Unicorns and Columned Courtyards

I’ve had a little time to contemplate my weekend in New York City, a whirlwind stop on an amazing trip. Contemplation is one thing, having words is another. I was captivated as my dear friend Mike and I explored the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Cloisters. At moments it was like walking through ancient streets, strolling through courtyards in a Madrid basilica, being before an altar in a cherished church of old. It was quite cold outside and light dusting of snow fell as we walked up the hill to the museum. My first glimpse was a bit magical.

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What lives inside the museum walls mystifying. The Cloisters is home to much of the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s collection of religious objects and artifacts. It is built to look much like a building of another day. Stone walls, high ceilings and installations of architectural elements from buildings of another time and place. Columns of Italy and Spain, icons from altars that pilgrims traveled before which to pray.

I had to catch my breath at the next corner. I had made a pilgrimage of my own to stand amidst the unicorn tapestries. I guess I did not remember that this was their home from art history courses. This was for me a lifelong dream to be up close to glimpse the imagery of a mystical beast. How wonderful! One tapestry had been taken down for conservation. I was so tempted to peek below the tarp protecting the tapestry awaiting repair,
though I never would.

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We stopped for a rest and sat on aged pew and gazed into an atrium as sun poured through the glass. As the morning’s snow melted and glistened, winter seemed to melt away too. A daydream, a gift, it was a cherished moment with a dearest friend that will not fade.

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Sometimes a trip to a museum is much more than an outing. It can be a pilgrimage, a retreat, a shared experience and lifelong memory. It takes one away from the world one knows to someplace ancient or perhaps futuristic, beyond the imagination, a place where hopes and dreams are ever so real.

 

Click here to learn more about the cloisters.

Audience Driven

There has been a theme almost every speaker explored. The importance of audience. In Judy Landau’s workshop on Object Based Learning she said what I think many of us know, but may forget. The audience brings knowledge to the exhibit. I have been thinking about this quite a bit and contemplating a few things about how to capitalize on this idea.

How often should an organization consider who the audience is or who they want it to be? That is a question facing two of the community organizations with which I work. I think that sometimes organizations, museums, non-profits forget that we cannot sit back and wait for the audience to come to us. Rather we must begin to evaluate what we do with a critical eye. Of all the museums that we visited I think the art museums spend less time trying to engage the audience with the exhibition itself. I think that program based engagement is much stronger in these places. Facilitated conversations, explanations and curator driven exhibits (not that this is always a bad thing) may be the interactions of choice.

Patrice Legro said, “Never underestimate the intelligence of your audience.”

Bob Enholm said he was asking, “How can we build an audience inspired by Woodrow Wilson?” I think we can each fill in our subject matter.

Susan Ades told us “Audience research and evaluation are critical to understanding visitor experience and use.”

I think one of the most important things for museums of the 21st Century to remember was from John Grabowska. He reminded us that “The audience is much larger than those who visit the park.” Again we can make that statement our own.

River View

I have been to a number of amazing cities along rivers. I live across from a small river now. It seems to me that each one is rich in narrative stories. Today as I was gazing across the place where the Potomac and the Shenandoah Rivers meet. I found myself thinking about all the river cities I have enjoyed spending time and about which I have learned over the years. 

I spent my teenage years on the Mississippi River in East Hannibal, Illinois where my mother owned a mom and pop motel called the Colonial Motel. Near the historic city of Hannibal, Missouri. The scenic views and narrow bluff roads with quaint homes nestled into the hills remind me so much of home. With the chill in the air I felt a little like the young woman who learned to drive, manual transmission, on those slick winter hills. Hannibal draws many visitors to its hills to see the boyhood home of Samuel Clemens and the places where Tom, Huck and Becky played in his novels.

As the tour guide, David Fox, whisked us through the historic sights and down the main street towards the bus I wanted to say, “Slow down! Let’s sit a while. Teach me more!” I wanted to gain the enthusiasm for speaking and for sharing history, his judgement of audience and flexibility. I think he is the true heart of Harper’s Ferry. I hope when I find time to bring my sons back here, to walk the cobbled roads that he will still be here.

