ETA 10 (3) pp.

331–347 Intellect Limited 2014

International Journal of Education through Art

Volume 10 Number 3
© 2014 Intellect Ltd Article. English language. doi: 10.1386/eta.10.3.331_1

Alice Arnold, Susan Martin Meggs and Annette G. Greer

East Carolina University, USA

Empathy and aesthetic

experience in the art
museum

Abstract Keywords
The purpose of this study was to explore how students’ aesthetic understanding and art
ability to empathize were impacted by multiple learning experiences in the environ- elementary education
ment of an art museum. As part of a semester-long class in elementary art methods, phenomenology
education majors experienced a docent-led tour of the local art museum, featuring empathy
the work of fibre artist Deidre Scherer. The tour was followed by a series of learning museums
events centred on the exhibit and the study of end-of-life care, the theme of Scherer’s
work. Students then answered structured questionnaires prompting them to proc-
ess the learning events with intentional reflection. A qualitative method of enquiry
sought to uncover the lived experiences of the students enrolled in the class. Through
these encounters, students developed empathy and understanding as well as the abil-
ity to describe the meanings of the art in terms of their own life scenarios.

The pedagogical processes and practices of a fourteen-week course in which

students analysed the art ‘in fabric and thread’ of Deidre Scherer provided
future teachers with insights about the potential of art to teach advanced life
skills, including empathy and coping with loss. Students enrolled in Art in
the Elementary School attended a week-long series of events led by the guest
artist (Scherer), sponsored by a grant from the North Carolina Humanities

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Alice Arnold | Susan Martin Meggs | Annette G. Greer

Council. Personal encounters with Scherer and with her art and its subjects
gave students the tools for a deeper understanding of art in general, as well
as the ability to analyse the meanings found in her work in terms of their own
life scenarios. Immersion in the aesthetic perspective of Scherer facilitated the
students’ ability to experience self and others with empathetic synergy and to
establish deep associations between the artistic process and the art of Scherer.
A focus of the course was to give students the cognitive structure to
pursue greater personal understanding and dialogue with works of art and
to acquire art-making and viewing as a lifelong pursuit. The main goal and
learning objective for this course was an enhanced appreciation of the power
of art to give students new and more complex insights, both aesthetic and
cognitive. Most students who begin this type of class arrive with a relatively
naive understanding of the meaning of art and the artistic process. Learning
about Scherer’s poignant creations dealing with end-of-life issues prompted
students to reexamine illnesses and deaths in their own families and commu-
nities and to frame those events on a more universal level of meaning. It is
thus the challenge and purpose of this single fourteen-week course not only
to give these students tangible experiences with art processes and materials,
but also to enlarge their understanding of art and to teach them to approach
art-making from a decision-making and problem-solving perspective. The
purpose of the study was to explore how the students’ aesthetic understand-
ing and ability to empathize was impacted by multiple learning experiences in
the environment of an art museum.
Many studies have shown that successful art programmes help students
learn in diverse areas of their lives and in other disciplines outside of the
arts (Guggenheim Museum 2011; President’s Committee on the Arts and
Humanities (PCAH) 2011; Deasy 2002). Reinvesting in arts Education: Winning
America’s Future through Creative Schools, a ‘call to action’ from the PCAH
(2011), highlights many examples of effective collaborative arts programmes
that have been shown to help students learn and excel in many aspects of their
lives, both academic and personal. The research shows that well-structured arts
programmes, if sustained over a period of time, can serve to maintain or even
enhance average end-of-grade test scores as well as give students a growing
sense of their place in the world, a sense of agency that equips them to survive
and thrive amidst the challenges of the twenty-first century (Deasy 2002).
Another high-profile report, from the Guggenheim Museum in New York
(2006, 2011), found that students who had systematic encounters with complex
works of art and tutoring in how to uncover the meanings and messages
in these works were more able to read for comprehension and to analyse
passages in literature. The Guggenheim study showed a strong link among
elementary-school students between study in the visual arts and development
of language skills. Art yields great benefits to students who are afforded the
opportunity to experience art that is beyond their traditional cultural aesthet-
ics to other aspects of culture, which they do not perceive as art. Assisting
students to understand the relationship between society, visual culture and the
art world requires a robust discipline-based art education programme inclusive
of training in art, criticism, aesthetics, history and production (Carter 2008).
Still, the most successful programmes (typically whole-school programmes)
are demanding of the entire teaching staff and of the students. An interdisci-
plinary approach is the norm in such programmes and requires both a keen
sense of the developmental nature of the child as well as an ability to collabo-
rate with a team of teachers in a free and flexible exchange of ideas around

