2 Weeks Remaining

Holy cow! Time has truly flown, and I am looking at only 9 more days of my internship at the Denver Art Museum. So much (as usual) has been going on in the museum that I don't even know where to begin! Back to writing out a good old list:

1) Embrace! 3D Renderings: In the last post, I mentioned that Sonnet had handed over the reins to me on the visitor response component of the Embrace! Lounge (interpretation area). The main concept behind this activity has always been to get adults to participate in an experience that would allow them to embrace their own space within the Hamilton building just like the artists in the show have done, thus solidifying the connection between the artist and visitor. I was in charge of organizing various meetings to figure out how to create a 3D version of some of the spaces within the Hamilton building, and those steps have been discussed in previous posts. Since that time, I have spent many, many hours constructing a template for a die cut of the "prow" of the museum (see below). I met with the Coordinator of Family Programs to create a sketch of the prow based upon an existing model produced by the DAM's design department, as well as to create a paper model from this sketch. Our sketch was a scale model of the prow. You can only imagine how big the rendering was! It took me entirely too long to scale it down to a usable size--a process that took me two trys to conquer.

Upon completing this die cut, along with a couple of other 3D rendering possibilities, Sonnet and I presented our ideas to a group of Master Teachers in the education department. Needless to say, our product was not as intuitive as we had hoped; the teachers couldn't even put together the die cut. This came as a shock to both Sonnet and I, as I had prototyped this activity with a group of interns and found a different result. This goes to show how you can become so close to a project that you sometimes loose your connection with your audience. You may think something is wonderful, but it can fall flat in actuality.

At this moment, Sonnet and I need to figure out a way to make the 3D renderings work for our visitors. We don't have time to go back to the drawing board. Things to think about: materials that will make the activity more adult-focused, creating a more intuitive die cut (add imagery), etc. When we brought these results to the Embrace! Lounge team, we received some positive feedback as well as some negative. More on this to come later...

It's the Hamilton Prow! Do you see the resemblance?

I'm pretty proud of this because my artistic talent is very limited.

My Versions of "Embracing" the Space

2) Arrival of Rupprecht Matthies!!!

This event really has been the most anticipated event of my internship. I had spoken with Rupprecht momentarily on the phone and had heard many stories about his wonderful personality, but I had yet to meet him. He arrived last Monday, and he has really been a treat to work with. Upon his arrival, Sonnet, Emilie and I took the day to meet with him to discuss various components of his installation, including the elements of his installation, information about the fabrication of the word pillows for his installation, his schedule for the next 3 weeks, etc. After a lunch break together, we all gathered around his computer to view a slide show of his work...a live monograph if you will. It was so, so, so exciting to speak with a very successful German artist about his artistic vision, goals, and products. To cap off the day, we went over to the area in which his work will be installed to introduce Rupprecht to the space (no more photographs!), to map out potential organizational patterns of the space, to discuss the components to be used in the space, etc. Very exciting day.

3) Setting Up Documents on the DAM's Intranet: A vital part of the Embrace! show will be capturing images to display in the lounge in order to show the artistic process of each of the artists over a period of a couple of months. This being the case, I was given the assignment to organize on Share Point, the DAM's intranet site, various folders that will serve to house the myriad of images that will be produced before and during the show. This included uploading all of the photos we had taken thus far in the process of Rupprecht's installation (Emily Griffith Tour, etc.)

4) Embrace! Interpretation Calendar: I also created a calendar for August-November of the installation periods of the various artworks and the various events associated with the interpretive plan for the exhibition. This included scheduling interviews, recording installation dates, scheduling times for visitors to watch potentially interesting installations, creating notification deadlines for communicating with other departments to fulfill PR needs, etc.

5) Dinner with Rupprecht, the Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, and the RINO Artist Community: The second evening after Rupprecht's arrival at the DAM, the "Rupprecht Matthies team" hosted a dinner at the Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art's home that was attended by a community of local artists name RINO. The purpose of this dinner was to give Rupprecht an opportunity to meet local artists from RINO (from the River North area of Denver) so that he could forge relationships that would lead to these artists giving him some free studio space and helping him with the fabrication of some of his installation components. This was enormously successful not only for Rupprecht (he got some free space and made many friends) but I also was able to create relationships with these artists. They have invited me to come visit their galleries so that they can give me a tour! What a great opportunity this was for me to develop myself as a young professional. Jenny, you would be proud. You encouraged me to create my own network of professional contacts, and I got the courage to do so!