So much is happening here in seminar and back at home that each day when I sit down to write I am exhausted. I feel guilty for those moments I truly enjoy because I know the sacrifice my family has made for me to be here. I had several of those moments today. I wish I could have shared those moments and that river view.

Elegant Solutions and Fulfilling Careers

Speaking with the interns that I invite into my studio I always tell them that an internship will either open their eyes about what they want to do or perhaps teach them that they are perhaps headed in the wrong direction. I have been learning across the sum of the seminar so far that sometimes neither of these is quite correct but that perhaps each step is a bit of evolution towards a position in museums. For instance Robert Enholm, Executive Director of the President Woodrow Wilson House comes from a corporate law office. Susan Addes, Director of Smithsonian Office of Exhibition Central, having begun in museum education. I know as I return home I will be looking for ways to marry my love for creating art, time administrating programs, and experience facilitating/teaching with my desire to find work in a museum. I hear others contemplating their own careers and wonder if perhaps the museum world has places for all of us. I think it is time to do some more internships. Somewhere in the world there must be a place for the tangled web that is my resume, an elegant solution that leads to a fulfilling career.

I think today that Cheryl Braunstein and Steve Sarro did a fine job connecting their own roles working with a living collection to other parts of the museum world. I found it interesting use of graphics, simple elegant solutions to the problems unique to zoos like need for durability as well as flexibility. I found commonalities in the need to define the audience and find ways to entice new age groups/audiences to explore exhibitions.

I asked Cheryl on the walk up the hill (an what a walk it was) about if and when they get to communicate with other zoos about projects, which zoos she looks to for inspiration. She spoke about Baltimore and the Bronx Zoo, but shared that much travel to investigate other spaces has gone by the wayside due to constraints on funds right now. In spite of all the constraints on budgets and resources, it seems she is now putting to use all her years of experience for an organization and work about which she is passionate. I think that constitutes a fulfilling career and an elegant solution.

Illustrated exchangeable labels show flexibility

Images and interesting facts with themes and variations of other successful graphics freshing the Panda habitat and inform visitors who come to see Bao Bao.

Bronze statues appeal to much of the audience and are a big hit with visitors.

Choosing species that are good exhibit animals is an important part of the equation that balances happy animals with happy audiences.

Pinch me I’m Dreaming

So . . . how do I sum up today’s adventures? One word, riveting.

Having the opportunity to handle the pieces of the exhibit model was very enlightening. However, going into their shop and seeing the work being done, talking with the artists was truly inspiring. I found myself thinking, “I could do this.” I have been wondering how exhibition designers might be using technology like the substrata and 3D printers. It was fascinating to learn about the use of CT scan technology in the renderings for 3D printing. Talking with Nicole over lunch I know I was not the only student thinking how amazing a career at OEC might be and how much fun to learn about some many things as one would work in exhibition design.

Stepping into the National Gallery of Art and visiting the Design Department was a highlight of my trip. I was inspired by the space, learned so much through the objects and found the explanations of process intriguing. I only wish we had more time to explore the spaces and see the exhibitions. I so want some time to stroll leisurely through the NGA galleries and sit with the art, discover the works on paper, adore the paintings.

A few collected thoughts for the day.

Melody about anything intriguing, “There’s a story behind that.”

“Organization is critical” Laura Collins, Productions Supervisor at the OEC

The Force

A little levity on our way into the conversation with Beatrice Mowry, Chair, Exhibit Design and Technology was welcome this morning. Ms. Mowry’s excitement after a long career at the Smithsonian’s Nations Air and Space Museum and her candor were an amazing gift this morning. I wished as we walked through the exhibits that my family were with me and that I had a couple days to explore the objects that inspire the 7 million visitors a year.

The elegance of design was brought home. After Mowry describe the number of visitors and the challenge of making participatory activities that hold up I had no expectation of the elegance with which her staff solved the problem. The Wing Warping Interactive is a great sturdy example.

Again today I was struck by the full force of emotion throughout the day. In the Newseum, I was nearly knocked over by the power of the messages of the Wall, 9/11 and the Pulitzer Prize photos, feeling the events anew.

