If you think museums as soup kitchens sounds weird, try thinking of them as community hubs. Museums consultant, Elaine Heumann Gurian, has no trouble with visualising either, in fact it was she who developed these concepts. Elaine visited the Powerhouse Museum last week to discuss the changing face of museums with staff.
Elaine challenges the idea of Museums being institutions of passive education and exhibitions. She urges museums to interact with their audiences, by inviting community participation and collaboration in what is displayed. This is already happening online through social media such as Flickr, Twitter and Facebook, but Elaine suggests that participation go a step further – a face to face engagement with visitors while they are in the museum.
Here, Elaine writes about her ideal, the Blue Ocean Museum, an imaginary place of the near future.
http://www.informallearning.com/archive/Gurian%2090%20article%202.pdf
Yesterday afternoon, during a particularly heavy fall of rain, it was all hands to the pump in the library, when one of our users rushed from the shelves to say there was water streaming down a wall and on to our folio collection.
While one of us phoned for plastic sheeting, I raced with bucket and cloths down to the area where two people were grabbing books from the affected shelves and stacking them on the floor out of harm’s way. By the time the plastic sheeting arrived, the shelves affected by the leaks were cleared and we draped plastic sheeting over the surrounding shelves to cover the contents from splashes. I was then able to turn my attention to the books on the floor, mopping them and standing them to air.
While all this was going on a Museum staff member on a ladder, investigated the leak from outside the building, and the cause of the problem was revealed. A plastic DVD case, hurled from the next door appartment building, had landed in the gutter and blocked the downpipe. While many objects thrown from the appartments are found on the roof (why??), this was the first time that one had lodged in such an awkward place. Anyway, as soon as it was removed, the leaking stopped.
Well, the books are now dry and safe, Today’s job is to put them back in order and on the shelves!
Today’s library visitor came to research the heritage farming machinery and techniques of Savernake Station, a sheep farm near Corowa in New South Wales. We set her up with the 1992 video about Savernake Station, Heritage farming in Australia.
The use of original 16mm footage, shot in the 1930s, accompanied by a short selection of still photographs, show the activities of the farming year, from ploughing and sowing to harvesting. What’s interesting, is that they feature both modern and traditional methods: horses and tractor are side by side. These images capture the transition of framing methods from horse-powered farming and early mechanical inventions to the forerunners of today’s modern equipment and largescale farming practices.
Our researcher was delighted to find out that 1935 was a vintage year for farming in NSW. The sun shone at the right time, just enough rain fell when it was needed. The resulting harvest at Savernake Station that year was a record – the film shows the construction of a 180 ton thatched haystack.
You can visit Savernake today, check out their eco tours and farmstays.
I’ve heard of horse whisperers, dog and cat whisperers, but until last week I’d never heard of a Muse Whisperer. Enlightenment came in the form of an email query from Felicia Rose Adler, Muse Whisperer . Felicia has a kalaga which she believes belongs to a special person, and is on a mission to find this person. As Felicia says, life is a tango – let’s dance! By the way, if you’re interested in rugs, have a look at the tea and carpets blogspot.
This week has been busy – and it’s only Wednesday. Tuesday saw a visit from two Enmore Design School jewellery students, Kate Davey and Minh Tran. Both are in their last year and are researching a major topic for final assessment. Kate’s is openwork jewellery with an emphasis on the Byzantine-Etruscan era; Minh is researching two contemporary Australian metalsmiths, Joung-Mee Do and Helen Aitken-Kuhnen.
Kate and Minh intend working with precious metals in their chosen careers.
And on Tuesday afternoon, Carole Gilchrist from Adelaide University came in to research the architectural history of the present Powerhouse Museum. Carole is completing her Masters degree in Curatorial and Museum Studies at Adelaide University and for this final research project is focusing on museum architecture and its influence on the way objects are displayed. Her two case study museums are the Powerhouse Museum and the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris.
Astrotagging and citizen scientists
Recently I attended a session delivered by Fiona Romeo who talked about astrotagging.
The online robot is able to locate and identify heavenly bodies but it can’t cover the whole sky. Cue: casual astronomers aka the general public. Some of the astronomy photos presented are yet to be identified so viewer comments and suggestions are useful. Viewers also contribute their own photos to the online astro-community for comment and identification. Thanks to the input of these ‘citizen scientists’, hitherto unknown cosmic objects have been discovered and verified.
