Illness and Empathy: Promoting Anti-Ableist Practices in Art Museum Education

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article describes the Miniature Exhibition Project, a collaborative project involving two intimate, at-home, miniature exhibitions curated by the co-author, Beatriz Asfora Galuban, for the co-author Asami Robledo-Allen Yamamoto. These miniature exhibitions were made to study disability, empathy, and friendship and were intended to reclaim and make sense of the experience of illness. This article includes details and personal reflections from The Miniature Exhibition Project and describes how the project impacted the authors’ empathy, understanding of disability, and museum practices. The article will discuss how museums are continuing to uplift ableism through programming, representation, and policies and explore how museums can cause trauma for disabled and MAD people. Finally, the authors share recommendations for applying insights from this project to mitigate ableist practice.