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 Empathy and aesthetic experience in the art museum

thematic units of study. Eckhoff (2008) has documented the importance of

art-viewing experiences as a master art teaching strategy in early childhood
education that serves as an essential experiential learning framework for future
art teachers. The basis for this educational strategy is learning that incorpo-
rates role modelling or scaffolding. The educational strategy originates from
the work of Vygotsky, whose theory supports successful collaboration among
students and faculty as a form of role modelling (Eckhoff 2008).
The best model for the pre-professional at the undergraduate level allows
the student autonomy to pick and choose learning events from an array of
options. It models responsibility and permits students to decide for them-
selves learning priorities and goals, in accordance with their own professional
plans. Ideal learning is authentic learning and takes place in venues that give
students experiences similar to those they will have in the communities where
they will teach (Inwood 2010; Zimmerman 2009).

The class: Art in the elementary school

Students at East Carolina University in an undergraduate art course designed
for elementary education majors have traditionally focused on art-making
processes available and used in typical elementary schools. Art-making is an
important component of an art ‘methods’ course designed to give general
classroom teachers the tools and methods for successful, holistic teaching of
elementary school children. But a broader set of goals was the focus for this
course, a twofold focus intended to give students the cognitive structure to
pursue greater personal understanding and dialogue with works of art and
to acquire art-making and viewing as a lifelong pursuit. Only if the teachers
of children in the public schools hold art valuable will they be able to impart
that love of art to their students. In order to experience the aesthetic dimen-
sion of life, students need multiple encounters with diverse sets of artworks
that reflect the images of our culture (Carter 2008). Aestheticians and art crit-
ics have for centuries explained the complex, often contradictory and nuanced
condition of aesthetic understanding, but those practices have rarely been
introduced to non-art majors in ways that give them access to the sometimes
mysterious dimensions of aesthetics in their own lives (Parsons 2002; Barone
and Eisner 1997). The main goal and learning objective for this course, then,
was an enhanced appreciation of the power of art to give students new and
more complex insights, both aesthetic and cognitive.

Student profile
Students in the elementary education programme cannot be classified as
holding a single world-view. The artistic sophistication that students bring is
uneven, their cultures and backgrounds various. Although demographically
homogenous, the students are experientially complex and diverse; they only
happen to be enrolled in a similar course of study. Both women and men
enroll in the programme, some having returned to pursue an education degree
after years of travel and military service or after having raised a family.
However, most of the students enrolled in the class outlined in this article
come as teenagers with limited exposure to art. Typically, art is merely ‘pretty’
or ‘colourful’ to students entering a foundations class in art education. All they
might know of art is that it was a class that happened infrequently during their
elementary or middle school years. Many have never been to an art museum.
They have not been exposed to difficult or challenging art, and they view art

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as something removed from their world. It is thus the challenge and purpose
of this single fourteen-week course not only to give these students tangible
experiences with art processes and materials, but also to enlarge their under-
standing of art and to teach them to approach art-making from a decision-
making and problem-solving perspective.

