Students Curate Multi-media "Untied States" Gallery Show

In its 8th year, Millbrook's themed art history course continues to provide an unparalleled experience for students in the arts, as they research, study, curate art, and create a gallery show to share with Millbrook and the extended community.

Untied States
was the gallery show conceived and created by students in this year's art history course, On the Road - On the Move, and it opened in the Warner Gallery on May 19th. Over the course of the academic year, Vth and VIth form students in this course explored the art, music, literature, and films fostered under the “Ethos of the Bomb,” moving from the advent of the Cold War through to the turbulent ‘60s and its aftermath.

They dove into Kerouac On The Road, Kesey in The Cuckoo’s Nest, and Vonnegut over a Breakfast With Champions. They examined characters like Dr. Strangelove, learned about abstract expressionists, pop art, and the minimalists. They viewed and discussed the images of photographers like Gordon Parks, William Gedney, and Garry Winogrand, and they had the terrific opportunity to meet Paul McDonough when he brought his photographs to a Warner Gallery show in the fall. They played songs that launched rock ‘n roll and  and then heard how music matured into the classic sounds of the 60s and the Motown of the 70s. 

Their culminating gallery show, Untied States, came to be after their review of many different texts and thousands of images from art, television, magazines, and film, all of which supported the idea of a sense of disconnectedness in the unity of America. Gallery goers were led through the exhibit by student curators, who began by explaining their plethora of ideas written out as they had come to the surface throughout the school year. Song lyrics and poetry were artfully designed to illustrate the time period, and periodicals were displayed as an interactive element. Video excerpts from television and film were projected onto a feature wall, audio added another dimension to the experience, and students filled an oversized map of the United States with images the reflected essential course material. 

Teachers Bill Hardy and Walker Zeiser are already planning for next year's art history course, 20th Century Art & Aesthetics, which will focus on the art and ideas surrounding the mindset of modernity and postmodernity through its myriad -isms and schisms.
 
Past art history courses (and their corresponding gallery shows) have included:
Willem de Kooning - Bon A Tirer (2010)
Gordon Parks - The Discerning Eye (2011)
Greene & Greene - With Noble Hands (2012)
Ron Haviv - Testimony (2013)
Frank Lloyd Wright - The Space Within (2014)
Alec Soth - Somewhere Between Polite Society and the Wilderness (2015)
Great Art Objects - All You Can Ethos (2016)
Back