The Digital Museum: Transforming the Future Now

AAM and the AAM Media and Technology Committee gratefully acknowledge the time, talent, expertise and commitment of our webinar presenters and moderators. Without their contributions, this program would not be possible. Thank you!

	Allegra Burnette, Creative Director, Digital Media, The Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) Allegra Burnette is the creative director of Digital Media at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, overseeing design and production for the museum’s website, MoMA.org, as well as interpretive kiosks and digital displays. Projects on MoMA.org have included the site redesign; the online collection and e-cards; audience-specific sites such as Modern Teachers, Red Studio and Destination: Modern Art; podcasts; and MoMA’s ongoing series of exhibition subsites, including Tall Buildings, Eye on Europe and Contemporary Voices. Prior to working at MoMA, Allegra was responsible for creating and running a media department at the world-renowned museum exhibition planning and design firm Ralph Appelbaum Associates. Allegra has an MFA in museum exhibition planning and design from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, where she has also taught graduate courses in museum media, and a BA from Dartmouth College with a major in art history.
	Susan Chun, Cultural Heritage Consultant Susan Chun consults with cultural heritage organizations on information management and intellectual property strategy and policy. Her clients include museums, libraries, universities, academic consortia and funders. She is a founder of the steve project, which is investigating the value of social tagging to improve access to museum collections. Until 2007 Susan was general manager for collections information planning at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, where she was responsible for institutional strategy and for developing and managing projects involving intellectual property, asset management and archiving, digital imaging and licensing, publishing and standards. Prior to that, Susan was involved in all aspects of the Met’s scholarly and exhibition publishing program in the museum’s editorial department. She writes and lectures regularly on copyright, publishing, open content initiatives and social software.
	Herminia Weihsin Din, Faculty Member, University of Alaska Anchorage Herminia Din is a faculty member at the University of Alaska Anchorage. Prior to this position, she was the Web producer at the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis and education technologist at the Indianapolis Museum of Art. In the past few years, she has worked with the University of Alaska Museum of the North in Fairbanks on the LearnAlaska project—an educational tool to sort, display and share digital museum objects and historical archive images selected from the Alaska Digital Archives. In 2005 she facilitated a docent-training program using Internet2 videoconferencing for a traveling exhibit in Alaska, “Light Motifs: American Impressionist Paintings from the Metropolitan Museum of Art.” She is on the board of the Media and Technology committee of AAM. She was the MUSE Awards chair for two years and currently serves as the program chair. She holds a doctorate in art education from Ohio State University. Most recently, she co-edited the book “The Digital Museum: A Think Guide” published by the American Association of Museums.
	Robin Dowden, Director, New Media Initiatives, Walker Art Center Robin Dowden is the director of new media initiatives at the Walker Art Center of Art, Minneapolis. She develops interactive and emerging technologies for the center, including multimedia computer applications (Dialog table), telephony-based audio-information resources (Art on Call), the Walker’s website and projects to create digital resources. Robin directs Internet-based special projects including ArtsConnectEd, a joint initiative of the Walker and the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, and mnartists.org, an online resource for Minnesota artists developed by the Walker and the McKnight Foundation. Prior to joining the Walker, Robin was the collections systems and website manager at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
	Susan E. Edwards, Writer/Editor, Web Group, J. Paul Getty Trust Susan Edwards has developed online educational resources for the education department of the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles for more than five years. She works closely with museum educators to write and edit online curricula and lessons, create online tools for teachers and develop online games in GettyGames (www.getty.edu). Susan was instrumental in creating a virtual Getty Museum on Whyville, an educational online world for kids (www.whyville.net), which included development of two games—an art treasure hunt and a multiplayer card game called ArtSets. She began developing online educational interactive experiences at the Seattle Art Museum in 2000, where as a curatorial research assistant she worked closely with the education department to build My Art Gallery (www.seattleartmuseum.org/myartgallery), which teaches kids the steps of creating an exhibition. Susan has MA and MPhil degrees in art history from the University of Michigan.
	Phyllis Hecht, Associate Program Chair, Museum Studies, Advanced Academic Programs, Johns Hopkins University; co-editor, The Digital Museum: A Think Guide Phyllis Hecht is associate chair of the museum studies graduate program at Johns Hopkins University. She is also a media consultant for museums and nonprofits, specializing in strategic planning, project management, art direction and evaluation for multimedia projects. Previously, Phyllis was manager and art director of the website of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., and has more than 25 years of museum publishing experience in print and new media. She has spoken and written on topics ranging from developing the Web skills of K–12 teachers to using new methodologies for evaluating websites. She was on the board of the Media and Technology Committee of AAM from 2002–2007, serving as the MUSE Awards chair for three years. Phyllis holds a master’s degree in museum education from George Washington University and undergraduate degrees in journalism and art history from the University of Maryland.
	Nik Honeysett, Head of Administration, J. Paul Getty Museum Nik Honeysett is head of administration for the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. Prior to his current role, he managed the Getty’s Web Group, and was responsible for all aspects of its website and intranets. Before joining the Getty in 2000, Nik was the head of production at Cognitive Applications, Ltd., a United Kingdom consultancy firm working exclusively with museums and galleries in Europe and the U.S. Nik currently chairs AAM’s Media and Technology Standing Professional Committee and sits on a number of other AAM committees, including the Standing Professional Committee Council and the National Program Committee for AAM 2008. He holds a bachelor’s degree in physics and a master’s degree in microprocessors.