Tapping deeper levels of meaning through art

When undergraduate students are observed viewing art, several evaluative
models come to mind. Peng (2012) notes that the scanning aesthetic proc-
ess, first introduced by Harry S. Broudy (1972), is a method frequently used to
critique art and provides a useful platform to acquire aesthetic understanding
of sensory, formal, technical and expressive components of art. This aesthetic
scanning skill helps to develop ideological and moral character, humanistic
value orientations, and spiritual maturity through increased sensitivity to art
forms within life (Peng 2012).
In the artwork, students first identify the elements and principles that
contribute to the success and style of the work. They discuss the technical proc-
esses used in making the work and then talk about the ‘feeling tone’, or the
emotive qualities the work conjures. The question ‘how does this work make
you feel’ can help students uncover their responses to the essential emotional
element. For example, the monochromatic prints of Käthe Kollwitz may evoke
a feeling of ‘sadness’ or ‘sorrow’ in many students, and even ‘depression’ in
some. Each student finds a personal set of emotions in each example of art,
and it is this ability to feel empathy for the ‘feeling tone’ of the work and then
to dialogue about those feelings that aids understanding of content.
Mackey and Adams (2010) reported on the application of Feldman’s art
criticism model when studying children at the Getty museum. The Feldman
model (1994) calls for a process of looking at and interpreting artistic content,
moving the viewer from ‘description’ of what can be seen in the artwork, to
‘analysis’ of the relationships that exist within the work, to ‘interpretation’ of
the content or meaning(s) for the student, to ‘judgement’ or student evalua-
tion of the work.
In both the Peng method and the Feldman model, students move from
looking at objects and parts of the whole to understanding the total work and
making value judgments for themselves on its merit or its importance. The
process is personal, and students are encouraged to make independent judge-
ments based on their life experiences, their life stories.
An elaborate model for looking at contemporary art and judging art’s value
in terms of both personal and universal meanings appears in Terry Barrett’s
Criticizing Art: Understanding the Contemporary (2011). Barrett recommends
that students experience repeated exposures to works of art, encouraging the
mindset of ‘art critic’. He suggests that they can uncover the many mean-
ings found in works of art by writing about their own art, single works that
may prove provocative, or an exhibition of selected works. Barrett provides a
framework for students to move up the traditional levels of ‘describing, inter-
preting, and judging’ works of art, but then recommends that they ‘write and
rewrite’ about what they see, know and feel.
Parsons (2002) contrasts the differences between aesthetic experience
of persons and aesthetic qualities of objects relative to art. Understanding
of these differences assists in the development of curriculum. The aesthetic
experiences of persons are based upon developing a disposition to appreciate

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Figure 1: Drawing of M.F. 1988, graphite on paper, 16×14”, © Deidre Scherer,

1998.

the qualities of art objects. Therefore, the incorporation of direct art experi-
ences into curricula is an important task for future educators. According to
Parsons it is this critical exposure to art that allows students to know about
art and enhances their abilities to describe the qualities of the elements of
the art and to attach meaning to the emotions that it generates. These gener-
ated meanings are often pulled from deep connections to personal experience
(Parsons 2002).
Aspects of these processes were used in the classroom and in the univer-
sity art gallery before the docent-led tour of the art of Deidre Scherer and the
opening of her exhibit at the Greenville Museum of Art. In the classroom,
students were guided to move from a lower- to higher-level analysis of works

Figure 2: Listen, thread on fabric, 24×21’, © Deidre Scherer, 1990.

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Alice Arnold | Susan Martin Meggs | Annette G. Greer

of art, following the related methods of Barrett and Feldman. The scanning
method pioneered by Broudy and described above was reviewed and applied
to the analysis by the students. Following these exercises, the class met at
the university art gallery and engaged in verbal interaction, repeating the
methods of analysing art that had been introduced in the classroom. In this
way, students were prepared to use visual thinking strategies to enhance their
experience of the exhibit of Scherer’s work. If they felt they would rather not
see the highly charged images of Deidre Scherer, students were allowed to
attend another art event. Only one student opted for an alternative, attending
the opening of a student art show.

Deidre Scherer
During the spring of 2009, a grant from the North Carolina Humanities Council
brought together scholars and community members from many professions to
share knowledge and experiences about end-of-life concerns. The Greenville
Museum of Art served as the venue for two exhibitions by Deidre Scherer.
Both The Last Year and Surrounded by Family and Friends were on display and
became the centre of learning for classes and community events (Scherer
2009). The Last Year is a series of nine fabric and thread works, accompa-
nied by Scherer’s detailed drawings, that chronicles the last stages of life of
a woman the artist had befriended. The viewer is immersed in this woman’s
journey and witnesses her decline. Scherer’s website describes these images:

The Last Year, a series of nine fabric works by artist Deidre Scherer,
portrays the final year in the life of an elderly woman. With immense
compassion and respect, Scherer chronicles the woman’s journey

Figure 3: Child, Thread on fabric, 36×30”, © Deidre Scherer, 2001.

