A Diverse Take on Common Touch: How Adapted Tours Help Visitors with Disabilities Access the Exhibition
Angela Wang, Program Coordinator, Art-Reach

Common Touch in main gallery, 2016.

Picture shows the gallery, including four of Jaynes’s seven installations on view. In the center foreground is Jaynes’s Gift#1 on display on a flat, horizontally-angled rectangular table with a dark wood base. A white and brown paper owl rests on a cylindrical stand to the left of a large open book under a rectangular, clear acrylic hood. To the right of the display with the owl stands Jayne’s Gift #5, a map representation of the travels the 19th–century blind surveyor John Metcalf. It is a vertically-positioned, large rectangular table composed of a a linen top and a light brown wood base. A multi-color grid, outlines of geometric shapes, and green porcelain geometric shapes adorn the linen top. In the center background, on the back wall painted off-white, is Jayne’s Gift #4, a visual transmutation after the musical work of blind African American musician Thomas Wiggins. It is three horizontal and three vertical rows of prints in a geometric interplay of greens, browns and yellows. To the right of the prints on the wall is a small wooden frame in which brass musical notes are displayed. To the far right background is a view of Jaynes’s Gift #6, the scent mechanism the olfactometer, in a niche in an off-white curved wall. The floor of the room is covered with a tan colored carpet. [end of description]

Common Touch is an unusual exhibition because it was designed to be touched. Touch is often neglected when vision is so dominant in our culture. Needless to say, the exhibition derives much of its touch concept  from the history of the blind. Here, something is shared regardless of sight — the experience of touch, the contact with physical objects dominates.

For thirty years, Art-Reach has served as a connector between the cultural sector and the disability and low-income community. Art-Reach is honored to partner with the Library Company to bring a diverse audience to experience this unique exhibition.  As someone who works closely with the disability community, I adapted the tour to draw parallels between it and the exhibition. The goal is to have the audiences walk away with an appreciation and fascination with touch sans sight. There are two versions of the adapted tour. One is designed for visitors who are blind or low vision and the other for visitors on the spectrum of other disabilities.

Touch/verbal description tours are for visitors who are blind and low vision. During these tours, I verbally describe the objects that cannot be touched. These include the artifacts in the glass display cases and colors and shapes in pictures. The verbal description acts more as an augmentation for things that are unable to be touched in this exhibition, which are mostly the notes from artist Teresa Jaynes’s research. For example, while interacting with Gift #2, I will point out and describe the wooden writing frame from across the piece that lends its physicality to the art work.

Art-Reach tour of Common Touch, August 18, 2016.

Photo shows a large group of individuals gathered in front of Teresa Jaynes’s Gift #4 of nine green, yellow, and brown screen prints. The screen prints depict grid patterns. In the right of the image, a young woman attired in black pants and a short-sleeved teal blouse with a flower pattern on the edge, slightly hunches over as if listening to something. Her right hand is to her ear and her left hand holds a large envelope to her waist. To her left, are two women. They lean and bend over in listening stances. In the left of the image, is a group of men and women in summer clothes. They look toward the women standing in front of the screen prints. The screen prints are hung above a short white-colored floor riser. [end of description]

On August 18th, a group from Salvation Army Developmental Disabilities program in New Castle, Delaware came to the Library Company for a tour that combines tactile experience from the exhibition with interactive activities. During our hour-long interactive tour, the group learned about the history of the blind and how touch and other senses are heightened to fill the gap of the loss of vision. We used our ears to listen, hands to touch, and noses to smell.  I made flashcards that have raised alphabets on them using hot glue. Participants closed their eyes to guess which letter was on their card. We would stand in front of Gift #2 for this exercise, as we drew parallels from the abstract letters of Jennie Partridge, the woman whose writing inspired the piece. As we moved on to Gift #5, Teresa’s interpretation of the life and adventure of English surveyor John Metcalf, we used a tactile “map” and had the participants close their eyes to guess the objects glued on the paper.  These activities helped visitors who have intellectual disabilities better understand Common Touch on a more basic level while not straying away from the concept of the exhibition.

As Art-Reach celebrates its 30th birthday this year, we hope to expand on opportunities like these to bring the full spectrum of society to share the rich cultural experience the city has to offer.