United Kingdom: Maria Fichtinger (Learning on Excursions)

One of the classes that I have chosen to take while studying abroad at the University of Westminster in London is a module called Art and Society. Every week for this class we visit a different art museum in London to discuss and analyze art. The class is almost entirely study abroad students, many of whom are American. Our professor is a British woman, who works part-time for the university. When she is not in the classroom, she is herself an artist, dealing mostly with video as her medium.

On our first day of class, after the usual review of the syllabus and expectations for our assignments, we went to one of the largest, and most visited museums in London: The British Museum. Our professor leads us to the museum, leading down the street, and through alleys. She seemed to know exactly where to go as if she had already solved what seems often to me to be the maze that is central London.

We did not spend much time at the museum. We started off in the African art exhibit, just to get an idea of what it means to analyze art. We took turns looking over different art pieces and historical objects trying to dissect their meaning. After this, we set off again behind our professor. Passing by the Ancient Egyptian wing and the Rosetta stone, we went to one of the most popular collections on display at the museum: the Greek Parthenon.

The British Museum has almost 50% of what is left of the Greek Parthenon, and there have been calls to return the museum’s collection to Athens. Here, among large figures of intricately carved marble, we discussed the idea of ownership with art, a central theme of the class. British history of imperialism continues to be reckoned with today, particularly in the form of “discovered” artifacts from different areas of the world. Artifacts hold important cultural, spiritual, and emotional meanings to many people. Collections like the Greek Parthenon force us to question the claims of ownership that the British hold on art from around the globe, and the societal implications of taking these items away from the people they come from.

Maria Fichtinger 

Hometown: Rochester, Minnesota

Major: History; Cert. in European Studies and Education & Educational Services

Program: University of Westminster

I have always wanted to go to London, and this program fit well with the degree I am pursuing.