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 Empathy and aesthetic experience in the art museum

Figure 4: Bigger Than Each Other, Thread on fabric, 36×30”, © Deidre Scherer,
2000.

toward death, from the onset of her decline, through brief reprieves of
renewed strength, and finally, to acceptance and release … Each work
depicts a visually compelling moment, while raising universal and social
issues that surround the processes of aging, dying and grieving.
(Scherer 2013)

Figure 5: At Night, Thread on fabric, 36×48”, © Deidre Scherer, 2000.

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Alice Arnold | Susan Martin Meggs | Annette G. Greer

Over a period of approximately 30 years, Scherer has developed her tech-

nique of building multiple layers of fabric into an intricate, sophisticated and
totally unique form. As many as sixteen layers of cloth are gradually built
to define the shadows and planes, patterns and textures of each large-scale
‘tapestry’. The artist is best known for her intimate and complex portraits of
the elderly and individuals in their last stages of life. These images are sensi-
tive portrayals of illness and death as a natural part of the cycle of life. As
Scherer explains, ‘We have all taken our first breath, and we are all going
to take our last breath. In considering our own death, we have a chance to
consider our own life’ (1998: 49). One critic viewing her work called it

An awe inspiring introduction to a mature creative talent. With clar-

ity and candidness, Deidre Scherer leads us into a world of light and
shadow, color and form, fabric and thread; a world infused by the radi-
ant presence of the human spirit ...

Balfour M. Mount, MD, Professor of Palliative Medicine, McGill

University.
(Scherer 2013)

Greenville Museum of art docents

The Greenville Museum of Art was the venue of the Scherer exhibit conven-
iently located within walking distance of the art education class. During a
regularly scheduled class session, all students were provided trained docent
services at the museum where the art exhibit was held. The docents were
students from an interdisciplinary honours course at the same university, in
which an interior design faculty member immersed the honours students in
a study of the elements and principles of design. A member of the health
sciences faculty provided docents additional training in order to relate the
subject matter of the exhibit to an ability to empathize and understand health
care issues. The student docents also studied the theme of death and dying in
art and were specifically trained by the artist, Deidre Scherer, prior to deliver-
ing the tour for the students of elementary art education.
A team of two docents designed the tour for the students. For the tour, the
docents incorporated their training in the relationship between art and health
care. This included stories of the artist’s interactions with her subjects, which
communicated Scherer’s compassion for her subjects. The docents facilitated the
students’ self-exploration and their exploration of the art. They also introduced
new means for creating art – new materials, new textures and new techniques.
This exploration aligns with one of the course objectives regarding materials
and processes. Those objectives are broadly described in the undergraduate
catalogue as ‘Art education philosophy, methodology, materials, processes and
specific projects for elementary school classes’ (East Carolina University 2012).
In fact, the docent experience went beyond the course objectives in promot-
ing creative thinking about the potential for innovative project designs. The
docents had experience with the specific techniques used by Scherer. Several
of them had attended the fabric workshop that the artist directed. They all had
watched a documentary film about Deidre Scherer that detailed the processes
the artist used. As one of the docents who conducted the tour commented,
‘The movie, Holding Our Own, had several points that I hope to bring for future
tours. After the movie I was more aware of Deidre’s techniques and better able
to talk about how she chooses and layers fabric’ (RH: student 2009).

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For the tour experience, the art education class was divided into two
groups, each led by a different docent. The instructor accompanied one of
the groups. Since the exhibit occupied two large rooms, each with a distinct
theme, the groups were separated to begin their tours in opposite rooms. This
allowed them to express their reactions and observations in a focused manner,
with a minimum of distraction. Given time limitations, each group spent virtu-
ally the entire tour experience in one room with a singular theme. However,
this did not detract from the objectives of the tour. One docent reported that
the students spent most of their time in one part of the exhibit, where she
observed them demonstrating critical thinking about the work. She said she
was pleased with the group, that the students were attentive and engaged,
with most interjecting ideas off and on, and a few talking constantly.

