Chicago - Art Institute

The Touch Gallery
http://www.artic.edu/aic/exhibitions/exhibition/touch

Overview: Visitors to the Art Institute of Chicago now have the opportunity to experience how the sense of touch can enrich their appreciate of art. The Touch Gallery is located in Gallery 10, on the lower level of the Allerton Building.

Made of bronze and marble and representing different periods, the sculptures in the gallery all represent the human face. Through touch visitors can discover the facial expression, accessories, and style of dress as well as discern an artwork's form, scale, temperature, and texture in ways that sight cannot provide.


The touch gallery was rather disappointing. Several busts made of stone, marble, and bronze are on display with Braille descriptions nearby. They do not seem to have been created for the sense of touch in particular, but were picked probably because of the various textures they possess. Although they offer the dimensionality that can be read by touch, it seems that they were created primarily for the sighted. I closed my eyes to explore several of the busts, as did other sighted visitors, but the experience did not add anything to my visual experience. I had already seen the busts and was using touch as a supplement to what I had seen. I noticed that many did not close their eyes to explore but instead simply glided a hand over the surface as if to quickly assess that the material was what their vision suggested. The tactile sense was used to confirm what the eyes had already established.

This exhibit might have been more interesting and playful if visitors were challenged to explore the busts without being able to see them, and then challenged to identify the bust by sight afterward – testing the accuracty of their sense of touch and letting sight confirm what the hands had established. This would have encouraged a more engaged encounter with the object through tactile impressions.