Art students at Kristin School and Christ’s College were treated last week to a personal talk from Te Papa’s Director of Art on the works of Monet and the Impressionists.

Te Papa is currently playing host to the largest collection of Impressionist paintings ever to come to New Zealand. The ‘Monet and the Impressionists’ exhibition features over 50 paintings from 19th century French artists, the majority of which come from the collection held at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

Te Papa is running an exciting range of events associated with Monet and the Impressionists including floortalks, guest speakers, French music, and education programmes.

As part of its school programme, Te Papa’s education team organised a lecture on the exhibition for students from Kristin School and Christ’s College from the Director Art and Collection Services Jonathan Mane-Wheoki on Wednesday 4 March 2009. The students were able to learn about the context and features of the artworks from Jonathan (a passionate and well-regarded expert), while viewing them online and interacting with each other. This all made for a rich learning experience.

Colossal squid goes cross-country

This is not the first time Te Papa has used video conferencing over KAREN as part of their education programme. Earlier last week, Diana-Grace Morris (Te Papa Education team leader) and her team showcased the Colossal Squid exhibition to schools via video conference. The students were shown photos and an animated video of the Colossal Squid and were taken through a live dissection of a common squid.

Though still early days, Diana-Grace is excited about video conferencing as a way to let more school students from across New Zealand experience and interact with the treasures at Te Papa, and is looking forward to expanding their video conferencing programme out to schools.

More information

Te Papa: Monet and the Impressionists
Te Papa: Colossal Squid

Top photo: Jonathan Mane-Wheoki during the Monet video conference
Bottom photo: Riria Hotere educator with Te Papa, with students from Kristin School and Christ’s College