Reading Summary
Your name: Kenneth Lamborn
Week # 2
Reading: “A New Model for Access in the Museum,” Carmen Papalia
Summary (One Paragraph):
This article, written by visually impaired event coordinator and performance artist Carmen Papalia, explored
the topic of access (or lack thereof) in the museums. Through an exploration of his own disability and the
access is has allowed him, Papalia explains that art museums are a place that is too limited for visitors to take
much away from the art. There are three ways for us to interact with objects in a museum: we can look at
them; we can read the information given about them; and we can do our own research about them. But the
problem is, museums present us with a factual interpretation that causes viewers to negate their own
experience. We have forgotten how to experience art, and how to explore our way to a unique conclusion
about that piece. Hopefully, in the coming years, art museums can become more inclusive in the ways that
they allow visitors to explore their collection. It would help people to re-learn how art was meant to be
experienced.
List of primary claims made in this reading:
1. The ways in which visitors can experience art in a museum is very limited.
2. Everyone brings a different perspective to the table when it comes to observing and learning about
art.
3. Knowing that everyone views art through a different lens allows us to understand better ways in
which visitors can experience the artwork being shown, so that their own conclusions become to
focus.
Key quote (no more than a sentence or two): “[…] if I, a person who learns about their surroundings through
their non-visual senses, experience limited access to a museum exhibition because there are few
opportunities for me to engage with the material being presented in a way that is not visual, it is the
institution, in their failure to accommodate me as a non-visual learner, that disables me as a museum visitor”
(10).
Why I chose this quote: This quotation goes beyond simply representing the challenges that visually
impaired visitors face when visiting an art museum. It shows that disability is not created by the individual
who is affected by their illness, but it is rather the lack of accommodation on the behalf of an institution that
renders that person disabled—a fascinating perspective on how disabled people are forced to operate in our
society.
Questions that I want to explore:

Is it possible for a museum to be able to accommodate every type of visitor?

How can this type of art education be helpful to visitors who are not disabled as well?

How can museums emphasize the public’s conclusions on an art piece rather than their factual and
contextual conclusion that is given?