[accessibleimage] Museum Exhibits Art by Children

Museum Exhibits Art by Children

THE NEW YORK TIMES, March 8, 1949

Paintings and Sculpture of Normal and Blind Students at Modern Art Gallery

'Haptic' Technique Seen

Production by Tactile Sense Not Limited to Sculpture in Exhibition
Classifications

by Edward Alden Jewell

An interesting though in many respects a pretty puzzling little exhibition
opened yesterday at the Museum of Modern Art, 11 West Fifty-third Street. It
is called "Visual and non-Visual Art Expression." The work, by children who
are blind or partly blind and children with normal eyesight, has been placed
in the museum's Young People's Gallery, on the third floor. It is the third
exhibition put on this season in this gallery, which operates under the
direction of Victor d'Amico, head of the museum's educational project.

The material of which the present exhibition is composed was produced a few
years ago in classes conducted in Austria by Dr. Viktor Lowenfeld while he
was affiliated with the Institute for the Blind in Vienna. Dr. Lowenfeld is
now a member of the art department at Hampton Institute in Virginia.

Classification of Work

On the walls have been hung paintings in water-color or gouache, or a
combination of the two mediums, and photographs of sculpture. The material
is divided into several groups, the two main categories labeled,
respectively, "Haptic" and "Visual." Further classification has to do with
the optic equipment of the young artists. Paintings by normal children are
placed in one group, paintings by the partly blind in another, etc. Those
totally blind have worked only in sculpture.

Haptic means "pertaining to the sense of touch." But it is here used, as
applied to painting, with a broader implication. In fact, the "touch" or
tactile sense seems not essentially to apply even to the work in sculpture,
for here, as in the painting groups, the classifying labels read "haptic"
and "Visual." It was explained at the gallery, just before the exhibition
opened, that terms such as "Impressionistic" and "Expressionistic" more
exactly fit the case.

It remains to be seen whether visitors in general will find the thesis as
here pictorially argued as difficult to follow as did the reviewer. The two
types of expression, impressionistic and expressionistic, with which we are
all familiar, are indeed illustrated. But introducing the factor of normal,
impaired and nonexistent eyesight seems to make the whole thing much more
complicated.

Statement by Dr. Lowenfeld

In a brief statement provided by the museum Dr. Lowenfeld says: "Having
investigated thousands of creative works of all age groups of blind and
normal-sighted persons, I found extreme cases of both types: visual types
among the blind and haptic types among the normal-sighted pupils. A blind
person reacts visually if he is able to receive out of his touch impressions
a simultaneous imagination, similar to our visual images. Only 35 per cent
of the totally blind individuals can come to such impressions. The other
extreme case is a normal-sighted person who does not use at all his sight
for his creative work. He creates like a blind person, using only his touch
impressions and his bodily feelings."

The work itself is very interesting, some of it quite extraordinary. But the
little exhibition seems in need of a rather sizable brochure. It must be
feared that the terminology employed in the wall labels will prove, for most
people, a stumbling block.
Museum Exhibits Art by Children

THE NEW YORK TIMES, March 8, 1949

Paintings and Sculpture of Normal and Blind Students at Modern Art Gallery

'Haptic' Technique Seen

Production by Tactile Sense Not Limited to Sculpture in Exhibition
Classifications

by Edward Alden Jewell

An interesting though in many respects a pretty puzzling little exhibition
opened yesterday at the Museum of Modern Art, 11 West Fifty-third Street. It
is called "Visual and non-Visual Art Expression." The work, by children who
are blind or partly blind and children with normal eyesight, has been placed
in the museum's Young People's Gallery, on the third floor. It is the third
exhibition put on this season in this gallery, which operates under the
direction of Victor d'Amico, head of the museum's educational project.

The material of which the present exhibition is composed was produced a few
years ago in classes conducted in Austria by Dr. Viktor Lowenfeld while he
was affiliated with the Institute for the Blind in Vienna. Dr. Lowenfeld is
now a member of the art department at Hampton Institute in Virginia.

Classification of Work

On the walls have been hung paintings in water-color or gouache, or a
combination of the two mediums, and photographs of sculpture. The material
is divided into several groups, the two main categories labeled,
respectively, "Haptic" and "Visual." Further classification has to do with
the optic equipment of the young artists. Paintings by normal children are
placed in one group, paintings by the partly blind in another, etc. Those
totally blind have worked only in sculpture.

Haptic means "pertaining to the sense of touch." But it is here used, as
applied to painting, with a broader implication. In fact, the "touch" or
tactile sense seems not essentially to apply even to the work in sculpture,
for here, as in the painting groups, the classifying labels read "haptic"
and "Visual." It was explained at the gallery, just before the exhibition
opened, that terms such as "Impressionistic" and "Expressionistic" more
exactly fit the case.

It remains to be seen whether visitors in general will find the thesis as
here pictorially argued as difficult to follow as did the reviewer. The two
types of expression, impressionistic and expressionistic, with which we are
all familiar, are indeed illustrated. But introducing the factor of normal,
impaired and nonexistent eyesight seems to make the whole thing much more
complicated.

Statement by Dr. Lowenfeld

In a brief statement provided by the museum Dr. Lowenfeld says: "Having
investigated thousands of creative works of all age groups of blind and
normal-sighted persons, I found extreme cases of both types: visual types
among the blind and haptic types among the normal-sighted pupils. A blind
person reacts visually if he is able to receive out of his touch impressions
a simultaneous imagination, similar to our visual images. Only 35 per cent
of the totally blind individuals can come to such impressions. The other
extreme case is a normal-sighted person who does not use at all his sight
for his creative work. He creates like a blind person, using only his touch
impressions and his bodily feelings."

The work itself is very interesting, some of it quite extraordinary. But the
little exhibition seems in need of a rather sizable brochure. It must be
feared that the terminology employed in the wall labels will prove, for most
people, a stumbling block.

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