Method
The purpose of the study was to explore the learning experiences of elemen-
tary education students that were influenced by fabric and thread art from
the Scherer exhibit utilizing an applied learning–teaching strategy. Barone
and Eisner (1997) noted that the aim of arts-based research is to enhance
perspectives and to explore innovative educational phenomena. The research
presented opens the debate of how the arts can be used within education and
allows for ongoing discussion for how aesthetic design elements support the
transformation of experiences of persons (feelings, thoughts and images) into
aesthetic form.
The subject matter of the Scherer fabric and thread art depicted individu-
als experiencing death and dying. The study was concerned with extracting the
meaning that education students give to the art experience when the context
represents the end of life; therefore, a qualitative method known as heuristic
phenomenological tradition was used to explore the art that was experienced
and to examine the way in which it was experienced (Willis 2004).
Heuristic phenomenology requires that researchers follow a process for
immersion, incubation, illumination, explication and creative synthesis (Fenner
2012). In heuristic phenomenology, mind-full narratives are deconstructed to
uncover the layers of contemplative reflection and to extract meaning from
the human experience (Grierson 2010). A cyclical approach to analysis of the
written text is used to gain understanding of how the art engaged students
in cultural reflexivity (Fenner 2012). Heuristic phenomenology has been used
in recent years to study art education and art therapy (Fenner 2012; Grierson
2010; Willis 2004).
Also, Tam (2010) used phenomenology to study primary and secondary
school teachers’ investigations of their pupils experience in art. Tam notes that
phenomenology is an approach often used to study responses to visual art
(2010). Phenomenology provides an opportunity for subjects to describe their
experiences from which articulated themes can be extracted (Tam 2010). Thus,
an open-ended questionnaire was designed to elicit, not a dry recitation of
fact, but rather a phenomenological description of how it felt to be exposed to
emotional art.

Open-ended structured questionnaire

After students had experienced several of the learning events focused on the
art of Deidre Scherer, data collection was conducted through an open-ended
structured questionnaire given in the classroom. Use of the paper-based

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collection method allowed students the time to reflect on their experience of

the art exhibit and focused on the feelings and memories the experience elic-
ited. The questionnaire also asked whether the student experienced the exhibit
alone or with another person. Students were encouraged to attend the exhibit
opening with a friend or to attend independently; however, all were provided
trained docent services at the museum where the art exhibit was held. After
sufficient time to contemplate their personal interpretation of the meaning
of the art, the students were given the questionnaire in their classroom. This
means of data collection allowed the student participants sufficient time to
engage in cultural reflexivity about the art and to structure a narrative of the
experience.

Participant informants
The students in the art education class were elementary education majors with
a mean age of 18, and 95 per cent of participants were female. There were two
classes, each having 22 students in the class. Most of the students came from
the eastern coastal seaboard and were primarily Caucasian. Thus, they were
homogeneous. To protect student rights, participants signed consent forms
for the questionnaires to be used for research, and these were set aside in a
secured envelop until after grades for the course were awarded. Only those
responses from informants granting permission were used. This study was
conducted with an IRB review and approval.

Data analysis
The approach to data analysis was guided by heuristic phenomenology. The
data from the questionnaires was set-aside for a period of twelve months as a
means of incubation. This separation in time allowed the primary investigator
(PI) to approach analysis of the data in an objective manner during immersion.
Two colleagues were recruited as co-investigators with experience in qualita-
tive research, one having a Masters in Fine Art and the other a Doctorate
in Nursing. Use of multiple individuals allowed for member check, providing
multiple crosschecking of responses of the research team in phenomenologi-
cal deconstruction of the narratives provided by the informants. Iterative hori-
zontalization was used through a cyclical process to allow for illumination by
the research team. The PI (course instructor) reviewed all transcripts produced
by the questionnaires and engaged in reflective textual analysis of the data.
The co-investigators reviewed the data as a team separate from the PI, review-
ing all transcripts and coding as they engaged in shared reflective analysis of
the data. The PI and the research team then jointly reviewed and reflected
on the data analysis in a process to arrive at unification of the essence of the
phenomena and explicate thematic meaning. Once agreement in coding of
the data had been reached, the researchers engaged in an imaginative process
of creative synthesis, taking the codes printed on strips of paper and intuitively
placing them in relational patterns to produce a visual schematic of themes.

