Our Grade 11 IB Visual Arts students recently stepped beyond the classroom and into two of Rome’s most influential contemporary galleries for a day of focused inquiry and dialogue with the living art world.
At Galleria Lorcan O’Neill, students experienced Giuseppe Ducrot’s striking solo exhibition, where sculpture and material craft operate in conversation with deep historical traditions. Ducrot’s work draws upon classical forms and architectural memory while pushing them into contemporary territory through scale, surface, and unexpected material transformations. Students examined how historical language can be reinterpreted through modern practice, raising important IB questions about continuity, reference, and artistic authorship.
The visit continued at Galleria Uno su Nove, where the group exhibition Cool Grid presented a very different artistic language. Here, students encountered systems-based abstraction and geometric investigation as an evolving contemporary practice. The works explored repetition, structure, algorithmic thinking, and visual rhythm, demonstrating how artists today continue to expand the possibilities of abstraction.
Across both galleries, students engaged directly with gallery staff who unpacked the often invisible work behind exhibitions: curatorial decision-making, installation strategies, material experimentation, and the technical challenges involved in realizing ambitious artworks. These conversations revealed the ecosystem that supports contemporary art, from studio production to gallery presentation.
For IB Visual Arts, experiences like this are essential. They extend learning beyond textbooks and slides into real encounters with artists, curators, and artworks in their intended environment. Students returned with sketchbook notes, research ideas, and new inquiry questions that will feed directly into their Art-Making Inquiries Portfolio and inform the conceptual development of their own studio practice.
In this sense, the galleries became an extension of the studio: a place where observation, dialogue, and curiosity fuel artistic growth.
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MMI Art Expanded Classroom 
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