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Virtual Group Experiences : (Led by founder Professor Andrew Lear ) An important factor in how we all orient ourselves in the world is our sense of history, the history of humanity, of our country, city, family. Yet the histories most of us hear not only as children but through our education and indeed as adults as well is one in which only adult white cisgender men have agency, accomplishments, influence.

Other categories of people – women, people of color, people on the LGBTQ+ spectrum – scarcely appear in history, and they almost never appear playing an important role in any story. And this is the story that we see reflected in high culture: opera, ballet, poetry, theater, and art museums.

This in fact, represents an inaccurate, filtered view of the human story. Women—ambitious, powerful, talented women—people of color and LGBTQ+ individuals were there and had an important role, participating in and leading key moments in the history of our own civilizations and countries. At all levels of culture and power, if you know where to look, they are there in art museums, hidden as it were in plain sight.

The We Were There! virtual group experiences reveal these hidden layers of history in the world’s art museums, showing our audiences that people with whom they can identify are present in the world’s masterpieces. Targeted toward corporate, institutional, and education groups, it changes a trip to the museum from a potentially alienating experience into an affirming one, by showing our guests powerful women and people from (at least almost) every part of the LGBTQ+ spectrum, including queer people of color, learning what obstacles they faced and how they flourished.

o Offerings:

§ for LGBTQ groups:

· LGBTQ history walking tour of Greenwich Village

· The LGBTQ Secrets of the Metropolitan Museum—LGBTQ masterpieces, from ancient Greek statues to Picasso’s Gertrude Stein

· The LGBTQ Secrets of London’s National Portrait Gallery

· LGBTQ Rulers and their Fairy Tale Castles

§ For women’s groups:

· The Feisty Women of the Metropolitan Museum—powerful and ambitious women in history

· The Feisty Women of the US National Portrait Gallery

· The Shady Ladies of the Metropolitan Museum—royal mistresses and courtesans in art and history

· The Shady Ladies of Paris

§ For both:

· Fashion and Passion at the Metropolitan Museum—fashion and beauty standards through history

· Scandals and Secrets of Britain’s Stately Homes

· Scandals and Secrets of Paris’ Père Lachaise Cemetery

· The “We Were There!” tour of the Metropolitan Museum, showing that people with all our identities were not only present but important and influential in the past and in great works of culture.

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