A Guerrila Reading by Vito Acconci and Maria Mirabal in the exhibition Hand Signals: Digits, Fists, and Talons, June 26, 2013. Part of Uncontested Spaces: Guerrilla Readings in MoMA Galleries

It’s been a remarkable year for poetry at MoMA. I threatened to slather the Museum with poetry, and I did. By the time it was finished, I brought over 125 poets, novelists, essayists, artists, and musicians into MoMA to do public interventions.

Two Daughters. 1961. India. Written, directed, and music composed by Satyajit Ray

These notes accompany screenings of Satyajit Ray’s </em>Two Daughters</a> on July 10, 11, and 12 in Theater 2.</p>

In the six years following his debut with Pather Panchali</a>

Massively Open Online Courses (MOOCs) have been loudly heralded in the news as being either the savior or the destroyer of education’s future. MOOCs are being created by the hundreds every year and attended by thousands per course. Why? Apparently everyone is eager to engage in high quality educational programs taught by world experts for free. I have enrolled in some terrific MOOCs and some terrible ones, seen great student interaction in the discussion boards and some unfortunate exchanges of misinformation. MOOC student interaction often gets tricky and frequently overwhelming, but it’s always amazing to be in a class with thousands of students from all over the world, all communicating with each other on a single topic of interest. It is exhilarating to experience global, intellectual connectivity.

Screenshot of MoMA’s “Art and Inquiry” course page on the Coursera website

As you may remember from my previous blog post, MoMA already offers a robust program of online courses that are NOT MOOCs because: 1. The “instructor-led” course attendance is limited to under 45 students (35 students is the cap for studio courses)—definitely NOT “massive”—and 2. Students pay a fee for the MoMA online course service, so they are not “open” in the same way as a free MOOC. However, earlier this year one of the largest MOOC providers Coursera, asked us to contribute to a new venture: creating MOOCs for primary and secondary school teachers looking for professional development opportunities. After a quick check-in with Lisa Mazzola, MoMA’s assistant director in charge of School and Teacher Programs, we agreed to join Coursera in this important work.

Why? Teachers are such an important audience for MoMA, and not just art teachers. Teachers of all kinds use our new MoMA Learning website that is chock full of in-depth and ready-to-use information, including slide sets, videos, and images. But teachers also need modeling and mentoring on how to use museum materials and teaching methods effectively. We offer some on-the-ground teacher workshops on this subject, but we never have enough space or time to accommodate the large number of teachers who request help. We want to experiment with MOOCs as a platform to build teachers’ skills in inquiry-based learning techniques while also engaging them in peer-to-peer learning strategies. We think teachers will love collaborating on the coursework and exchanging ideas about their practice with peers from all over the world. And we know they will appreciate the price of admission: free!

Our first MOOC, “Art and Inquiry,” begins July 29 and as of this post, there are over 8,000 enrolled. You can learn more about the course on Coursera’s website, and keep an eye out for Lisa Mazzola’s forthcoming blog post about creating MoMA’s first MOOC.

MoMA PS1’s annual Warm Up summer music festival kicked off last Saturday (and continues through September 7)! Check out the slideshow

Ben Shahn. Women at Fourth of July Carnival and Fish Fry, Ashville, Ohio. 1938. Gelatin silver print. 6 1/2 x 9 1/2″ (16.5 x 24.1 cm). Gift of the Farm Security Administration

From all of us here at MoMA, have a wonderful Fourth of July!

MoMA’s celebration of the landmark year 1913 continues with the 12th in a series of videos highlighting important works from 1913 in the Museum’s collection.

An Archive as Impetus (Not on View) performance in MoMA’s Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Sculpture Garden. Photograph by Martin Seck

Plenty of people think of museums, libraries, and archives as stagnant and apolitical places; sites where histories are not created, but simply preserved. In her performance Archive as Impetus (Not on View)—presented several times per week during the month of June as part of MoMA’s Artists Experiment initiative—artist Xaviera Simmons asked viewers to reconsider the role of the museum.

Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jean Seberg in Breathless. 1960. France. Directed by Jean-Luc Godard

These notes accompany screenings of Jean-Luc Godard’s </em>Breathless</a> on July 3 and 4 in Theater 2.</p>

To give Jean-Luc Godard’s A bout de soufflé (Breathless) its proper place in film history would require a great deal more space than is available here

Children playing in Shiro Takatani’s installation composition, in Sharjah’s Heritage Area. 2013. Fog machine (water, nozzle, pump) and motorized mirror. Installation view, Sharjah Biennial 11, Re:emerge: Towards a New Cultural Cartography, March 13–May 13, 2013. Commissioned by Sharjah Art Foundation.

In 1972, the year that Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi became the ruler Emir of Sharjah, oil was struck 50 miles off the emirate’s shore. Soon, its capitol city was producing 35,000 barrels each day.

Ralph Baer. Magnavox Odyssey. 1972. Various materials. Purchase

Quite a lot has happened since we announced the first 14 video games to enter the MoMA collection, seven months ago.