Despite the lack of remunerationthey do this to be helpful and because they love arttheir training to be docents is extremely rigorous. } The ax fell in the third paragraph. $.ajax({ // Show signup failure error and hide other errors Well wager museum lawyers had pointed that out. They were not given the courtesy, gratitude or loyalty of being moved into the new positions they would be overwhelmingly qualified for if they werent too white and privileged.. There is no question that the Art Institute of Chicagoand all museumsneed to diversify. Shame on the Art Institute for Summarily canning its volunteer docents, No Such Thing As Student Loan "Forgiveness". our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. if (!window.jQuery) loadJQuery(); But #NotAllDocents do this, and I dont want to disparage the art historical expertise that the museums docents possess. }, 100); Your list of must-see, fun, insightful, and very Los Angeles art events this month, including Alison Saar, Kade Twist, a show on the visual language of protest, and much more. Put simply, the bureaucrat fired the docents. Twenty-six young people submitted their poems, and 9 winners were selected by an intergenerational jury of poets and artists. They were canned in a masterpiece of authentic frontier gibberish authored by Veronica Stein (above), the museum's newly appointed Woman's Board Executive Director of Learning and Public Engagement, who announced her priorities as "designing culturally responsive programming and anti-racist curricula, cultivating fully accessible spaces, and } And no author is better at it than Maggie OFarrell. https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2021/10/09/the-art-institute-of-chicago-fires-all-122-of-its-unpaid-and-volunteer-docents-because-they-arent-sufficiently-diverse/. })(); You are currently logged into this Artnet News Pro account on another device. Without question, much of this exchange and inspiration happens directly in our gallerieson school tours, during family visits, and recently, through virtual programs. The Art Institute used to have more than 100 docents, 82 of them active, until Veronica Stein, an executive director of learning and engagement, sent a Sept. 3 email canning all of them. However, throwing out babies with bathwater is probably too sudden, too drastic when docent groups, like minority communities, are not monolithic and volunteers in general are becoming harder to find for any consequential task. And wouldnt that make it offensive? The tour guides, composed mostly of well-off white women, were given two-year museum passes as a thank you for their service. Volunteers pay her freight. }, We think this was a callous move in a cruel time in America. + '<\/div>' if (!expirationMinutes) { Join now to unlock comments, browse ad-free, and access exclusive content from your favorite FDRLST writers, Helen Raleigh, CFA, is an American entrepreneur, writer, and speaker. // FUNCTIONS Ironically, Veronica Stein's Master of Arts degree came from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. }); if (!$modal.length) { + '