Interaktiver Ausstellungsrundgang

Siblings Guide Through the Exhibition
Siblings – Amazing & Annoying

The starting point for this guided tour through the exhibition Siblings – Amazing & Annoying was the ongoing collaboration with class 2r of the Sportmittelschule St. Pölten. For over a year now, this class has been part of a Children’s Advisory Board, a participatory body of the KinderKunstLabor. Together with these advisory groups and participants of the Art Ideas Workshop, themes and content for the KinderKunstLabor are co-created and developed.

Andreas Hoffer, who has been supporting this Children’s Advisory Board from the very beginning, invited the exhibition’s curator, Mona Jas, to engage in a critical and constructive discussion with the students about the artworks, the concept, and the artists.

Following this exchange, the students explored their favorite works both verbally and through drawing. During this process, they were also asked whether they could imagine offering a guided tour for visitors.

The response was immediate and unanimous: five girls from the class volunteered to take on this role—even before it was clear what such a tour might look like. The wish to present this tour to both the press and the public came directly from the group. After attending the exhibition opening together and reflecting on their first impressions, a separate meeting was arranged exclusively with the girls.

As a first step, they moved freely through the exhibition, following their own curiosity: Which works attract attention? Where do they linger? What questions arise? From this open exploration, individual interests and focal points emerged. Based on these, they selected the works they wanted to present.

Together, they discussed how to shape the tour and what aspects were important to them. Along the way, they were introduced to curatorial considerations—not as guidelines, but as orientation within the process. An initially planned hands-on workshop was later discarded by the group in favor of a format that focuses more strongly on conversation, exchange, and their own perspectives.

The tour is intentionally conceived as an open, process-oriented setting. The students present selected works, speak from their own perspectives, and engage directly with visitors. There is no fixed dramaturgy; instead, the conversation evolves organically from the interests and viewpoints of the students and the responses of the audience.

At the end of the tour, the exchange may transition into a shared reflection or participatory activity. Central to this format is a shift in roles and hierarchies: the students independently take responsibility for both the content and the execution of the tour. Educators remain in the background, offering support only when needed and contributing information solely upon invitation by the students.

In this way, the tour becomes a space in which young people not only talk about art, but publicly articulate, share, and open their perspectives to discussion—an approach that reflects the core objectives of the Children’s Advisory Boards.