6) I have begun to tackle another artist file on Dasha Shiskin. This is my 9th file...whew.

7) Meeting with Annie: I also meet with Annie during the last week to be tutored on GarageBand, a program through MAC that allows individuals to create podcasts. This will be very important for me to master so that I can edit the audio footage we generate from the interviews of the Embrace! artists.

8) Talking with Visitors Paper: In my last blog post, I mentioned that I had completed a Talking with Visitors paper and that I was waiting for Sonnet to meet with me concerning the necessary changes I need to make to this document. We finally met up in the museum, and I received some more instructions on how to craft my document to be more of a place where I delineate parameters for my audience and not as a place where I am forcing my (or other critics') viewpoints on the visitor. I am planning on revising this document once my official internship is over to fall more in line with this aim. I never realized how difficult these papers would be to write. It's extremely challenging to not just provide answers but to provide options for visitors. This is a sentiment that I truly believe in; however, it is so hard to implement.

9) Meetings with Rupprecht: Needless to say, we have had numerous meetings with Rupprecht including a budgeting meeting (EK!); a walkthrough of the installation space with security, exhibition design, installation, curatorial, and education staff to determine what restrictions Rupprecht has and what his vision was shaping out to be; a meeting with the wood shop staff to discuss the possibility of Rupprecht using one of their tables to construct his work (they agreed to this); and a couple of meetings discussing workshop preparations.

Rupprecht pondering during the Embrace! full-team walkthrough of the installation space.

Meeting with the wood shop guys.

10) Observing Emily Griffith and Meeting with the African Community Center's Staff: Last Thursday, we went over to the Emily Griffith Opportunity School to observe the classroom of students we would be having in our workshop and to introduce Rupprecht to the students before that workshop on Monday. This was an incredibly touching day for me. Not only did I get to see some of the same individuals that I gave a tour to a few weeks ago, but they remembered me and gave me a huge smile and plenty of waves. Although that was moving, the most enjoyable part was helping the students write their life stories. I can't even tell you how much I felt for these refugees, individuals who have shown so much courage and who face incredible odds in this extremely difficult economy. I'm so glad that we had this opportunity to get to know these individuals on a personal level; it only serves to make Rupprecht's installation all the more meaningful.

We also made a trip over to the African Community Center to nail down some logistics for the next week.

11) Workshop Prep: As if I haven't been busy enough, Emilie and I have been working tirelessly on organizing the workshops so that they run smoothly. We set up a system for projecting the student-generated words on the walls and a way in which to trace the words so that they can serve as usable patterns for our sewing volunteers. The gathering of supplies and a discussion of various logistical concerns were done. Can't wait to update you on the workshops!

Planning out how big the words should be!

Excitement is in the Air!

This week marks the 7th week I have been at the DAM and 4 weeks until I officially graduate. You can’t believe it? Neither can I.

Over the last week and a half, I have experienced some of the best moments of my internship thus far. As always, here is a laundry list of all the things I’ve been up to:

1) Every once in a while, I get a strange, somewhat random, task that really has nothing to do with any of the other projects I have been working on. I’ve had a couple of those in the last week or so.

a. Untitled Blog Business: For every Untitled, my supervisor writes a blog post that centers on the topic for that evening’s festivities. The next Untitled’s theme is “Old School,” a commentary on the various historical periods/schools of art as well as those trends that have followed us throughout the 80s and 90s—think spandex, neon, snap bracelets, Walkmans, PAC Man, etc. What came up during a couple of brainstorming meetings about the marketing plan for “Old School” was that our Modern and Contemporary collection consists of many works that appropriate historical images and infuse them with contemporary meaning. Artists such as Wiley and Colescott come to mind. One of my assignments for this last week was to go to a Wiley painting we have displayed, and from there pull some information from a visitor response piece situated in front of the work. In this activity, visitors are asked to write a 6 word bio of the painting. My task was to choose the top 5 or so in order that Sonnet could pick and choose what she wanted to discuss in her blog. Images were scanned and text was delivered. Here is an image of the painting and some of my favorite bios:

1) You be Mary, I’ll be Joseph.
2) Here’s where bling bling meets Baroque.
3) We’re not your typical portrait sitters.
4) The hip hop guys are canonized.
5) Basketball wannabes divinized through faux marriage.
6) Induction into a life of captivity.
7) Forget what you think you know.

