Object,+by+Claude+Cahun

= Object, by Claude Cahun =

Claude Cahun French, 1894–1954 Object, 1936

“As beautiful as the random encounter between an umbrella and a sewing-machine upon a dissecting-table”

— [|Compte de Lautrémont]

[|Claude Cahun’s Object]was the first “mystery object” selected by museum educators at the [|Art Institute of Chicago] to begin the experiment of what happens when teachers introduce art into their classroom. It has the perfect “ick” quotient to draw a response from even the most jaded student. Featuring a hairy eyeball sliced by a cloud-like shape and a reference to the French revolution, Objectcelebrates the fruits of the unshackled intellect. By emphasizing the irrational, [|Surrealism] shows us to what extent our brains are conditioned by a cultural obsession with order and rationality at the expense of other ways of experiencing and meaning-making.

Our experiment wasn’t predicated on introducing students to Surrealism and its radical critique of rationality. Such an introduction may have put them off and limited their responses. Instead, each teacher used the “mystery object” in distinct and fresh ways. In posts that follow we share our results. = =

=Teachers' Responses=

Angela Hayes:
Time spent with students: The whole related lecture was 45 min, the time spent on the piece specifically was about 10 minutes.

I discussed the process of giving artwork titles. What processes students can use to title their work, analyzing work for clues/words/themes, etc. Using other works of art I gave them time to look at it and think up possible titles which were written on the board. Sometimes background information was given about particular pieces, others were "cold" reads. This piece was used as a "cold" read and no information was given. We discussed what they saw, then interpreted those images, and came up with a list of possible titles.
 * Activity Description:**

They really got into trying to figure out what was going on in the piece. They analyzed it closely sharing out objects and observations readily. When asked about possible themes they immediately said mythology, which surprised me since mine and my colleague's immediate response was religion (we didn't do a close enough read apparently). After sharing observations several students shared their title suggestions, which are attached in a photo. It was quite amusing, the discussion was lively, and after the entire presentation the students seemed to be more at ease with the task of titling their own artwork.
 * Students' Response:**

As stated above, I think this was a good outcome for a whole class discussion on titling work. I had already planned on coming up with a lesson about this since my students A) need to title their work for assessments and B) were giving their work horrible titles in my opinion. When I received the mystery object I had this lesson in the works but not finalized and the piece put me on the path to present the discussion much quicker than I had planned, which worked out very well. I never would have chosen a piece like this to include in the discussion (personal aesthetics) but I will in the future because of the investigative hat the students must wear in order to read the piece correctly and authentically.
 * Reflections on instructional practice:**



Luke Albrecht:

 * Time spent with students:** 45min

I introduced the art piece as “object” and said for the students to brainstorm what they notice about it. In my class, we have established the idea of notice as objective observation. Students elbow shared and then reported out one word they could use to tell what they noticed. I recorded this on the dry-erase board (I copied this on a post-it and attached it to the student work I gave Sarah.) After we had a class set of words, we talked about which were true notice words and which started to have some subject value-adding to them. Blue is pretty objective, but weird is putting a value on the art. We have been having an ongoing conversation about personal value gets communicated and how shared value is established; so if some is saying the value is weird, how can we determine if it is a shared value? A lot of “shared value” in this country is measured through polling, so we polled the class (through a get up an vote with your feet method-walk to weird side or not weird side of the room). We then asked if any of the value words we put on the poster were proportional. The math showed they were not, except if you looked at uncomfortable to comfortable as comfortable to uncomfortable. This is a proportional relationship. Proportional relationships are interesting because they show equivalence, not just “which are most” for example. We then finished with an exit ticket where I asked the students to use the math discussion to justify which “value” makes most sense for our shared value of the “object”. Most responses sited “weird” as it was the “most”, but a few were starting to get at both “weird” and “comfortable” which showed their understanding of proportional reasoning. Some students did not see the connection to the mathematical analysis and still just said their personal opinion (which is okay, but doesn’t answer the question of “use the mathematical reasoning” to justify your answer).
 * Activity description: **

See above. Furthermore, students enjoyed the lesson and were great about “just going with it.”
 * Students' response:**

My only final comment is to stress that I took this challenge as a one-day event. I was teaching proportions and challenged myself to work the art piece into that lesson with just a few hours notice. After our discussion at the TAP I thought about my preference to use the art object as a part of an existing lesson, as compared to many of the other teachers using it as the lesson. I am interested in the two paths into this task. One: I have an idea and now I will integrate the object. Two: I have an object and now I will come up with the idea. Do the paths have equal merit? Do they get to the same place? Can we be on both at the same time?
 * Reflections on instructional practice:**

Sherrie Gauley:
I did the activity with 9 different classes, K to 6th grade. K-2nd, one period. 3-6th, two periods. (Some classes meet on Mon & Wed; others meet Tues & Thurs.)
 * Time spent with students:** 1 to 2 periods (40 minutes each period)

I did a facilitated observation & discussion of the object followed by art making inspired by the object. The art making was very open-ended: the students could make anything they were inspired to draw, write or sing (my one caveat: “which is appropriate for school”). For K-2nd grade we looked and talked for about 15 minutes and they had about 15 minutes to draw something.
 * Activity description:**

For 3rd through 6th grade, students filled out an activity sheet with 12 questions, which took one period. They did the art making during the next art class. We did Q.1-6 as group discussion and shared answers. Q.7-12, they did on their own. The activity sheet is based on basic "What's Going On?" questioning strategies combined with QAR (Question Answer Relationship) that classroom teachers use to help kids learn the difference between 3 strategies: finding the answer in the text, "collaborating with the author" in discovering meaning, and "in my head" type of Q&A (my own opinions, etc). Several years ago I developed this worksheet after a QAR workshop and revised it for the Mystery Object--expanding the Elements of Art section because we had just finished a unit on them. In part, I used the mystery object to see if they could apply vocabulary from that unit (like organic shape) to a new art work.

All grade levels seemed “hooked” by the strangeness of the object, and they seemed to enjoy the fact that I didn’t know anything about the art (for a change I was in the same boat with them). Most students didn’t hesitate long or at all when art making began. The unusual qualities of the object seemed to free them to come up with unique, new combinations of their own, e.g. putting the eyeball inside a huge wave, turning the eyeball into a head, and adding a beak—to name a few of the outcomes. One thing stands out, one of the 6th grade boys who wrote and performed the rap song is a chronic behavior problem (very smart, and easily bored by lessons that others find engaging), yet he came to me after class and asked to have a special time to redo the recording and add a few more verses. Unfortunately we never were able to make time for a redo, but I was impressed that he was invested in the product.
 * Students' response: **

In revising the worksheet, I wanted to see if these questions and the open-ended art making assignment could help my 6th graders work more independently next year, chose. My conclusion is yes. This exercise with you helped me develop some of my e.g choosing their own objects to investigate and make art inspired by what they teaching approach for next year: helping the 6th graders be more self-directed. Thank you for stimulating some growth for me
 * Reflections on instructional practice:**





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Peter Stover:

 * Middle (3-5)**




 * Primary (K-3)**




 * Upper (6-8)**



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