Poking Holes in the Oil Paintings: The Case for Critical Theory in Postmodern Art Museum Education

Abstract

Abstract This article discusses the theory and practice of transformative postmodern museum education, presented as a necessary response to contemporary society in which multiple perspectives have made modernist philosophies and practices of museum education largely irrelevant. I make a deconstructivist analysis of the history of museum education by describing modernist notions of museums and their educational roles. I then propose a definition and explication of a pedagogy of postmodern art museum education that casts the project of art education and the museum within frameworks of challenge, inquiry, and resistance that stimulate interpretations of art to take place in the wider context of everyday life.