We have some creative visitors, don’t we?!

Another Untitled related assignment I was asked to take care of was the transcription of Sonnet's (my supervisor) interview with the Curator of Photography, Eric Paddock. The point of this interview was to generate information on the oldest photograph in the collection. This would serve as information for another blog post Sonnet is writing about “Old School.” Very, very interesting interview, but I would not recommend transcribing on a daily basis…it is exhausting! In addition to this transcription, I took photographs of some daguerreotypes we have displayed in the Discovery Library within the Western Art galleries for some visual reference.

b) Side Trip Gallery Facilitation: I worked another afternoon in the Side Trip helping visitors make their own rock posters (see previous posts).

c) Field Trip to the Denver Firefighters Museum: Last Thursday, a group of education staff and interns went across the street to the Denver Firefighters Museum to talk to their director a little bit about what they do there as well as the educational activities that they provide for their audience. It was a wonderful afternoon of experiencing how much gallery interpretation can be done on a very small budget. As it turns out, the DAM and the Denver Firefighters Museum have a very close relationship. They even share a large number of their volunteers with one another. Especially interesting is the fact that many supplies are given to the DFM after the art museum has deemed these items to be passed their “usefulness” for the institution.

What really grabbed me was how well the DFM was able to adapt learning models from other institutions. Perhaps, it isn’t all about innovation, but creative and strategic adaptation.

d) Denver CAMP HotSpot Facilitator: Last Friday, I was able to facilitate a gallery activity with six groups of underprivileged children. For various objects within the permanent gallery, the education staff has created what they call HotSpots, or activities the center on a object's visual qualities. For the camp last week, we took the kids up to the 6th floor, which houses the European collection among other things. Within the Discovery Library on this floor, I facilitated a HotSpot that focused on an Egyptian sarcophagus. First, I gave an overview of what a sarcophagus was, we talked about where Egypt is located, and spent some time looking over the object. A flower collar is prominently depicted on the chest of the sarcophagus, which served as our point of departure for the gallery activity. The children were assisted in creating their own Egyptian collars using pillows, pins, and silk flowers. The finished product was then color photo copied.

This is one of my favorite things I have done so far in my internship. I had forgotten how much I love talking to people, especially about topics that I am passionate about. I was able to tap into my art history expertise, as well as use what I know about museum education to give all of that content context. I certainly learned a lot about myself as a facilitator!

e) I have finished a Talking with Visitors paper (see previous posts), and am waiting for my meeting with Sonnet so that we can edit my document.

2) Embrace! Related Projects:

a. As I have mentioned before, part of the Embrace! lounge has come under my wing of responsibility. The visitor response portion of the interpretive area, or the 3D renderings of various architectural spaces of the Hamilton building, has been a source of concern/contention for a while in our bi-monthly meetings. By some twist of fate, I happened to be the one who was delegated to see this project through.

Without drawing this out too much, let’s just say that I met with the Coordinator of Family and School Programs to discuss the feasibility of creating 3D renderings of certain areas of the Hamilton building. I locked in a few commitments from her, and proceeded to call a Lounge team meeting to discuss my findings and articulate the next phase of our game plan. This week I should be able to start prototyping some of the die cuts that we have created; this will ensure that we have an intuitive gallery activity…More to come on this later!

b. As always, I have continued working on the artists’ files for Embrace! Zhong Biao’s file has been completed, and Charles Sandison’s should be finished by the end of this week. I also meet with the other intern helping me with these files. I briefed her on the process, and I have served as her resource for effectively and efficiently getting Hahn and Baker’s files done.

c. By far the most exciting thing that happened over the last 14 days here at the DAM has been giving a tour of the museum to a group of recent refugees and students from the Emily Griffith Opportunity School (See previous posts for more information on Rupprecht Matthies community project). Emilie (Matthies's installation team member) and I met to design a tour for these individuals, knowing that most of them have just arrived in the states, have probably never been to a museum, and have low to moderate English-speaking skills. We decided to take them to 3 areas of the museum: the Western Art gallery (to talk about art here in the West), a installation created from the process of community collaboration (what these individuals will be doing), and the area which Rupprecht Matthies will install his work.