The force that twisted the Towers can bring one back to the day. Powerful.

The internal space and the views from the museum were breathtaking. Some images need little explanation.

I am still collecting words. Today some come from the pictures above.

“Freedom” “Force” Others are the words of the people who generously took time to share with us.

Beatrice Mowry on evaluating perspective exhibits: “We have to ask, ‘How is this unique to us?'”

Also Beatrice Mowry, referring to the impressions of independent evaluators of the National Air and Space Museum. “This is the museum of America’s dreams.”

Paul Sparrow, Senior Vice President of Newseum on the design of the Watergate Door exhibition and what not to do in exhibit design: “No one sees the damn door.”

Collectors of . . .

Most people I know collect. For instance, one of my sisters collects chickens. My eldest sister collects piggy banks. i never wonder what to buy her for a birthday or Christmas present. I just search for a unique or special back. I have a friend who collects buttons, not the ones that you have on your shirt but the kind that say something profound, cute or that have images she likes on them. I collect prints from regional printmakers, Smartwool socks and depression glass. My brother when he was alive, collected knowledge. My mentor who I wrote a little bit about yesterday, Hank was a true collector assembling some of the most comprehensive collections in the US: fine art prints, paintings, African artifacts and much more. Much of Hank’s collections have gone to institutions, universities and museums, to be used for educational purposes, to share with others.

On this trip I started to begin a new collection of my own. I have been collecting words, phrases and questions that will influence my thinking for sometime to come. Unlike my collection of magnets from vacations. I am not just collecting one or two this trip but keeping the words in my notes, sometimes in the margins and even typed into the “Notes” app on my phone. Many have come from my classmates, several from speakers and a few from my classmates. A few from conversations overheard in a museum. I thought I might share a few here. Maybe you’d like to add a few of your own.

Randall in the first media workshop on using hyperlinks in blogs, “It’s like jazz!”

“Give your brain as much attention as you do your hair and you’ll be a thousand times better off.” Malcolm X in Barbara Kruger’s installation at the Hirshhorn Museum.

“Belief + Doubt = Sanity” Barbara Kruger.

Stephanie Brown on her husband’s opinion of Modern art. “I have nothing to bring to the dumpsters.”

“Now that’s an interesting question.”  Judy Landau in Object Based Learning: Part II.

“Conflict is OK. Creation is messy.” Stephanie Brown,

Rebecca Bray on building on reassembling Julia Child’s Kitchen after the “world was changing” (Julia Child, 2001) due to 9/11. People wanted to see everything put back together.”

Also Rebecca Bray, “In an exhibit there is a moment where everything fits.”

Cathy Frenkel on the exhibit House and Home, “Everyone understands home.”

Abbie Chessler on exhibition creation “Many disciplines must come together.”

“Everyman is his own historian.” Becker, 1932

“A great museum is specific and practical; a great museum is also abstract and thoretical.” (David Carr, 2006)

Randall responding to my discomfort of creating a viritual exhibition. “Create a theatrical design.”

My favorite so far comes from my son and was relayed by a friend in an email. “Aren’t all museums about history?”

Who came up with the pegboard first, Hank or Julia?

Julia’s Kitchen

I have had a really emotional Day 3. It was emotional before we started the day but much more as I look back over it.

Our time in the National Museum of American History at the exhibit FOOD and with Curator Paula Johnson affected me on many levels. I never imagined that the kitchen of Julia Child would be the object/exhibit that moved me so very much.

The amount of discussion over the exhibition, the nostalgic value, and the nature of our changing relationships with food, prove to me that something very powerful was happening in that gallery.

