Law enforcement and intelligence officials are spending more time these days inside New York City’s Metropolitan Museum of Art in order to improve their skills of observation.

 

The officers and agents are taking the class, The Art of Perception, developed by art historian (and former attorney) Amy Herman. “We’re getting them off the streets and out of the precincts, and it refreshes their sense of inquiry,” Herman told the Telegraph.

 

Law enforcement attendees include the FBI, CIA, U.S. Secret Service, Department of Homeland Security, Transportation Security Administration and the New York Police Department.

 

FBI special agent Bill Reiner credited Herman’s class with helping one of his undercover colleagues crack a $100 million fraud scheme involving mob control of garbage collection in Connecticut. He says that Herman taught his officers “Don't just look at a picture and see a picture. See what's happening.”

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

CIA and FBI Sent on Museum Course to 'Refresh Sense of Inquiry' (by Jon Swaine, Telegraph)

Teaching Officers to See the Crime Scene - “The Art of Perception” Training (New York State/Eastern Canada Chapter of the FBI National Academy Associates) (pdf)

Teaching Cops to See (by Neal Hirschfeld, Smithsonian)