Calling Maxwell Smart

Last month, I visited the Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto. I'd never been before, and was very pleased to find a fascinating place, filled with great shoes, of course, but also filled, throughout, with creative, inventive exhibition design in both permanent and temporary exhibits. So I thought I'd share some images here. Above, a shoe created by a student as part of a classroom project. All of these student shoes were beautifully displayed in vitrines, making me think that the students were thrilled and perhaps felt a lasting connection to the museum.











Entrance to permanent exhibition






Permanent exhibition: loved the use of color and pattern here and the way that the shoes were mounted low and a playful, curving band of images and patterns encircled them.

Below, images from a temporary exhibit on Roccoco shoes. As you can see, it's a plain black box of a room, transformed by interior walls, rococco style and chandeliers. The attention to detail even extends to the padding that the shoes sit on in the cases and the number"buttons."





Below: An exhibit on First People's (Native American) shoes from across Canada, divided by region. The large backdrops showing details from the footwear are printed in segmented banners. It took me a little bit to discover that the boxes pulled open, but once they did, they did a nice job providing additional information. What I didn't like here? The fairly extensive use of the passive voice in label writing. A stitch isn't laid down, someone does the stitching.



Below: a sort of open storage exhibition, showing off more highlights from their collection. Right outside this room was a large window into a lab where you could see conservators at work. What did I like here? The design was very simple but engaging, and where else could you see Napoleon's socks?



And finally, another student shoe--flip flop gone wild!

Personal Meaning Making

I'm often in meetings talking about that visitors bring their own perspectives to museums, and that we can no longer think of the visitor as an empty vessel, in which to pour all our arcane knowledge. In one such meeting this week, we got in a conversation about historic sites that might move a visitor to tears...after discussing sites such as Stepping Stones, which was the home of Bill and Lois Wilson, founders of AA and Al-Anon, and other powerful sites, one of the meeting participants said, "I cried when I saw Pee Wee Reese's plaque at the Baseball Hall of Fame." To her, he was a memorable part of her childhood. So, that's Brooklyn Dodger Reese above, a reminder of how you never know what will reach people.

Personal Commemorations

I've been thinking lately about the ways in which we choose to commemorate individuals--not necessarily famous ones, but just those who connect with others, but may not be famous or well-known. In the last few weeks, my own small community has seen the accidental--and unconnected deaths of three young people. Intriguingly, the way that high school and college students choose to commemorate those lives is a facebook site dedicated to the person. People "friend" the site, post pictures and videos, and write messages directly to the deceased. In a way, it's a collective "curation" of a life by friends. It made me wonder about what happens to those sites over time? Do they continue to exist in cyberspace?

In Toronto, I saw two other commemorations--both very different. At the entrance to the Bay, Toronto's big department store, is this window.

Long ago, this particular store must have been Simpson's, rather than the Hudson Bay Company--my somewhat fuzzy picture doesn't quite show it, but it's commemorating Simpson's employees killed during World War II. But I wondered about this window...is it always up? does anyone ever look at it? and who were all these people? what were their lives like before the war? what happened to them? How do their families remember them--and do they even know this was there? I was touched by whatever corporate entity still maintained this display.

We also visited Gallery 44, which had an installation by Ivan Jurakic. My photos don't quite express it, but he created, in an outline of electric bulbs, an outline of a Nazi plane shot down by Resistance fighters--including his father--during World War II. It's not about the plane, really, but seemed to me to be about commemorating that part of his father's life.















All of these made me think about how museums commemorate people. Well, we're happy to do plaques for people who give us money (or in the case, below, have big pictures of donors in your museum) but perhaps we could spend more time finding those individual stories, and telling them in compelling ways to connect them with larger themes and meanings. And, don't take those objects without compelling stories attached just because you don't know how to say no.














From top to bottom:
Installation by Ivan Jurkavic at Gallery 44, Toronto
Entry window, The Bay, Toronto
Photo in installation by Ivan Jurkavic
A bored museum visitor ignores images of donors at the Royal Ontario Museum's new wing

Look at Me, Me, Me!

Just back from a trip to Toronto, that included a visit to the Royal Ontario Museum, with the new Michael Lee-Chin crystal, designed by Daniel Libeskind. It's been a very long time since I've been so disappointed in a museum. I've always loved visiting the ROM and felt that they had all sorts of interesting ways to connect with visitors. But now, they seem to have lost that connection in their new addition. What do I mean? To start with, although the crystal is certainly eye-catching, as you approach it, it seems unfriendly and sort of threatening, as it hangs over you.














You then come into a sterile long white hallway, already looking sort of dingy. I noticed visitors looking lost and confused. Upstairs, the crystal shape produces very odd galleries, and I have to imagine that curators and designers will soon grow tired of how the space is restricted by the angles and the highly slanted walls, moving everything to the center, and providing much less floor space than one thinks. I was a bit unmoved by the "Spirit House" at the center of the crystal, which, the ROM's website says, "creates a personal Museum experience for each visitor."

