Loren Wright, assistant director in Interpretation (who knew there was such thing?) at the Art Institute, led the event. Per the museum’s website, Interpretation in this context, is the “highly collaborative,” way of making “sure the galleries are accessible and relatable to visitors.”
Wright did just that as we first stood in front of Marc Chagall’s America Windows, which, appropriately, are not only are blue, but also feature panels suggesting urban life and music, for her presentation about Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, complete with a few moments of listening pleasure.
The thought of too much audience participation is always a little off-putting in these situations, but the attendees proved to be knowledgable, appropriately inquisitive and considerate of time constraints while reacting to Wright’s prodding questions about the art, the music and their interrelationship.
We moved en masse to Archibald Motley”s painting Blues, depicting a Paris nightclub, for a discussion that, not surprisingly, included Gershwin’s An American in Paris.
Finally, we literally turned around to see Thomas Hart Benton’s The Cotton Pickers and accompanied that with conversation about Gershwin’s controversial Porgy and Bess and his song Summertime, along with quick excerpts of Louis Armstrong/Ella Fitzgerald and Audra McDonald versions of it.
No one left the program feeling blue.