John Deweys Educational Philosophy and the Barnes Foundation

The Barnes Foundation began as an educational institution, giving instruction in the appreciation of art, particularly of painting, to a highly selected group of students. Dr. Albert C. Barnes conceived his Foundation as an educational institution not as a museum. The staff of teachers carried on the instructional and research activities under the direction of Dr. Barnes. John Dewey, the father of American progressive education was one of the staff members. He was the first director of education at the Barnes Foundations. The Foundation was set up with an elaborate series of courses with lectures using the paintings to illustrate theory. These courses still exist today. The program offered by the Foundations Art Department is unique in both its approach and its procedure. Based on the tenets of John Deweys philosophy as he applied them to education in general, the program consists primarily in demonstrating the working of the objective method of investigation, familiar in the field of science, and the applying that method to the study of art.