But then, strangely, all the imagination disappears. A brand new exhibit on dinosaurs was crowded with visitors, but I found it hard to follow, and not exceptional in design. An exhibit whose name I can't remember (nor can I find on the website) about Canadian decorative arts could have been installed anytime in the last seventy-five years. Big line-ups of furniture and silver just aren't for me.

Okay, did I like anything? The stairway of wonder, although I suspect rarely used by visitors, highlighted collections items in beautiful ways. A nice, not fabulous hands-on exhibit area was being enthusiastically used by families. And finally, as it started to get dark outside, it was great to walk by and see those big dinosaurs through the windows of the crystal.

Who's the me, me, me in the title to this post? Seems like it might be the architect, and not the museum.

Aspects of Comfort

Nina Simon, at Museum 2.0 has been writing about aspects of comfort in museums. She describes a program she attended, saying, “It was the kind of experience I wish I had at lots of museum programs—the staff and the content pulled me out of my comfort zone, engaged me in something unusual, and made me feel great. 

 How can educational programs at museums push the boundaries of comfort to support these special experiences?”

She then, provides readers with some suggestions. I thought I’d try to apply those suggestions to projects I’ve worked on, attended, or heard about—both good and bad.

“By sending people on missions.”
The mission might be simple—a new tour at the Van Alen Site of the Columbia County Historical Society takes visitors (and five fascinating characters) on a day in June, 1754. There’s no real mission to solve, but the journey is what matters here. And, most historic house tours—the least mission-like of anything—perhaps a forced march is the better description. The this is a that and that is a this tour is guaranteed to make anyone want to bail out of a mission!

“By giving people roles.”
An easy one for historic sites. Sites are about people and have stories embedded in them. Again at Van Alen, on a school tour, students are asked to take on one of five characters who intersect in time and place. It’s amazing to watch a fourth grader, playing an 70 year old Dutch farmer in 18th century America, reflect back on his life. He said, looking out the window, “It’s been good and bad. Good, I built this house and have a family; bad, I’m getting older and can’t see what’s happening outside.” This role playing wasn’t complicated: no computers, no fancy costumes, no audio installations, just a strong desire to connect the past with young visitors. I think museums have a critical role to play in developing empathy among our visitors, a quality sometimes all too lacking in our culture.

And by the way, we might look to various performing arts groups to better understand how meaningful this can be. Several years ago, the high point of my teenage daughter's trip to London--for her and her friends--was a performance at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre. Why? Not because she'd read it in school, or saw a movie--it was because Anna and Sophie had, for several summers, performed in an annual summer Shakespeare workshop for young people. Thanks, West Kortright Centre for making Shakespeare live for so many young people in our part of the Catskills!

“By making it a social experience.”
I think about this in terms of my work at the Upstate History Alliance where I developed professional training activities for museum staff. Particularly memorable were several sessions of the Museum Institute at Sagamore, an intensive four day retreat. Museum professionals sometimes forget that our work should be fun. At Sagamore, one year, Bill Adair of the Rosenbach Museum and Library challenged participants to create a theatrical performance based on items in the Rosenbach’s collections. It was an amazing group of materials—Marianne Moore poems and Joseph Cornell boxes, a list of slaves written by Thomas Jefferson, and more.

As Nina writes, “ There is strength in numbers.” So all of us, including presenters and participants, armed with tape, paper, markers, and our own energy, stood up on a small stage and shared our perspectives. From a talk show that used narratives of whites captured by Native Americans, to a powerful visualization of the slave list, the efforts were amazing—and they were that way, in part, because we made it fun. (And by the way, although I haven't attended any, all of the Rosenbach's programming sounds like fun--check out their annual Dracula parade).

“By training staff and lecturers as listeners.”
Again, back to historic house tours. At one site that will remain nameless, the staff assured me that their evaluations showed that their visitors loved the very long tour. Except one, they said. What did that one evaluation say? It said, “Please God, make him stop!” Not a listener. I often work with small museum boards and start by asking each of them to describe a memorable museum experience. Nine times out of ten, it’s not about the object, or the house, it’s about the person they interacted with. “So interesting,” they say, but what they really mean, I think, is “so interested in me” and able to connect a visitor’s interests with the story of the place.

"By couching the experience within a comfortable environment. "
Nina Simon has written about several science museums that now provide engaging science programs on a regular basis in bars. Why not? Why do we have to sit on uncomfortable folding chairs in a room that’s too cold or too hot? Why are programs scheduled at times that are, in these busy times, challenging to make? I remember hearing about the Historical Society of Saratoga Springs several years ago—they found that although Saratoga has a huge influx of people in the summer, they weren’t getting attendance at their local history programs. However, the race track—the draw in Saratoga—doesn’t open until afternoon. The historical society changed their program time to the morning—and attracted people who were looking for something to do before going to the races. Comfort isn’t just a chair, it’s place and time, and of course, it’s how welcoming we are to our visitors. How often have you been to a small museum where your appearance feels like a burden? Where they seem surprised to see you? And then, of course, if you happen to arrive within an hour of closing time, the front desk person is grumpy. Be nice!