The entire tour was a delight! I had individuals from all across Africa, as well as from Thailand and Iran. It certainly wasn’t the easiest tour to give; explaining harder concepts proved to be difficult. However, I did feel as though they were getting excited about the project. What really makes me smile is knowing that for many of these individuals I acted as their gateway into the world of museums. What more could I have asked for?!

Later in the week I delivered family passes to Emily Griffith so that the individuals that made it to the art museum could bring their families back for free! What a great way to build professional relationships.

d. Logan Lecture Transcripts: For two of the Embrace! artists, Katharina Grosse and Jessica Stockholder, the museum had copies of lectures that they have given the previous year at part of the Logan Lecture Series. My job was to transcribe portions of these lectures (1 ½ hrs. long each) that I thought would be interesting for the docents to be exposed to. In this way, docents can either read my transcript or watch the DVD at the points I have indicated in order to learn information they will inform how they present their works to the DAM’s audience.

e. I have scheduled time to learn how to use Apple’s GarageBand in order that I will be able to edit interview footage of Embrace! artists for our cell phone audio content.

f. Attended various meetings, including an all-staff meeting (with our new interim director), Embrace! lounge meetings, weekly meetings with Sonnet, curator meeting for Rupprecht’s installation, and a walk-through with the buildings and design staff on Rupprecht’s installation. So much gets done in an intangible form here at the museum.

We’ll that seems like it all for now…oh, and I’m staying here until November!!!

A List of Adventures

As luck would have it, the moment I recommitted myself to writing more frequently, the moment I came down with a crazy cold! I’ve been recovering for the last few days, and I should be back in full swing by the end of the week.

So what haven’t I been up to?! Let’s just make a list:

1) I completed the files for both Nicola López and Shinique Smith, I have begun to work on a file for Zhong Biao (in my “free time”), and I have briefed another intern over the entire process of creating these interpretive files. I have to admit that it was really nice to set up a meeting and actually be in charge of it!

2) Here and there I’ve been working on compiling some information about how to evaluate museum advocacy with adults between the ages of 18-35. This has proved to be a difficult endeavor, for there actually has not been a lot of research done on “museum advocacy.” However, there are many indicators of the development of museum advocacy, which have been what I’ve chosen to research. Hopefully, this will all come together! I’ve even tapped into the expertise of Elee to guide me a little on this investigation. I’m not too worried about the progress made here. It is an ongoing project, and it is one not completely related to the scope of my internship.

3) Last Wednesday I attended an AAM webinar called “Understanding the Life Stages of a Museum Visitor,” which I have responded to on my other blog: http://emily-lessonsinlearning.blogspot.com/ It seemed as if the stars aligned; they happened to spend quite a long period of time discussing the different characteristics of Museum Advocates vs. Core Visitors.

4) I delivered some reference materials to the Emily Griffith Opportunity School so that the teacher of the class we will be working with has some images/essays to share with her students. We are hoping that this will give them some sort of context for our project.

5) The administrative assistant for the Education department (Emilie), the other team member working on Rupprecht’s project, asked me to come with her to Emily Griffith’s Upholstery department to discuss possible ways in which we could produce the 250+ pillows Rupprecht wants for his installation. They proved to be extremely helpful, offering us free materials as well as extra (FREE!) help as the project moves into full force. I’m not extremely comfortable talking to complete strangers, but this internship is helping me develop that skill set. : )

6) The visitor response component of the Embrace! lounge has now come under my responsibility. Initially, we wanted visitors to be able to embrace their own section of the Hamilton building, using renderings of the spaces utilized by the artists as a springboard. We have now moved into looking at how our visitors can make 3D models of these architectural sites while also being able to create their own work within this space. My first task was to take pictures of the possible sites. From there, a team of staff members narrowed the 17 spaces down to 4. I’m now in charge of seeing how we can make this all happen! I’ve set up meetings with a couple individuals that have experience working with die cuts, etc., and now have enough information that I have scheduled my first meeting for today! It’s very exciting to have my own work on my own project to share with 3-4 staff members. Hooray for me!

