Making Room: Museum as Space for Self-Expression
The Bronx Museum is a site of creative making and self-expression. The Making Room exhibition documents, celebrates, and extends that role—presenting artworks from participants in the Museum’s education programs along with works from the permanent collection and interactive elements.
Specifically, this exhibition highlights work by participants in Lifelong Studio, an art-making program for adults 55 and older, as well as by participants in Teen Council, a paid afterschool art program for high schoolers. The artworks produced by participants in these programs are rooted in their varied life experiences and explore personal narratives, memories, and modes of self-expression—within the context of the Museum.
The exhibition interpretive materials for Making Room are produced collaboratively by Bronx Museum Education Staff Members with participants in Lifelong Studio and Teen Council.
The exhibition is curated by Patrick Rowe, Director of Education and Public Engagement, and Nell Klugman, Associate Director of Education and Public Engagement.
Top Image: Lifelong Studio Photography Workshop, spring 2023
About Lifelong Studio
Lifelong Studio is a series of sequential, hands-on artmaking workshops at The Bronx Museum for adults ages 55 and over. Each 8-week program is free of charge and culminates in an artmaking project and final celebration.
Created in 2023 with funding from E.A. Michelson Philanthropy, Lifelong Studio offers older adults opportunities to express their creativity, learn new artistic techniques, and hone existing skills while engaging deeply with the museum space.
About Teen Council
Teen Council is a four-month paid internship for New York City high school students (ages 14-19), offered in both the fall and the spring.
Created in 2005, Teen Council offers opportunities for young people to engage deeply with contemporary art and the museum space. In this intensive after-school program, teens discuss and express ideas and create art relating to issues affecting young people today. Participants also gain experience in collaboration, communication, and curation. Teens may participate in one or both sessions each year.