Ideas for research activities to explore fertile questions

Embedded content: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUJchJCCF2g

How you might explore the fertile question ‘What does the red paint mean?’ in relation to the ‘Crook Cook’ curiosity card.

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Video title: Ideas for research activities to explore the fertile questions. Subtitle: 'What does the red paint mean?' (junior, middle, senior primary)

Indira Neville sitting on a sofa at the Auckland Services to Schools Centre, with books and shelves in the background.

Text appears:

Indira Neville
Services to Schools
National Library of New Zealand
Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa

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My name's Indira Neville. I'm Principal Advisor for Services to Schools, National Library.

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Photo: 'Crook Cook' statue, with red paint on Cook's face and the top of his trousers.

Text appears: What does the red mean?

Back to Indira Neville.

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And today I'm going to be talking about 'Crook Cook' and some activities you might undertake as part of the research part of exploring or answering the fertile question: 'What does the red mean?'

You could explore the colour red. So if I had juniors, I would take my class on a 'red hunt' ... around the school looking for ... red traffic lights, perhaps the red sticker on the medicine cupboard, ... red pens as they're used in other people's books... and then having a discussion around 'What does red mean in all of these contexts?'

If I had students who are a little bit older, I might do some exploration of colour-related language and its meaning so ... 'What does it mean to be red-faced?' 'What does it mean to be yellow-bellied?' ...

'When are you green with envy?' 'When are you feeling blue?'

And perhaps, could make some artworks that illustrate these kinds of colours and feelings.

If I had senior students, I would probably explore the history of artists, artists appropriating other artists' work.

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Painting: Mona Lisa painting with black goatee beard and moustache with curled whiskers, and letters 'L.H.O.O.Q' in black hand-written lettering underneath.

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So, artworks like 'Crook Cook' but Duchamp's 'L.H.O.O.Q' and the Guerrilla Girls' 'Do women have to be naked to get into the Met. Museum?' ...

Get into some stuff like: 'What was the intention of the original artwork?'

'How has it changed with the appropriation?'

Discussions of effectiveness, authorship, humour, dominant discourses, the notion of a canon ... feelings in agreement or not by the learners with the appropriation.

'Who owns artworks?' 'Who owns ideas?' ...

'How do ideas impact different viewers and communities?'

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Back to Indira Neville.

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You know, I'd probably get my students to create their own appropriated artworks, undermining or changing the message of the original artist ...

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Photo: 'Crook Cook' statue, with red paint on Cook's face and the top of his trousers.

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... remixing an old master, for example.

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Video and photo credits:

Curiosity card CC0003
www.natlib.govt.nz/schools/teaching-and-learning-resources

Gisborne Captain Cook statue vandalised with red paint, 2016 by Liam Clayton. The Gisborne Herald. All rights reserved.

L.H.O.O.Q., 1919 by Marcel Duchamp. WikiArt. Public domain New Zealand.

Video ends.