Research-oriented teaching with practical experience in Study Gallery 1.357

Curtains darken the seminar room’s windows; visitors enter a wooden black box – and suddenly find themselves in Study Gallery 1.357 of the Goethe University in Frankfurt. The study gallery has been in operation since June 2010; lecturers, museum curators, and students jointly draw up plans for the different exhibitions in the study gallery. The focus of the previous four exhibitions was contemporary video art – made possible through close cooperation with the Frankfurt Städel Museum, whose curator for post-1945 art, Dr. Martin Engler, developed the Study Gallery 1.357 plan jointly with Prof. Bernhard Jussen of the History Department.

The idea behind the study gallery is to promote practical orientation and interdisciplinary studies in the humanities. Students and faculty from various disciplines jointly organize the exhibitions. Together they select and analyze the videos; student working groups take responsibility for writing the wall texts, introductory speeches, flyers and press releases. At the same time, group members gain professionally relevant practical experience: the exhibition must be ready at a particular time; students learn to speak directly to the point and make professional presentations. “The challenge for us as faculty is to know when we should hold back and leave the process to the students,” says Dr. Henning Engelke of the Institute of Art History. One of the scholar’s tasks is to provide a stimulus, but also to gradually take a more limited, moderating role. Engelke is pleased that research and teaching go hand in hand within the study group and that the study group cooperates across semesters: “Experiencing older students, who bring prior knowledge to the meetings, can be a stimulus for the new students of the incoming semester. They come to realize that it can be done – but only with effort on their part.”

The current exhibition in the Study Gallery 1.357:
Hito Steyerl: Journal No. 1 – An Artist's Impression
For more information, see www.uni-frankfurt.de/fb/fb08/hs/studien/studiengalerie/