Visual Thinking Strategies: Can looking at art really make you better at your job?
The simple answer is yes, absolutely. Although we may find it hard to find a connection between looking at art and improving work performance, Visual Thinking Strategies can radically improve critical thinking ability, empathy, analytical skills, collaboration, and verbal expression. In fact, Visual Thinking Strategies can fundamentally change how you see the world. But the trick is to choose the right work of art, ask the right questions, and have a skilled trainer to facilitate the process.
What are Visual Thinking Strategies?
Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS), were developed at the Museum of Modern Art in New York by Abigail Housen and Philip Yenawine. The museum and art educators at MOMA had struggled for years to find ways to engage and educate the children who came to look at their art. None of the approaches they used seemed to ‘stick’. The children would become bored, or they would easily forget what they had learned. MOMA staff wanted to find something learner-centered that would help students to make decisions about art for themselves, rather than learning ‘about’ art. After much research, and trial and error, they hit upon an elegant system that when skillfully implemented can have stunning results.
The system is as simple as this: you find the right kind of picture, then ask three simple questions. And then, as if by magic, the viewers become engaged. They deeply analyze the pictures instead of just looking at them on a surface level. They talk and express opinions. They listen to each other and ask questions. They get inspired. And this works irrespective of age, nationality, education level, socioeconomic background, or any other demographic you care to think of. The project started with schoolchildren, but is now also used to train adults to become better workers, managers, and leaders.
What’s the right kind of picture?
Housen and Yenawine recommend pictures that include:
familiar or interesting subject matter for the viewers
familiar imagery for the viewers
strong narratives, or easily imaginable narratives
a range of possible ‘meanings’ given the audience
ambiguity - something that’s not too obvious and with enough complexity to provoke discussion
Here are some examples of pictures that work well for VTS:
Edward Hopper, Nighthawks (pictured above).
David Hockney, Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy
Edgar Degas, L’Absinthe.
Suzanne Duquet, Groupe.
You might notice that all of the above include people. This provides the easiest way to establish narratives and other possibilities, but more abstract work can be equally effective with more experienced VTS participants. The above are all paintings, but photos work well too, like any of these.
What are the questions?
Here are the three questions recommended by Housen and Yenawine:
What’s going on/happening in this picture?
What do you see that makes you say that?
What more can you find?
The questions can be phrased slightly differently depending on the audience or the picture, but the wording is important. The questions must be open-ended, they must be phrased in a way that does not lead the viewer in any way, the questions must not feel confrontational or judgmental, or suggest that there is some kind of ‘right’ answer.
If done in this way, the effects can be profound. People who rarely express an opinion suddenly find a voice. Those who usually dominate discussions find they can listen and take turns. Biases and prejudices slip away and empathy improves. Power dynamics are reduced, and conversations are open and free. People say what they see, they infer and hypothesize, they change their minds, they argue, concede, compromise, accept.
So what?
Clearly, these are positive results, but so what? Very few of us spend our study or work hours gazing at art. So how can this be applied to the real world?
Well, the methodology is transferable to many contexts. In Yenawine’s book, Visual Thinking Strategies, which focuses mainly on using VTS in schools, there are examples of using the approach to look at literary texts, maths problems, historical or scientific photos or texts. But there are many more applications, and they're not limited to the school or university classroom.
At Global Sky Education, we’ve used VTS as a springboard for discussion in Business English lessons. It helps students to stop worrying about making mistakes, and to focus on communicating and expressing their opinions. On Business Skills courses, we’ve used VTS to help participants look more deeply at case studies and as a way to encourage divergent thinking and innovation. We’ve used graphs and data in the place of works of art, encouraging participants to analyze information from different angles. We’ve also incorporated VTS into academic skills classes as a great way to develop critical thinking and discussion skills.
More recently, we’ve been experimenting with using video clips from films/TV drama. This clip from Boardwalk Empire works well, as does this from Ladybird, and this from Fences. We watch with no sound and allow the viewers to create the narrative themselves, and comment on the characters’ feelings, their relationships to others, and possible motivations. It’s a highly effective way to develop empathy and emotional intelligence, as well as analytical and communication skills.
What's the role of the facilitator/trainer?
The simplicity and elegance of the VTS system could make you think that anyone can run a VTS workshop. But it's not as simple as picking a work of art and just reeling off the three questions. The facilitator first needs to create an environment of trust and openness, so that participants are willing to express themselves without fear. Then, the trainer has to ensure that participants interact in a respectful and productive way. As the discussion gets underway, the facilitator should encourage participants to go deeper using a range of techniques such as paraphrasing, clarifying, and asking probing questions.
The skill is to manage the conversation without judging, positively or negatively, any contributions. Following the discussion, participants should be encouraged to reflect on what they learned, and how they can apply it to their work and life.
What do the participants say?
With a skilled facilitator clearly showing the links to real world applications, participants quickly get over their sense of ‘why are we doing this?’ and start to enjoy new ways of expressing themselves and discussing things in more depth. We always get requests for more VTS, both from training participants and HR managers.
But the real proof as a trainer is observing how the participants change, how their confidence improves, how much more articulate they become, how much their minds are blown by experiencing things in new ways. While I can’t claim that VTS will change the world, it certainly changes the world of the viewer. Could it change your business for the better?