For more information about Fiona’s activities, you can follow her blog http://foe.typepad.com/about.html
Curator Dr Paul Donnelly is writing an article for The Asian Arts Society of Australia (TAASA) about Iznik tiles, using one (A9636-6) from the Museum’s collection as a focus. This tile dates from about 1560 AD, the time of Suleman the Magnificent, and Paul has been consulting a range of publications about Ottoman architecture and artefacts in order to narrow down a range of buildings from which this tile may have come.
Iznik earthenware tiles, produced in 16th and 17th century Turkey were painted with stylized and symmetrical designs of flowers, leaves and fruits. Colours were blue, white, turquoise, shades of green and purple. But their most distinctive feature was the use of a deep orange-red colour (sometimes know as ‘sealing wax’ red). These beautiful tiles tiles adorned walls of public buildings including mausoleums and mosques.
During his research Paul has identified a pattern that matches the Museum’s tile. He has also made a discovery – in comparing the patterns, it’s clear that the Museum’s tile has been cut on two sides of one corner, which suggests that either it was cut to fit an architectural scheme, or was damaged on removal and the broken edges tidied up. Thanks to an interlibrary loan, we know for the first time that the tile was cut, and can see from the illustration how the original tile would have appeared when complete.
Emily Schultz, who is the costume designer for Primal Films came to research rural costume worn in Victoria in the 1880s, as well as traditional attire worn by indigenous people of the area. The company is producing Primal, a film written and directed by Josh Reed. The film crew has worked on many films including Moulin Rouge, Narnia, Australia, Black Water and Gettin’ Square. Emily describes Primal as an ‘uncompromising indie thriller’.
A recent visitor was Regional Services intern Michelle Maddison, who is costume curator at the Museum of the Riverina. Michelle was researching Australian rural costume from 1900 to 1930. She was thrilled to see the Library’s store ctalogues of the period, Australian Woman’s Mirror (1924-1957), and The Draper of Australasia (1912 -1963)
Penelope Lau, Research and Project Officer at the State Library of Queensland (SLQ), visited to examine the Research Library’s holdings of design books and journals, the depth of which impressed Penelope greatly. The State Library of Queensland is undertaking planning to strengthen its design collection, and Penelope’s survey of the Research Library, and similar design libraries, forms part of the SLQ’s strategy to acquire design resources which complement those already held in the Distributed National Collection.
Last Tuesday, Research Library manager, Karen Johnson attended an entertaining talk at the Powerhouse given by Shelley Bernstein, Chief of Technology at the Brooklyn Museum .
Shelley spoke about BM’s commitment to engaging online with the local Brooklyn community. The aim is to encourage public participation in the museum’s online and physical presence via social platforms such as blogging, FaceBook, YouTube, Flickr and Twitter. This sort of community ‘conversation’ with museums is relatively new and not without challenges. One word comments from online participants such as ‘awesome’, ‘cool’ ‘wow’ are regarded as closed remarks and lacking purpose, whereas constructive comments are open and invite further dialogue between participants.
Shelley said that in spite of the difficulties, the hugely positive outcomes for the Museum have been worth it. According to Karen, the talk offered practical ideas for integrating an online presence with museum business in a way that benefits both the museum and its community.
Shelley was in Australia courtesy of the Australian Museum and the Transformation in Cultural and Scientific Communications Conference held in Melbourne 5-6 March 2009.
Another week and two more visits from Fiona Alldis, a UTS fashion student who is doing a Bachelor of Design in Fashion & Textiles/Bachelor of International Studies, a 6 year course that includes a foreign language component with a placement at a fashion centre in Italy or France. Now in her third year, Fiona is focusing on the application of couture techniques – working with flat patterns on fabric for everyday fashion design, as well as doing the draping/shaping of fabric directly on to a mannequin that is part of haute couture. This semester, she has to create a haute couture bodice in the style of a given designer, in Fiona’s case, Elsa Schiaparelli . For comparison, she is studying the works of French designers of the period such as Coco Chanel, Madeleine Vionnet, Jeanne Lanvin.
Luckily, as Fiona says, she is passionate about the creative process of haute couture. She has promised to bring in some of her millinery inventions. Watch this space…