7) I also facilitated one of the major public programs that the DAM offers for adult audiences called Untitled. Untitled takes a topic that develops out of the content of our permanent collection and/or special exhibitions, and offers more interactive experiences for visitors one Friday evening every month (6 month season). These events have proved to be quite successful, bringing in close to a thousand people. This past program centered on museum etiquette with a traditional Japanese tea ceremony taking place within the Asia Art collection (there were MAJOR issues between conservation and education staff concerning the moving of open containers of water in the gallery), dining etiquette lessons in the Western Art collection, a place to write a postcard for the Post Secret project, a theatre troupe performance based upon a painting in the permanent collection (Modern and Contemporary) and that night’s theme, and many other little activities. I assisted in running various components of the evening, as well as directing visitors, doing some evaluation, and having some fun!

8) I’m finishing up a Talking with Visitors paper that I will review with Sonnet next week and continue to develop from there.

9) I’m still researching here and there a couple of options for activities to be done at the next two Untitleds, including looking up a flash mob organizing group called Improv Everywhere.

10) Let’s see…I also wrote a letter to recruit volunteers to help us in fabricating those silly pillows! These pillows are such a pain!

11) Attended weekly meetings.

12) Some interesting tidbits: I will be giving a tour of the museum for a group of students from Emily Griffith next week. They will be documenting this, and I might end up in the catalogue for the show! Gosh, this internship is awesome.

So much is going on that it is hard to make sure I write everything down. Regardless of how scatter-brained/repetitive this blog is, I’m glad that I will have an opportunity to look back at all the work I did at the end of the summer! Hopefully, these notes will trigger some memories as time passes, and they will help me to synthesize all of the things I’ve done so that I can pump up my resume once again.

A Very Overdue Update

I know that it is cliché to say, but time sure does fly when you are having fun! This week is my fourth week interning at the DAM, and I am happy to report that I’ve been quite busy working on some very exciting projects. I’ve managed to now complete 4 artist files, the last one being Katharina Grosse from Germany. By the end of this week, I should have completed two more files (Nicola López and Shinique Smith), for a running total of 6 files. After a review of the work load, Sonnet decided to cut back on the number of files that needed to be completed—some artists are local, thus not needing much attention, and others are so well-known that the museum has had a lot of experience working with these individuals. In any case, I will be training another intern to complete the rest of the files.

I’ve also placed the “Talking with Visitors” papers on hold, given the fact that there are more urgent tasks that need to be taken care of as soon as possible. I’m really looking forward to these papers. It will be a great way to incorporate my knowledge of how visitors function in museums with my art history background. Last week, I even went on a Collection Highlights tour based upon these papers in order to get a sense of how the docents utilize the information educators have given to them. I found the tour to not be too far off from what I have generally experienced on art museum tours; however, I did notice the inclusion of quotes from artists, the informal atmosphere cultivated by the docent, and the focus on the visual. All of these things are imperative in creating visitor-centered dialogue with artifacts. Still, there is a lot of work to be done here.

Another exciting thing I have been dabbling with here and there is facilitating an interactive gallery experience within the current special exhibition The Psychedelic Experience: Rock Posters from the San Francisco Bay Area, 1965-71. When the situation arises where there is no one to work the Side Trip interpretive area of the exhibition, I head over to the main building and assist patrons with making posters that mimic those seen in the galleries. This Side Trip area is an immersive environment that brings you back to the late 60s with the white cube of the museum gallery transformed into a colorful, comfy space filled with components such as lounge areas to watch TV and read magazines from the 60s, to write your own thoughts/comments/first/confessions from this era on rolodexes, music listening stations, etc. This is probably one of the coolest museum experiences I have encountered. Nina Simon, blogger of Museum 2.0, came to the DAM and then proceeded to blog about her experience. Check it out on the link below!

