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Collection Guide

Collection Guide

Harris-Stowe State University Speaks

The Saint Louis Art Museum partnered with Harris-Stowe State University during the 2023 exhibition, The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century, and employed students as museum engagement guides. This audio guide features student voices connecting their interpretation of art from the Museum's collection and themes recognized in hip hop.

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    AUDIO GUIDE TRANSCRIPT

    The transcript for each audio track is available in expandable sections of individual object pages.

Museum Floorplan

Introduction

  • Speaker 
     
    Andréa Purnell 
    Community Collaborations Manager 
    Saint Louis Art Museum 

    Hello, I’m Andréa Purnell, Community Collaborations Manager at the Saint Louis Art Museum and the co-curator of the 2023 exhibition The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21 Century.

    The curatorial team learned early on that putting community at the forefront of this exhibition would be critical to telling the larger story of hip hop and its impact on visual arts and culture. The exhibition reflected deep community engagement through local partnerships responding to one of the five pillars of hip hop, which are: emceeing (or rapping), DJ-ing, breakdancing, graffiti, and knowledge. DJ Afrika Bambaataa, one of the three godfathers of hip hop, is credited with creating the classification system meant to capture the original essence of hip hop.

    During the duration of the exhibition, the Museum worked with Harris-Stowe State University, Saint Louis’ only Historically Black College and University, to uphold the Knowledge Pillar. Along with on campus programming we also partnered with the University to employ students as engagement guides for The Culture exhibition. The students were trained on visitor engagement, exhibition content, as well as mentored by Museum docents and staff. They were strongly encouraged to expand their knowledge of museum culture and collaborated on producing an audio guide sharing their perspectives. This audio guide features their interpretation of select works of art from the Museum’s collection. Each Collection Guide track is unique, and I encourage you to experience them in any order you like. Whether you’re listening from your home or in the Museum’s galleries, we hope you enjoy the Collection Guide: Harris-Stowe State University Speaks.

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