Close-Looking with the CMA’s Student Guide Program: Get to Know Thomas Ciardi

The Cleveland Museum of Art’s Student Guide Program trains college students to personally engage museumgoers using close-looking techniques. Through this tour-based program, the students aim to demonstrate how works of art from every period and culture from around the world are relevant to how we see, think, and live. The program is generously supported by the Walton Family Foundation and the Ford Foundation through the Diversifying Art Museum Leadership Initiative (DAMLI).

In this recurring series, we are showcasing a CMA student guide in The Thinker, including an interview conducted by one of their peers as well as a short essay focusing on an object of their choosing from the CMA’s permanent collection that exemplifies the ways slow and close-looking have impacted their experiences as both a guide and viewer.

Last month we featured senior student guide Jeanna Lopez. This month features an interview with computer science major Thomas Ciardi (Case Western Reserve University class of 2021) and Hannah Boylan (Case Western Reserve University class of 2020). This post also highlights Ciardi’s essay on Nataraja, Shiva as the Lord of Dance, a must CMA highlight from the museum’s Indian and Southeast Asian art collection.

HB: How has slow/close looking changed your experience of art?

TC: Slow looking has helped me establish a relationship and stronger connection to art, which is exactly what slow looking is. It is taking the time to form a connection and relationship with the art you are looking at. It helps break down barriers and lessen intimidation when it comes to art. In the past there have been pieces that I have glanced at and thought to myself that there is no way that I will be able to understand what that means, so I moved on very quickly. But forcing myself to spend time with the pieces and look at them from a different perspective has impacted the way I see and relate to art.

HB: How do you bring your background and experience to your work as a student guide? How does it feel to work in such a diverse group of students?

TC: I have no background in art, and that is what I bring to the program. Last year, for instance, when I designed my tour, it was centered on the idea that this is something that someone who doesn’t know anything about art will be able to access and use. I was never an art buff, so I understood that other people are in that boat as well. I used that as a starting point to design my tours so they are accessible to anyone, even if they haven’t had exposure to art.

I enjoy working in a diverse group of students. I like looking around and seeing that there are art history students but also engineers. Everyone has a unique way of looking at artwork, and we each bring that to the table, so that has been a powerful experience: to see those other perspectives and to form relationships with people I would not have otherwise

HB: What is the most challenging part of the program? Most rewarding?

TC: I think the most challenging part is finding the time to go to the museum. Some of our assignments are to visit the galleries and spend time looking at art, but sometimes it is difficult to set aside the time. When I do spend time there, it’s a pleasurable experience.

I think the most rewarding part of the program has been how it has transformed my ability to see art. I see museums in a whole different light now. When I was in Nashville with my friends over fall break this year, we went to an art museum. In the past that might not have been something I had been inclined to do, but this program has changed how I experience museums, and I have benefited from that.

HB: How do you feel that you contribute to the CMA’s mission?

TC: The CMA’s mission statement is to create transformative experiences through art, “for the benefit of all the people forever,” so I contribute by helping to break down barriers for my peers and younger people who may not necessarily think of museums as the first place they want to visit. By being able to work at the museum and share my museum experiences with friends and people that I am surrounded by encourages them to come to the CMA. I am helping the CMA reach every single person regardless of age or interest. I think I have helped play a role in bringing a larger demographic to experience the museum, whether they are interested in art or not.

HB: How did your involvement and participation fit into your broader goals for developing yourself?

TC: One of my goals in attending college was to become the most diverse thinker I can be. I am a computer science major, but I value being able to approach problems not only from an engineering or science lens but also from a historical or art lens. When I saw an opening for the student-guide position, it was an opportunity to think from a variety of perspectives and to see through different lenses. I think the program has definitely helped me with that growth.

HB: Why is slow looking an important (or, dare I say, enjoyable) skill today?

TC: Today’s society is so fast paced. Technology has evolved our attitudes about life in general. It’s all about seeing more, doing more, getting more, experiencing more, and there is so much energy behind that. I think that is good in a lot of ways in pushing us as a society, but at the same time it has removed some of our ability to be present and engaged. “Slow art” has especially helped me learn how to slow down. I buy into the hustle culture, but slow looking has reminded me that it is important to slow down in your daily life and to take a more in-depth look to engage with things and to be present. Through learning how to do that with art, I have also learned how to do that better in my daily life. Hopefully, as I continue to develop my slow-looking skills, they will become more ingrained in my life.