I came back to the hotel on my own. As I walked up Massachusetts Ave past JHU, I was still thinking about the passion with which Paula Johnson spoke about collecting the interview with Julia Child on 9/11. In my mindseye, I kept seeing this pegboard in the workshop of my beloved mentor Emile H. Mathis II. We called him Hank. Child’s pegboard with her cooking utensils looks very much like Hank’s pegboard with his framing tools on it. It made me so powerfully miss Hank, and caused me to call Hank’s partner. We talk about him a lot, as Hank died about 18 months ago from a rare cancer. I shared how moved I was by the kitchen. My friend’s response, “Her kitchen was Hank’s favorite thing he saw in DC.” So, I asked “Who came up with the pegboard first, Hank or Julia?” Turns out the pegboard in the framing gallery was an idea Hank replicated in his own studio and kitchen when he returned to Racine, WI.

Yesterday in the classroom Stephanie Brown reminded us that visitors to our exhibitions bring their own lives, experiences, knowledge and emotions. Today that lesson, came powerfully upon me. I am an artist in a city filled with amazing art but I will never leave behind the little kitchen that reminded me of my dear friend and mentor. May he rest in peace.

Please click here to learn a little bit about Emile’s legacy.

Pressure

Metamorphic Rock was the highlight of today. With my group we contemplated the process by which this rock is formed as pressure from its surroundings over times can change and even reintegrate rocks. In the Q?rius Lab, a great new participatory exhibit in the National Museum of Natural History, we examined cyclosilicate mineral tourmaline closely, observing its many colors, incorporated shapes and form. We held it, feeling its weight, photographed it, discussed it, video taped it, and began to form ideas around it. This I think is the most interesting aspects of the new exhibit so many specimen can be held and examined with real authentic lab equipment.

Its begun to inspire some very interesting ideas about how change can be instigated through pressure. How this statement might metaphorically describe life, art, science, design, history and so much more is evolving as the amazing women in my group discuss and contemplate our primary object. My mind is spinning about how life sometimes mimics this process of metamorphosis. Lots of pressure over a very long span of time may change the way we live our lives. I’ve experienced an awful lot of pressure and have decided that like the microscope reveals amazing color, texture, structure and even flaws in the tourmaline, pressure in life magnifies many things in the human condition that are parallel.

I did a little searching and found definitions that help me to explore the Big Idea.I found a really interesting webpage about tourmaline tonight on the University of Montana’s UM Earth Materials website.

I also searched for a definition of pressure that might help me define the big idea. Here are the definitions and synonyms that affected me most.

Tension and Relationship

I think for me much of my first day of the Washington Seminar was spent contemplating relationships of all sorts. I truly enjoyed experiencing the Hirshhorn Museum’s architecture for the first time and the discussion of our impressions that ensued. Now that it is quiet and I am reflecting on the day I realize that there are more questions forming in my mind, about the museum and the artwork inside its curvilinear spaces, about the people who approach it like I did today for the first time. I even wonder if all the controversy surrounding it has helped or hurt the museum over time.

 

Mechanical and Industrial yet organic, round and angular, for me the architecture itself seems an oxymoron. I found myself thinking of Judith Landau’s description of the engineering and the “tendons” within the concrete that supports the building. Did the architects contemplate the anatomy and physiology of an animal’s body? How tendons are strong and flexible? Were they inspired by something in nature that was not a perfect circle like a planet’s orbit or an egg? The fact the building seems asymmetrical and off-center can leave the visitor contemplating its shape, drew me to look up the architect and designs. I have more reading to do. I think about the radiating lines of the fountain and consider that somehow they remind me of lines plotting an idea map or a flowchart. I can see the lines as the radiating from the disc over images of Akhenaten in ancient Egyptian reliefs.

I was intrigued, impressed and honored by the time and attention Kerry Brougher spent sharing the exhibition, Damage Control: Art and Destruction Since 1950. The tension built as we wove our way through the exhibit and as we came full circle did not resolve itself but hung in my mind. The layers of expression relate to the audience of today and yet speak about yesterday and tomorrow. I think the sort of angulating narrative with many different media introduces, through different spaces and different ways of displaying them, also tension. The sound and the colors of the large projections giving visitors a context for events and happenings that before might have seemed unreal and now seem very real, sometimes scary very possibilities for the future.

“Big Idea” and the upcoming assignments, museum visits and each comment by a colleague brings me to another question. How will I ever decide on one object to focus on in one museum?