Giving Compass' Take:

• Professors at Trinity College in Washington D.C. are working to combat representation and equity issues in art courses by redeveloping the art history curriculum to be more inclusive.

• How can other colleges departments follow suit?  Where else can we see equity gaps in arts education at the college level? Where can donors get involved?

• Read more about improving equity in the arts.

In the rise of a socially-conscious zeitgeist, a spectrum of practices across the vast catalog of art institutions and programming have come into question, specifically around the issues of representation and equity. From hiring policies to curation, art audiences are demanding more inclusive narratives.

But some institutions have found a way to respond to the current state of cultural criticism in more productive ways. One such educational institution is Trinity Washington University of Washington, D.C. I was honored and initially surprised when the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, Sita Ramamurti, reached out to me on LinkedIn seeking a meeting. I was even more surprised by what she asked me to do for them.

Seeing a major gap in Trinity’s offerings within the Art History Department, Sita and her colleagues asked me to develop two new curricula: 1) a two-part class in the history of African American art, and 2) a class in the history of worldwide resistance art.

I wanted to approach the development of these courses with sensitive consideration to the rising tension around cultural representation in the arts. So instead of focusing on the direct memorization of artworks and artists, as is the foundation of most art history teaching, I wanted the students to activate their critical thinking skills around problematic practices within The Canon of American Art.

If we collectively agree that there are culturally-significant problems within art history, but we do little to empower a generation of new thinkers armed with the skills to make change, then we will continue to have contentious debate with no solution.

Read the full article about building a more inclusive art history curriculum by Kayleigh Bryant-Greenwell at Americans for the Arts.