Top: Puck, in a 1980s version of a Midsummer Night's Dream at the West Kortright Centre, 2007.
Above: Interior of the Luykas VanAlen House, Courtesy of the Columbia County Historical Society.

Year End Review

So it's almost the end of this year, and the end of a year's worth of sporadic blogging and time for some random museum thoughts, based on experiences during the past year:

Best combination of place and art: visiting Arles and then the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. Amazing both individually and even more so collectively.

Most entertaining and challenging teamwork: working with a talented team of staff and consultants at the Berkshire Museum on a new exhibition about innovation in the Berkshires. Very thoughtful work and a team that all respected the work of others. Biggest luxury in a work setting: getting to be a team member with opinions on this project, not a project manager.

Best volunteer organization: The Sayre Historical Society, who after long years of work, opened a part of their new museum to the public on December 16. As a board, their commitment to professionalism in building restoration, collections care and exhibit development was exemplary, and as well, they represent one of the friendliest, most enthusiastic communities where Riverhill has worked.

Blogs I'm currently reading on a regular basis and always find interesting: Museum 2.0 is written by Nina Simon and is about the ways in which "the philosophies of Web 2.0 can be applied in museums to make them more engaging, community-based vital elements of society." Thoughtful, funny reading and a great sweep of posts on influences from other places.

and CultureGrrl by arts journalist Lee Rosenbaum, who's passionate and outspoken about many issues relating to the arts and museums. She writes about art museums, somewhat out of my sphere, but it's always enlightening, and her continued push about deaccessioning in museums should be reading for all of us.

Museum I'll remember a long time--the Jewish Historical Museum of the Netherlands. Museum that was sort of forgettable: the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, despite a topic that is one that we all should be considering these days.

Topics I want to think more about in 2008: how to take interactives to a next step in terms of development and how to meet the challenge of interpretive difficult community issues in both historic houses and museums.

Exhibits or museums I wish I'd seen this year:
The Eldredge Street Synagogue, Mythic Creatures at the American Museum of Natural History, the Kara Walker retrospective at the Whitney Museum (highly recommended by a colleague), and far too many more to list!














Above from top:
Set design by Peggy Clark for a production of Philip Barry's holiday. The main character, Linda Seton, is in a playroom, awaiting the start of a New Year's Eve Party
Music Division, Library of Congress
The Sayre Historical Society's board of directors
A young museum goer and her mother at the Sayre Historical Society Museum
(last two photographs courtesy Ken Bracken)

Prototyping

Prototyping--it sounds very serious like we might work at General Motors and we're prototyping some big gas-guzzling, laden with fins, new car. But...this year I've worked on three projects where I've prototyped interactive stations for exhibitions. And in every one, I've been stunned at how revealing and helpful the process has been.

Why prototype?

It helps identify those great ideas that are perhaps only great to exhibit developers. I loved the idea of boondoggle for an interactive on summer camp (that's the upstate New York term for making lanyards out of that plastic stuff). In testing, we discovered that directions are amazingly to hard to write for this. Without a sample, all were lost. The solution: one set of strands attached to a hook to try and take-home packets with instructions. The unexpected consequence: despite its difficulty, it brought forth wonderful memories from parents.

It helps refine language to make it accessible for many. In testing an I Spy sort of interactive about the AC transformer we found that few people knew or understood what an AC transformer was (me too, really), but even more surprising, that the idea of unintended outcomes was a little fuzzy as well. A rewritten and re-tested label (below)meant that it became more understandable--and more fun--for visitors.















It saves museums from expensive design and fabrication costs for things that don't quite work. For instance, in a prototype activity about matching dolls from around the world with a map, the name of the country with the doll was in upper and lower case; the name of the country on the map was in all upper case letters. In prototyping, we discovered that early readers were having a really tough time puzzling out the country names because of the type itself--a very easy fix.

You learn how to extend the experience from the visitors themselves. For a pretend picnic interactive, we noticed that, in the prototyping, young visitors not only packed their picnic basket, but then took it over to a corner in the room and sat and had a picnic--our revised label copy encouraged others to do the same.













And, I think, most importantly, it strengthens the connection between a museum and its visitors. Participants inevitably are pleased to be asked to participate, and as one parent wrote, "Thanks for the opportunity. We can't wait to try the real thing!"

Photos: Top and center, from prototyping at the Berkshire Museum for the new Feigenbaum Hall of Innovation, December, 2007. Bottom: Interactive label for Summer in the Finger Lakes exhibitions, June, 2007.