At the end of March, after almost 35 years in the museum education field, Patricia Sullivan is retiring from the Agnes Etherington Art Centre at Queen’s University. Pat attended her first CAGE symposium in 1991 and has served as Case Studies Chair, Junior Chair and Senior Chair for CAGE. Pat has been instrumental in gathering, recording, and maintaining the CAGE Archives, currently kept at the Agnes. She started her career at the Art Gallery of Ontario, working with youth, and over a long and successful career, has expanded her range of programs, projects and exhibitions at the Agnes.
What was your first experience in a gallery?
My first memorable gallery visit was when I was living in Amsterdam in the mid-70s. One dull Sunday afternoon, I visited the Van Gogh Museum. One of his early works—it was flowers, sunflowers, I think—stunned me. It was the lovely impact of colour. I had taken art in high school, but didn’t pursue it. Even as an undergraduate, I took English. But my 2 years in Europe opened a world to me. I went into Art History at York University in Toronto. I visited galleries frequently—big public galleries, smaller commercial galleries. I loved the AGO.
What drew you to gallery work?
During my graduate work (at Queen’s), I realized that working in a gallery, with art, was an actual thing you could do! I also realized I didn’t want to be an academic, that I wanted to work with art and people, together. I was interested in the public’s response to art. But when I started out, I didn’t even realize that the job of “gallery educator” existed.
I started out at the Art Gallery of Ontario as a part-time gallery educator in 1982. After leading kids’ studio programs for a few years, I switched to the high school tours department.
By 1988, I was full-time and getting more responsibilities, including docent training and teacher education. In September of 1999 I became the Public Programs Officer at the Agnes Etherington Art Centre at Queen’s University in Kingston.
How have you seen gallery/art education change over the years?
Things have changed enormously in gallery education. Firstly, the use of technology not only in exhibitions, but in how people engage with the gallery has grown.
I’ve seen many more purpose-built art education centres
I think there’s been a shift in gallery organization. Education departments move around in the structure, from Curatorial to Visitor Services. Now Education and Programming often has more influence and are their own departments. We’ve seen salaries go up. There’s more pay equity.
As museums and galleries have seen their audiences diversify and ask for more diverse offerings, the influence of Education and Programming has increased. Museums needed to be more accountable to their audiences. This broadening of programs and audience has been a major change [during my career]. We still need to hire more diversely, but we’ve come a long way.
The background of art gallery directors has changed. Almost always, gallery directors tended to be curators. That’s changed. We’re now seeing directors from various backgrounds. In the effort to be more accountable, galleries are giving greater profile to outreach and public programming.
What messages/attributes/ethics have you tried to instil in students/younger workers?
At the Agnes, we often have 30 student-docents and we’ve developed new volunteer roles: practicum students, summer students and giving seminars to students. So, I’ve had the chance to mentor lots of students. What I would say is this. Gallery education is creative. Your focus is the visitor. Always ask how is this program relevant. Respect the art, but find a connection to the visitor. Giving tours is about drawing out the visitor. Respect curatorial knowledge and go beyond it to places the visitor wants to go. In gallery education, it’s important to be a generalist, not a specialist.
What is the most important issue facing galleries/art education today?
Continuing to find connection with the audience and making art relevant. Using technology within the gallery and virtually beyond the gallery walls. Galleries face great competition from “entertainment”. We have to engage with the audience.
Where do you hope gallery education is going?
Well, the important word here is “hope”. As I said, there’s a new breed of director out there. I hope Education and Programming departments continue to have the respect of leadership. Our leaders need to have vision. We have to move beyond the quantitative into real and meaningful qualitative evaluation. Quantitative measures express so little about what’s really going on with the visitor. People going into art education, especially in galleries, are more and more educated, often with advanced degrees. They have to be prepared to be activists, to advocate for new programs that connect with audiences. They may not have influence on what exhibitions are mounted, but they should seek innovative and multi-faceted ways to connect with learners.
What do you think? How has gallery education changed since you’ve been in the field? Where do you hope it’s going?
