Tee-Hee Art Tour

I chaperoned some third-graders on a field trip

today to the North Carolina Museum of Art.  For

 those unfamiliar, this serves as the renowned home of some of the world's most treasured pieces. 

Monet at his 1882 finest with "The Cliff, Etretat, Sunset"...

And who could miss Pierre-Jacques Volaire's 1777 masterpiece, "The Eruption of Mt. Vesuvius". 

Yet all the kids saw were butts.

Butts and breasts and the occasional missing genetalia.  Remember, some of those sculptures

 are OLD!

The docent did a decent job of prepping the kids for the peep show, but even she knew it was just a powder keg waiting for a match.   These nine-year-olds could barely keep from busting a gut when they saw the artistic rendering of someone's butt.  Or chest.  Or torso in any phase of undress.  

The real comedy came when the guide tried to get the kids to focus on a masterwork, then turn around to see what they remembered.  Only she forgot that a nude dude in bronze was smack dab in front of them once they had turned.  A few goody-goodies in the group dutifully answered the grownup questions, but the funsters in the crowd were bent on seeing the boodies.

So here's my suggestion for the next third-grade visit:  The naked museum tour.  Honor their little fascination with form and, er, function, and give them the real deal.  Show them the beauty of the human form and explain the reasoning and motivation behind the artworks.  Get it over with, and allow the kids to see the beauty in all shapes and sizes of bodies. Invite the parents.  Mix in the metaphors and mosaics and mythology, and give them an education they'll remember in an artistic way.  Peel away the puritanical and prurient...give them precious information they can use and appreciate.

 

Sometimes the bare facts are all you need.