Findings and discussion

The analysis of students’ reflections of their experience with the end-of-life
fabric and thread art from the Scherer exhibit resulted in imaginative varia-
tions that were at times contradictory and polar. Themes revolved around death
as subject matter in art, the person and artist as an experienced relationship,

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 Empathy and aesthetic experience in the art museum

What was your overall ‘feeling’ about the exhibit?

Did the Scherer exhibit or event that you attended bring up any specific ‘memories’ or thoughts for
you? Please describe them.
Did you view the art alone or with someone else? Did being alone or with someone else help or
hinder your experience? Why?
On a scale from 1 to 10 (with 10 being good), how would you rate your overall experience of the
Scherer art event? Why?

Table 1: The instrument: Questions on student questionnaire.

expressions of growing appreciation of art, learning about death through art,

art as a transformative experience, recognition of the mourning/grieving proc-
ess, and expressions of cultural responses to art, each relative to educational
outcomes of experienced art as a strategy for learning in elementary education.

Results
The students’ reflections indicate that they gained skills in the ability to
appraise the art critically and to make connections to meaningful experiences
within their own lives (Gude 2004). Gaufberg and Williams (2011) describe an
educational innovation using a museum to connect medical learners to the skills
of observation and pattern recognition and to promote individual reflection,
foster empathy, and connect them to patient experiences within a safe envi-
ronment for learning. Similar to the questionnaire used in this study, Gaufberg
and Williams invited an emotional response and a connection between art
and life. In phenomenology, it is the research subjects’ own words about their
experience that are the findings for the research. As Gaufberg and Williams
expressed their findings using participants’ reflections (2011), for this phenom-
enology study, the same approach is used to distil the extracted themes.
The primary finding was that the week of exposure to Scherer’s art allowed
the students to discover and express deep empathy and strong emotions.
However, many themes emerged: thoughts centring upon death as subject
matter in art, Deidre Scherer (the artist) as an experienced relationship,
expressions of a growing appreciation of art, using art to learn about death,
art as a transformative experience, recognition of the mourning/grieving proc-
ess, and expressions of diverse cultural responses to art. The Scherer exhibit
provided the authentic learning necessary to foster autonomy and a growing
sense of agency in these future professionals.
The voices of the students expressed in the following paragraphs illustrate
the depth of feeling and empathy that emerged after the viewing experience.
Comprehension of meaning gained in the students’ art experience was trans-
lated into a deeper understanding and ability to analyse art.

Death as subject matter

Students expressed sadness, discomfort and grief from personal experiences.
The ability to express associations to art and the response to art is important
for future educators.

‘To me, the exhibit was a bit depressing, although the artwork was astound-
ing, the subject matter was sad’.

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Alice Arnold | Susan Martin Meggs | Annette G. Greer

‘The exhibit was sombering, viewing Deidre Scherer’s pieces of “The Last
Year” brought about mixed emotions because the pieces themselves were
beautifully crafted but resembled the ending of a life. Just last week a sister
in my sorority lost her six-year battle with cancer and the event brought to
life the things she went through behind closed doors. I could not stay long
because it made me think of her’.
‘I find it hard to look at people dying because I think of my own experiences’.
‘I just lost my great grandmother … in November. She was 99 years old and
all the pictures of the old couples and people really made me think about her
right before she died. It brought back some very emotional memories I had
with my [grandmother]’.

Deidre Scherer and art as an experienced relationship

Students expressed how they experienced the art including pace or time, the
aesthetic qualities, and the ability to share that experience with others.
‘I was able to take my time and look at the artwork at my own pace’.
‘It was unlike anything I had experienced, so I really enjoyed that aspect of it’.
‘I liked being with someone so I could discuss the art with them and share
feelings and emotions’.

