Why Combining Interactive Installations With Social Justice Art is an Effective Way to Engage Viewers and Make Space for Student Voice and Learning
Date
2020-08-21
Authors
Loszchuk, Crystal
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Abstract
Interactive installation art coupled with social justice art and messaging can tell the stories of
marginalized populations in cultures in a way that engages the viewers and participants minds,
emotions, and bodies. Interactivity aids in memory and demonstrates an embodied movement toward
change, while installation immerses the participant in an emotional and physical context devised by the
artist. The creators of this art can also benefit from having agency over their stories and control over the
way their narratives are being presented to others. Each viewer/participant brings their own
experiences to the art, but may have their perspectives challenged through the process of engagement
with the work.
In education this type of art can be used to promote critical thinking and cross-curricular
learning for students, by creating opportunities for students to research social issues that affect them,
and subsequently create visual projects about those issues through investigating art mediums and
messaging. Through preparation for installation students can explore new locations for artworks to be
presented, beyond schools and connecting to larger communities.
Teaching social justice art and creating artworks like these must be tempered with an
understanding of power and privilege, of accessibility to and ownership of art, and of the need to
question the long-term effect of such work for the participants and the creators.
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Keywords
installation, interactive, student voice, social justice art, activist art