Move over, Sky Zone and Chuck E. Cheese. A new hands-on exhibit at Minneapolis’ Walker Art Center entertains kids while immersing them in modern art — and even letting them climb on it.
At the opening preview of “Show & Tell,” which runs through April 5, a dozen kids clambered on a large, arc-shaped, hole-filled structure. It looked like playground equipment but was actually installation artist Cas Holman’s “Critter Party.” Amid the chaos, a mom nursed an infant.
In recent decades, Twin Cities cultural institutions have prioritized attracting youthful audiences, mostly young adults. Few have aimed for the 0-12 cohort, for good reason. Kids’ running feet, busy hands and shouting voices aren’t exactly compatible with stark, silent galleries and fragile, one-of-a-kind artworks.
But “Show & Tell” was designed as an appealing, well-scaffolded introduction to art museums: Baby’s First Gallery Visit, if you will. The exhibit displays (well-protected) paintings, drawings, photographs and sculptures alongside hands-on activities, including a 20,000-plus-piece puzzle to assemble and translucent colored shapes to arrange and project on the wall.
The artworks range from a dramatic animal painting by Minnesota’s Julie Buffalohead to a Roy Lichtenstein print depicting a screaming toddler. Kids especially delighted in peering through a series of portholes to discover sculptures — a model of “Spoonbridge and Cherry,” a pack of black rats — hidden in the wall.
A few of the artworks seemed selected less for their aesthetic merits than their educational content and stereotypical kid appeal. For example, a rainbow-hued numeric painting series by Jasper Johns and a cartoon-y alphabet sculpture by Claes Oldenburg.
But many of the works engaged kids’ curiosity and were great conversation starters. For example, my daughter enjoyed figuring out how Robin Rhode created his photo series “He Got Game” by drawing a basketball hoop on the ground and photographing his “dunks” with an overhead camera.
As a parent, my only criticism of the show was including Erwin Wurm’s “Choose One Pullover and Stay in Front of a Wall.” An artwork encouraging hundreds of kids to play dress up from a shared bin of sweaters was clearly not created by someone who has spent days combing lice out of their children’s hair and washing every single bedsheet and stuffy. I opted for taking the kids outside to run around in the sculpture garden instead.