Expressions of growing appreciation of art

Students expressed appreciation for the art itself as a process and a product.
‘I felt that the Deidre Scherer’s pieces were extremely moving and they
conjured up many emotions for me, happy and sad. Scherer is a talented artist
and the feelings that were meant to be conveyed definitely got through to
me’.
‘I thought the way the artist put her art together was very interesting. The way
she put together different fabrics to make figures was really cool’.
‘Pure astonishment. I was amazed how Deidre was able to use certain colors
and patterns of fabrics to mimic the emotions of her subjects’.
‘It was a very good exhibit. The artwork was beautiful and the setting of the
exhibit was great’.
‘It was good art and showed real-like pictures. I liked how the pictures were
threaded’.
‘I viewed it with a friend and I believe it helped me understand the art better
because she was able to point certain details out to me that I was unable to
catch therefore helping me put all the pieces of art together’.

Learning about death through art

Students expressed profound critical links between the subject matter of death
and current and future life events.
‘Attending the faith debate along with viewing the art helped me to become
more comfortable with death and the elderly’.

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 Empathy and aesthetic experience in the art museum

‘My father is very sick and it made me think a lot about his illness and how it
will be when he goes. It’s very hard to see your father suffer and not be able to
do anything about it. But I will always be there for him’.
‘I felt that I could still feel the agony of the old women in her last year’.
‘I viewed the art with two other people. I believe that my experience was
enhanced because they had different views, causing each of us to view the
portraits in various ways’.

Art as a transformative experience

Students expressed changes in themselves or others, which were transforma-
tive in nature and brought about new advances in their maturity level.
‘I was excited about the exhibit because I wasn’t sure what to expect. I like to
experience new things and was something I had never done or thought about
doing’.
‘I thought all of the artworks were amazing and poured emotions from them.
This was my first professional exhibit but it definitely won’t be my last’.
‘I went to the exhibit with my friend …. being with someone was a good
experience. I opened her eyes to a new kind of art which was fun’.
‘The exhibit made me think of grandparents. Although my grandparents are
only in their late 60s their health is “not that great” which makes me worry.
The exhibit encouraged me to spend more time with them’.
‘It brought back memories I have of my Grandfather and the tough time he
was experiencing with his colon cancer. I felt as if he had died all over again,
but I knew he was in a better place so it oddly brought peace over me’.

Recognition of the mourning – grieving process

Students were able to attach to their existing, oftentimes unresolved, grief and
to reflect on its meaning in their lives.
‘They brought back memories of my great-grandfather towards the end of his
life as well as the times recently that I have visited my great-grandmother’.
‘I thought about my Granddaddy a lot, he passed away 7 years ago. The pieces
with the oxygen masks brought back memories of him in the hospital’.
‘It reminded me of my grandpa that died from cancer. The “Surrounded”
exhibit made me think of how we went to visit him in the hospital. He came
to live with us as well so the pictures of the families at home around the sick
made me relate it to my experience’.

Expressions of cultural responses to art

Students expressed new cultural understanding of others similar or unlike
themselves such as the elderly.
‘I liked going with someone to consider their views on the art as well’.
‘It really made me think of how different cultures and religions view death
and how they handled it. It was very different from my family’.

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Alice Arnold | Susan Martin Meggs | Annette G. Greer

‘I enjoyed having her along and it helped my experience because we compared

our thoughts about the exhibit’.
‘Attending the faith debate along with viewing the art helped me to become
more comfortable with death and the elderly. I wish I could have seen more
drawings; or pieces of art but I understand it takes a while constructing these
masterpieces’.

