setNewsletterCookie('closedSignupBar', 1); if (o[this.name]) { The cultural Marxists that promote woke ideology do not care about art. Shame on the Art Institute for Summarily canning its volunteer docents, No Such Thing As Student Loan "Forgiveness". It has a magnificent collection of over 300,000 works of art. The Art Institute and its Critics Must Embrace Change.. Veronica Stein's birthday is 07/15/1980 and is 42 years old. Perhaps its not expertise or demographics per se but the confidence and entitlement that come with privilege, that became a stumbling block to effective collaboration on the departments priorities. Want to stay ahead of the art world? //and we can just return here. if (!$modal.length) { CHICAGO, IL.- The Art Institute of Chicago announced today that Veronica Stein will be the museum's new Woman's Board Executive Director, Learning and Public Engagement. + '
' })(); You are currently logged into this Artnet News Pro account on another device. These volunteers were described in a Chicago Tribune editorial,Shame on the Art Institute for Summarily canning its volunteer docents,as the mainstay of the venerable cultural institution for decades and the main provider of fine, learned tours to Chicagoans, tourists, students form Chicago Public Schools and myriad other visitors to our great museum.. If youre in line at a soup kitchen, do you care whos handing you a plate of nutritious food? And the third was as shapeless as jelly.. //hide form fields and show thank-you message All Rights Reserved.var w = Math.max(document.documentElement.clientWidth, window.innerWidth || 0), Thus the museum had decided to can the whole lot of them, replacing the group with a small number of paid educators working longer hours. timeout: 10000 They wont, of course. Stein joins the Art Institute from Chicagos Snow City Arts Foundation. In gratitude for their long, unpaid service-averaging 15 years each-the Art Institute offered the involuntarily retired guides a two-year free pass to the museum. Rather than refresh our current program, systems, and processes, we feel that now is the time to rebuild our program from the ground up. + '
' This isnt the only example of the left hailing mediocrity in the name of diversity and inclusion, nor is this trend limited to art museums. Winners receive up to S$20,000 to support arts-based initiatives for international collaboration and positive social change. Veronica Stein's Post. According to the docents committee letter to AIC President James Rondeau, each docent had to undergo eighteen months of twice-a-week training to qualify as a docent., In addition, they had to have five years of continual research and writing to meet the criteria of 13 museum content areas, and monthly and bi-weekly training to further educate ourselves with the materials, processes, and cultural context of the AICs 300,000 works of art. On average, each docent had 15 years of experience in training, research, collaboration, and facilitating the highest-quality tours worthy of an AIC program.. The only suspicious part is how long the letter takes to reveal the actual plan; its burying the lede. } + '<\/div>' When the museum closed its doors in March of 2020, we began an extensive reevaluation of our institution, taking a hard look at our resources, goals, and priorities, a spokesperson told Artnet News in an email. function addCss(fileName) { Theres Gertrude, theres Ep, and theres Ein Your list of must-see, fun, insightful, and very Los Angeles art events this month, including Alison Saar, Kade Twist, a show on the visual language of protest, and much more. But I also study community art and public art, I pay attention to ways institutions try (and often fail) to promote racial justice. Its not just the getting rid of docents many other wonderful programs are no more at AIC. Unlock premium content, ad-free browsing, and access to comments for just $4/month. The Art Institute of Chicago summarily fired all of its volunteer docents. Their average length of service: 15 years. First, the memo thanked them for their service and outlined the museums value to the community. He should meet with them, apologize and find some kind of compromise that does not involve the spectacle of long-serving devotees of a great museum left to feel like theyve been put out with the gift-store trash. Once the docents were essential; now, they were critics. View Veronica Stein's business profile as Executive Director, Woman's Board of Learning & Public Engagement at Art Institute of Chicago. That work of art hangs today in the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh. The Chicago Tribunes editorial board, meanwhile, called Steins letter weaselly and volunteer docents a vulnerable group in todays progressive power structure., People are upset about getting rid of docents because it is shifting the balance of power,curator and activist Kelli Morgan told Artnet News. In recent years, AIC and the docent corps have tried to recruit people of varied skin colors to become docents but apparently havent been successful enough for the institutes leadership. "My time at the Art Institute has been very special to me, and I am grateful to have worked with such highly committed, talented colleagues who are passionate about making an impact in . They carry on a proud American tradition of volunteerism that dates back to the colonial period. I am a daughter and granddaughter of White women who worked in museums. } There are 80+ professionals named "Veronica Stein", who use LinkedIn to exchange information, ideas, and opportunities. Californias City of Compton Gets Its Own Museum, These Miniature Artworks Prove That Its the Little Things In Life, Amos Paul Kennedy Jr. and the Democracy of Printing, Onassis AiR Invites Applications for 20232024 Tailor-Made Residencies in Athens, The Society Photographer of NYCs Downtown Underground, Call for Applications: Singapore International Foundations Arts for Good Projects, A Crowd-Sourced Archive of Our Oceans Plastics, Proudly powered by Newspack by Automattic. head.appendChild(link); This, Theres no story here, is the liberal medias verdict. Photo: Education Images/UIG via Getty Images. } The Art Institute used to have more than 100 docents, 82 of whom were active, until an executive director of learning and engagement, Veronica Stein, sent an email on Sept. 3 firing them all, the Wall Street Journal reported. It is equally ironic that the docents belong to a voting bloc that has become increasingly liberal. Most were also white. Jamie uses an eclectic blend of CBT, DBT and attachment-focused treatment. // dataType: 'json', The intense time commitment, the amount of knowledge and training required to do the job well, and the fact that this is an unpaid volunteer position, mean that being a docent is not suitable or desirable for everyone. Taylor Dafoe, + '
' The welcome and . These people are trying to bend reality to their own whims and preferences. Not because the museum was closing. All rights reserved. return ctx.regex.email.test( $email.val() ); function setNewsletterCookie(cookieName, value) { These are ladies who believe they have a calling to give back to their communities. + 'Signup failed. closedSignupBar: { var ctx = this; And about that letter: cutting through the blather is no easy task. addCss('https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/animate.css/3.5.2/animate.min.css'); Perhaps the docents should have seen the ax coming in Veronica Steins statement when she took the job on March 19, 2021. Overall educational programming will continue at a reduced scale. } }; Increasingly, they dismissed traditional concepts of beauty and embraced the vulgarities of artists like the infamous Robert Mapplethorpe. Hyperallergic is a forum for serious, playful, and radical thinking about art in the world today. Since that time, the program has benefited from the active engagement and enthusiasm of devoted volunteers, reaching countless students and visitors. All themes in the museums collections; all insights valuable to students. They can put a paycheck to immediate use. To ensure diversity and inclusion, future docents will be selected through an income equity-focused lens. All these buzzwords really mean that skills and knowledge about art are not nearly as important to the institute as docents skin color. + '