http://museumtwo.blogspot.com/2009/03/take-side-trip-to-denver-art-museum.html

I’ve also been briefed concerning various public programs that the DAM offers. More specifically, I have currently been exposed to Untitled, a public program that occurs once a month over roughly a six month period that serves to transform the museum into a more user-friendly environment. The DAM is currently using an IMLS grant to support this project, and I have been asked to assist in completing some of the goals of the grant for its first year. As a result, I will be researching how to measure advocacy within museum patrons, for that is something that the DAM wants to see develop through Untitled. I’ve also been asked to work on specific programming for upcoming Untitled experiences. This includes finding outside parties to come and perform various “Demo and Dos” relating to the museum’s collection and the themes of death, collaborative creation, and multiplicity. Lastly, I ended last week by attending an Untitled meeting with the other interns regarding how to market the next topic of the program…the problem was communicating the importance of the collection within the theme of “Old School.”

Now on to the meat of my internship (or at least what I want to be the focus of my time), the installation by Rupprecht Matthies. Last week, Sonnet, Emilie (education department’s administrative assistant), and I went to visit the two community organizations that we will be working with to generate content for Rupprecht’s installation: Emily Griffith Opportunity School and African Community Center. We reintroduced the project to them, I delivered to them a packet of images and essays about Rupprecht that I compiled, and we set up dates for the workshops. Those will happen in late July when Rupprecht is in town for 3 weeks. These groups were chosen because they both serve recent refugees, and Rupprecht’s theme for the words he will generate is arrival. We talked to Rupprecht via phone (he was in Munich), and so far our ideas about the pillow creation are on the right track (mentioned earlier).

Other than that I have sat in on NUMEROUS meetings concerning the interpretive plans for Embrace! , and we have made some progress on the lounge…floor plans, etc. I’m missing so much, but that is my update for you!

Oh, and there is a possibility that I am going to stay until November to document the process of the artists’ installations, assist in interviewing them, meet them (obviously), edit audio content from the interviews for the cell phone audio guide, etc. SO Exciting!!! We shall see…

Weekly Update

Another week has passed, and I am now beginning my third week on the job here at the Denver Art Museum. To catch you up to speed on what I've been doing over the last few days in the office, I've primarily been working on and FINISHING (YAY!) 3 artist files: Tara Donovan, Jessica Stockholder, and Matthew Brannon. They are extremely labor intensive, but for me—as an art historian at heart—I love it! Despite my excitement over this research, I was beginning to fear that I would be working on these files the entire time I'm here at the DAM, thus limiting the possible wide range of experiences I had been hoping for. Thankfully, Sonnet and I have weekly meetings, and I brought up this very fact. She agreed with my concern…thank goodness. I will now (at the most) have 5 files to complete, giving the rest to another intern to be here in August.
My time now will be divided between these files and writing the “Talking with Visitor’s” papers I have mentioned before.

An Image from the Garden of the Gods

A Fun Saturday Museum-Going

Today Victoria (a fellow intern) and I decided to visit a couple of museums in the downtown area. We were planning on going to the Museum of Contemporary Art, but for various reasons postponed that adventure for another Saturday. Instead, we went to the Molly Brown House Museum and the Kirkland Museum of Fine and Decorative Art.








Images of the House on 1340 Pennsylvania

Did you know that Molly Brown is actually Margaret Brown? The writer of the musical The Unsinkable Molly Brown changed her name because he thought it was more lyrical. We had an amazing tour guide, whose theatrical personality and story-telling abilities made the tour come to life.

Below you will find images of the Kirkland Museum. Nestled in the studio of artist Kirkland, this museum is an aesthetic overload. Victoria and I discussed it's parallels to Cabinets of Curiosities, as well as it's use of visible storage. Not my favorite museum. Buck and Gilmore would have cried at the lack of an HVAC system, open doors leading to a patio, and paintings hung outdoors.




Kirkland's studio. Those straps were used to hold Kirkland as he was adding his famous overlay of dots to his canvases.

The Day Buck and Gilmore Died