Conclusion
When elementary education majors are given the context of the entire commu-
nity as the venue for learning, then learning becomes more dynamic and more
deeply impressed upon the mind of the student (Inwood 2010; Parsons 2002).
Multiple exposures to many kinds of art enlarge students’ frame of reference,
so that they might develop a personal view of what art is and what it can
be (Zimmerman 2009; Davis 2010). Students benefit from the opportunity to
form personal opinions about the nature of the artistic process as one that is
open-ended and dynamic over time (Carter 2008). They respond by exhibit-
ing enhanced ability to convey this understanding of artistic license within the
classrooms of tomorrow. They need to be able to collaborate around complex
questions with teams of teachers, artists and learners in schools if they are to
provide learning venues that bridge the gulf from rote processes of instruction
to higher levels of thought (Anderson and Krathwohl 2001).
The process of understanding art takes time (Fenner 2012). Gaining
that understanding is a personal, individualistic process. When students are
exposed to forceful art and artists within the community, a more authentic
climate for learning is created. Careful and collaborative planning around
dynamic learning events provides a much more successful set of learning
outcomes.
When exposed to the many levels of meaning within the art of Deidre
Scherer, students learned to appreciate art more deeply. They learned about
experiencing a more personal relationship between artist and viewer and
between docent and audience. They learned of the powerful truths that art
can reveal concerning death and the experience of families dealing with the
dying process. They learned more about the role of faith traditions in the dying
process and moved from a strictly personal and specific view of death to one
that was more universal. The art experience allowed the students to grieve the
loss of members of their own families and to move towards a greater sense
of closure about personal losses. Further, this educational strategy allowed
students to connect vicariously with the subjects depicted in Scherer’s images
in order to experience their feelings (Pedersen and Pope 2010). This connec-
tion to the feelings of others is a form of empathy. Development of empathy is
important as art educators can assist those they teach to explore self through
art, as well as experience the cultural contexts of others (Wikström 2001).
Multiple, diverse encounters with art expand learner perspectives on the
dimensions of life and art, giving a holistic societal viewpoint. The skill to
engage in a dialogue with art increases abilities in cognitive understanding,
promotes lifelong learning, and fosters an appreciation of aesthetic encoun-
ters that can generate cultural empathy (Barrett 2011; Broudy 1972; Carter
2008; Deasy 2002). In short, art empowers and imparts wisdom, discernment
and empathy. This is a lesson that future teachers can convey to their students
only after they have learned it themselves. In the decades ahead, mentoring

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and coaching will create even more models for the flexible exchange of ideas
and the freedom of expression that will encourage a sense of voice, autonomy,
and agency.

Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge artist Deidre Scherer and the North
Carolina Humanities Council for making this research possible.

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Suggested Citation
Arnold, A., Meggs, S. M. and Greer, A. (2014), ‘Empathy and aesthetic expe-
rience in the art museum’, International Journal of Education through Art
10: 3, pp. 331–347, doi: 10.1386/eta.10.3.331_1

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 Empathy and aesthetic experience in the art museum

Contributor details
Alice Arnold is Professor of Art Education at East Carolina University in
Greenville, North Carolina. Alice’s interests have included community engage-
ment and outreach, contemporary artistic practices, interdisciplinary arts,
ecology, and international programming. Alice has been an active member
of the National Art Education Association, and the United States Society
for Education through Art, serving in many capacities and offices, including
President of USSEA from 2005–2007.
Contact: Jenkins Fine Arts Center, Mail stop 502, East Carolina University,
Greenville, N.C. 27858, USA.
E-mail: arnoldm@ecu.edu

Susan Martin Meggs is Associate Professor of Interior Design and a faculty

member for the Honors College at East Carolina University. She received an
MS from Fordham University and an MFA from the University of Wisconsin.
Meggs has published on service-learning, interdisciplinary pedagogy, and the
use of virtual reality as a learning environment. Meggs’ creative work appeared
in numerous juried exhibits and is included in major collections.
Contact: Rivers 251B, Mail stop 504, East Carolina University, Greenville,
North Carolina 27858, USA.
E-mail: meggss@ecu.edu

Annette Greer is Associate Professor of Bioethics and Interdisciplinary Studies

at Brody School of Medicine, East Carolina University. She authored the
North Carolina Humanities Grant discussed in this article. Greer co-teaches
honors, adult education, public health, and rural health. Her primary interest
is interdisciplinary pedagogy using qualitative methods.
Contact: Department of Bioethics and Interdisciplinary Studies, Mail stop
641, Brody 2S-17, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina 27858,
USA.
E-mail: greera@ecu.edu

Alice Arnold, Susan Martin Meggs and Annette G. Greer have asserted their
right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as
the authors of this work in the format that was submitted to Intellect Ltd.

347
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