the story behind each picture, in what she called a ‘verbal imaging’ session. We were asked to talk about Rossetti’s painting ‘The Day Dream’. Rebecca handed round a piece of canvas, and a bar of honeysuckle soap, bringing some of the themes in the work to life using smell and touch. She gave a literal but layered description giving us space to fill in the gaps.
Rebecca didn’t give all the information away. We had to probe, discuss and discover as a group. Through dialogue we pondered the intentions of the artist, made summations of the mood and themes, and also explored a myriad of creative interpretations. I could see how this approach of getting the group to be actively involved in the art of description, would work in education groups. We took an hour to look at one picture. This session got people thinking about how they could actively engage audiences. Rebecca is also partially sighted and I came away feeling excited about the potential for involving visually impaired people as guides.
I met Rebecca several years ago when she worked at RNIB in London. It was great to see her again and to hear about her work in New York. I asked her for her thoughts on the conference and what she was doing in the Metropolitan Museum.
The conference seems like a very tight group of people with a common interest in visual impairment and art. It has been a forum where some really important issues such as the use of touch and the involvement of disabled people can be aired and discussed. It has been particularly interesting hearing from visual impaired artists about their personal experiences. I'm also interested in the area of cognitive psychology and neuro-science.
It's hard to say across the board how things differ in the US. I've only worked at the Metropolitan museum which is unusual because of its size. There is an acknowledgement of the importance of touch there. The concept is more readily accepted by curators and so is easier to offer. We have much more use of tactile diagrams, handling collections and touch tours. However we've been in a weird situation at the Metropolitan because we've had no space for art-making for four years. We are looking at developing an artist in residence programme for our department and will include disabled artists as part of that roster.
In terms of employees with disabilities, we have quite a few. Right now there are four people in my department and two of us are visually impaired. In addition, of twelve freelance educators, four are deaf and teach general audiences using a voice interpreter, as well as Deaf audiences in sign language. We've also tried a team teaching approach. We have one person who is non-verbal who has CP who wants to be a gallery educator. We have developed a training programme for her to be able to teach in the gallery. We see it as important that the museum staff reflects the audience. They can take the training that we can facilitate with works of art to do other kinds of programmes. We do a lot of work off-site as well taking our programmes out to people in their homes and in hospitals.
Conclusion
Did this conference work? Yes I think it got people thinking ‘outside’ the box and moving forwards. Some of the information given around new technology and website resources was very relevant. Hearing about The Metropolitan in New York and The Louvre in Paris was inspiring. We also heard about small initiatives such as the Tyne & Wear Museum training visually impaired interpreters. It was also good to hear Marcus Weisen talk. He has contributed enormously to the development of access in museums and galleries for visually impaired people and now offers training and advice on a freelance basis. Marcus raised the important issue of employing visually impaired and disabled creatives, as arts developers, educators etc. I felt the fact this wasn’t picked up for general discussion, was a missed opportunity.
The key thing that would justify the conference to me would be if programming of work by visually impaired artists and the use of visually impaired professionals as educators and arts developers, comes to fruition. And I hope, like Pádraig that visually impaired creatives will find more opportunities to come together to discuss our creative practice. But more pressingly perhaps I wonder if there’ll ever be any ‘real’ funding in UK to enable all this to happen!!
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joyce Harper (joyce.harper[at]blueyonder.co.uk) said on 2008-02-12 21:57:
I would like to thank the V&A, St. Dunstans and Goldsmiths College for organising the ‘In touch with Art’ conference.
Teaching in a specialised field and responding to individual needs can make you feel isolated. It was good to meet people from all over the world with the same passion and devotion to this type of work.
On the subject of venue, as a sighted delegate, a simple map would have been appreciated pointing out meeting rooms, facilities etc.
It was good to spend a few precious moments viewing the impressive collections at the V&A, the silverware, fashion and theatre during breaks or on-route to meetings.
I would have liked more opportunities to question artists like
Sargy Mann about his impressive paintings and the practicalities of working since becoming totally blind. It would be interesting to discover how he copes with common problems such as ‘loosing’
figures etc. whilst painting.
I love exploring art galleries and exhibitions, and like to pass this onto my students, so I welcome the changes to make art accessible to all.
The V&A and The National Portrait Gallery have provided excellent in-house workshops at Mertonvision, to stimulate students unable to visit and encourage others.
I look forward to future conferences and think on-line discussions and comments an important way to share useful information and learn from one another.
Joyce Harper
last updated: 2008-01-11 12:34:58
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tags : visual impairment review accessibility visual arts mixed media