This interview was conducted by CMA Student Guide Hannah Boylan (Case Western Reserve University class of 2020).

Looking Closely at Nataraja, Shiva as the Lord of Dance

By Thomas Ciardi, CMA student guide

I selected the statue Nataraja, Shiva as the Lord of Dance (1930.331) because I was intrigued by its complex content and composition. The statue contains an incredible variety of elements, and the closer one looks, the more one finds. Nataraja feels powerful. Its intricate design, especially for the uninitiated, lends an air of mystery and makes the figure’s otherworldly status apparent. What follows is my experience of this millennia-old sculpture. It describes the path my eyes followed and my interpretations of what I saw — how my eyes leapt from place to place, symbol to symbol. Come see it for yourself! It is currently on view in gallery 244, surrounded by glass and the backdrop of CWRU’s and the CMA’s campuses.

A stone-gray mass more than three feet high and wide, proudly placed in front of a glass window. Rays of sunlight cast across it through the day. Framing the figure is a ring with jets of fire jutting from it at even intervals. The flames flicker in the light, warming the surrounding air. The ring serves as both a frame and support, connected to the figure at the top of the headdress, at the ends of two arms spread to the side, and at a single foot planted for balance. At the base lies a small infant-like figure. The larger figure steps on the smaller as the latter looks upward, its gaze seemingly calm or resigned. The small figure has shoulder-length, textured hair and large earrings that remind me of lollipops. It has an elongated body with short limbs spread at random angles across the ground. Two dragon-like serpents snake outward from the “dwarfish figure,” as described in the wall text, and upward on the surrounding circle — radiating a series of 31 individual flames. The flame emanating from the mouth of one curls upward and swirls into the mouth of the other; they are the source of fire.

Gazing at the statue, I was overwhelmed by the intricate design. A wildly contorted figure held in perfect balance. The figure of Nataraja, with his two legs and four arms, is tall and slender. The leg balanced atop the small strange figure resting at the bottom is bent roughly at a right angle, making the posture impressive in its strength. The ankle and toes are adorned with jewelry, some beaded, some metallic in character, giving a sense of opulence and importance to Nataraja even if you don’t know who he is on sight. His other leg hovers in front of the figure underfoot at a similar 90-degree angle. His lower body is concealed in an elaborate loincloth. The fabric appears thin and is marked by complex patterns. His elevated status is reinforced by his neck, covered with a plethora of necklaces, some hanging, some tight to the body, along with the multiple bracelets, headdress, and other intricacies. The back arm of his left side extends outward and up, against a right angle. Held in the palm of his left arm is a flame exactly like those that surround him. Alternatively, the front arm of his left side is pulled straight across his body, fingers pointing downward at the toes of his extended left leg. His rear right arm is in a similar position as that of the rear left, at a sharp right angle, but it grasps a different object, a small drum that, to me, looked like a compressed hourglass. The front right arm, like the front left arm but with a different gesture, pushes outward from the body with an open palm toward the viewer. These angles and gestures allow us to see the figure as moving rhythmically.

Finally, I gazed at his expressionless face with closed-eyes. It is a perfectly symmetrical circular face with a long nose and sharp chin framed by ears with lobes stretched to the shoulder, one by an enormous cylindrical plug earring, the other a slack bit of flesh freed from its ring but encircled by a jeweled cuff. On Nataraja’s head is an intricate headdress, beginning with a series of swag and tassel shapes across his forehead, above the noticeable indentation in his flesh, then rising into a sort of feathered tuft not unlike a peacock’s tail, but more angular and significantly shorter.

Student-guided close-looking tours — free and open to the public — occur every second, third, and fourth Friday of the academic year at 6:00 and 7:00 p.m. Spring tours begin Friday, January 24, 2020. Student-guided tours offer a completely new way of connecting with the collection in fun, active, and informal ways. Participants are encouraged through discussion, writing, and drawing activities to consider what they see and why they see it as such; the tours are less about the specific histories of artworks and more about building and expanding one’s observation skills.