The theory of Gestalt psychology argues that a person or object is seen as its whole, not just its parts. Students in Nick West\u2019s Museum Curating (MUSE 300) course took their interest in this principle to the Picker Art Gallery this spring. Their exhibition, Gestalt: Greater Than the Sum, provided an intimate lens into the three students\u2019 class discussions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Students in MUSE 300 were fragments, too \u2014 they each shaped a part of their final exhibition. This process began in the classroom. A museum curating course creates a Picker Art Gallery show that encourages visitors to construct their own meaning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1272,"featured_media":12105,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[37,322,1575,1577,1576,91,93,99,1584],"coauthors":[1451],"class_list":["post-12091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-scene","tag-art","tag-art-and-art-history","tag-gestalt-psychology","tag-gestalt-greater-than-the-sum","tag-museum-curating","tag-photography","tag-picker-art-gallery","tag-psychology","tag-university-museums"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/palXSH-391","amp_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2023\/04\/Gestalt.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1272"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12091"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12091\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12241,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12091\/revisions\/12241"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12105"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12091"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=12091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\u201cIn the course, we spend a lot of time on readings, so the students will get some theoretical perspectives,\u201d says West, a co-director of University Museums who is also an art and art history research affiliate and curator of the Picker Art Gallery. \u201cThen, we think about how we would apply some of those readings to the exhibition they work on concurrently throughout the semester.\u201d
This work includes a look into the Picker Art Gallery\u2019s collections, which comprises approximately 11,000 items. This was where curator Jacky Zhang \u201925 found Gestalt Philadelphia,<\/em> an image with a red-geometric print. The image has simple parts: red rhombuses that\u2019d be simple enough to draw, but when these squares are oriented across the page, an illusion jumps out. The center of the image bulges, and the viewer notices the whole.
Zhang boils this principle down into a simple analogy: \u201cWhen you see a deer on the road, your brain concludes that it is a deer, instead of four legs, two eyes, and a dotted body. Your brain will tell you [that] you are seeing something as a whole, not its parts.\u201d
Several pieces in the exhibition call the viewer to look into themselves.
\u201cWe ended up talking about intersectionality,\u201d says West. \u201cDifferent aspects of individual identity make you who you are, and affect what you show or hide from the world at specific moments.\u201d
To showcase identity interplay, curator Sam Fleming \u201924 chose a series of photographs portraying the resistance of marginalized people.
\u201cThe photographs represent how multiple pieces of one\u2019s identity intersect to create an authentic individual,\u201d explains Fleming. \u201cThey provide snapshots of identities that weave the fabric of contemporary society.\u201d
The exhibition itself mimics Gestalt\u2019s part-to-whole principle. Contributions from Madison Motroni \u201923 emphasized how individuals come together as fragments forming a community. And viewers are encouraged to form their own idea of what each piece means, altogether.
\u201cBy the end of the exhibition, we want our audience to construct the pieces that we picked out into their own, whole meaning,\u201d says Zhang.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"