	Deborah Seid Howes, Museum Educator in Charge of Educational Media, Metropolitan Museum of Art Deborah Seid Howes is the museum educator in charge of educational media at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Her staff supports all of the museum’s audiovisual services and educational publishing efforts, including the Timeline of Art History and Explore and Learn on the museum's website (www.metmuseum.org), videos, interactive kiosks and a wide-range of print materials including the award-winning teacher resource series about the museum’s collection. Deborah currently supervises the technical planning and execution of the Met’s new education center and library, scheduled to open in Fall 2007. Prior to coming to the Met 11 years ago, she was an educational technology consultant and taught interactive multimedia at the Austin Children's Museum. From 1986 through 1992 she was a lecturer for modern and contemporary art at the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC) and co-produced With Open Eyes, an interactive videodisc and later CD-ROM designed for young children to explore the AIC collection.
	Michael Jenkins, General Manager, Collections Information Planning, Metropolitan Museum of Art Michael Jenkins is general manager for collections information planning at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. In this role, he advises the Office of the Director on policy and projects that make information about the museum’s encyclopedic collection available through digital networks. Prior to his current position, Michael managed a comprehensive initiative to preserve and protect the Met’s archive of digital images through a secure centralized repository for the storage, management and distribution of images. He has spoken and written about topics including digital asset management in the museum space and improving access to collections online. Michael serves on the RLG Programs Collections Sharing Working Group, CDWA Lite Advisory Board, and is a member of the steering committee of steve, an open source project investigating the usefulness of social tagging in the museum space.
	Victoria Lichtendorf, Museum Education Consultant Victoria Lichtendorf is an associate educator at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, overseeing distance-learning programs and the museum’s teen website, Red Studio. She develops programs for diverse audiences at the museum, online and via videoconference, and has created teaching materials such as MoMA in a Box, a teaching kit for distance learning. She conceived and oversaw the production of Seen Art?, a children’s book by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith (MoMA/Viking Press Books, 2004), and authored educators’ guides, Modern Art and Ideas IV: Suprematism, Contsructivism, De Stijl, and the Bauhaus and Picturing People: Photography in MoMA’s Collection. A member of the Technology Practice and Policy Council, an advisory to University of the State of New York Board of Regents, Albany, N.Y., Victoria has presented at conferences including those of the American Association of Museums, National Art Educators Association and the National Educational Computing Conference. Prior to coming to MoMA in 1999, Victoria attended Bowdoin College Museum of Art through a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
	Matthew MacArthur, Director, New Media Programs, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution Matthew MacArthur is director of the new media program at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History (NMAH), Washington, D.C. At the Smithsonian, he has worked on a variety of initiatives that employ technology to teach history and material culture, including CD-ROMs, websites and handheld applications. A number of these groundbreaking projects, including Revealing Things and HistoryWired, have experimented with innovative interface techniques. During his tenure, NMAH sites have won recognition from such organizations and publications as the American Association of Museums, New York Festivals, HOW, Communication Arts and I.D. magazines. He holds a BA in American studies from the University of Oregon and an MA in history from Claremont Graduate School, where he focused on history and new media.
	Michael Mouw, Multimedia Director, Minnesota Historical Society Michael Mouw works as a creative and technical director, collaborating with the Minnesota Historical Society’s exhibitions teams to develop multimedia for a statewide network of museums and historic sites. Much of this work is documentary-based, drawn from stories told by diverse communities. These documentaries are often delivered through immersive multimedia experiences, such as the “Flour Tower” elevator ride at the Mill City Museum, and the tornado-themed object theater “Get to the Basement!” at the Minnesota History Center. Michael is a graduate of the affiliated fine arts degree program between Tufts University and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
	Peter Samis, Associate Curator, Interpretation, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) Peter Samis is associate curator of interpretation at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA). Together with his team, he produces innovative content for the museum’s galleries, website, podcasts, and Koret Visitor Education Center. He served as art historian/content expert for the first CD-ROM on modern art, and then spearheaded development of multimedia programs for SFMOMA’s new building in 1995. Since then, SFMOMA’s Interactive Educational Technologies (IET) programs have received numerous awards from sources as diverse as the American Association of Museums, Museums and the Web, the Webbys, the National Educational Media Network, and I.D. magazine. Peter serves as adjunct professor in the graduate program for Technology-Enhanced Communication for Cultural Heritage at Switzerland’s University of Lugano, and sits on the advisory councils for IMLS-funded open source initiatives Pachyderm 2.0 (www.pachyderm.org) and steve (www.steve.museum). He holds a BA in religion from Columbia College in New York, and an MA in the history of art from the University of California, Berkeley.
	Scott Sayre, Principal, Museum411/Sandbox Studios With more than 15 years experience in guiding museums to select, develop and apply educational and business technologies, Scott Sayre is the co-founder and a principal of Sandbox Studios. In 2005 Sandbox Studios formed Museum 411, a new division focusing on the design, production and hosting of mobile phone–based museum information systems. From 2002–2003 Scott served as the Art Museum Image Consortium’s (AMICO) director of member services and U.S. operations. From 1991–2002 he was the director of media and technology at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, where he led the museum’s Interactive Media Group in the development of ArtsConnectEd.org (1997), the institute’s website artsMIA.org (1993) and 16 interactive multimedia programs installed throughout the museum’s galleries. Scott has also served as the chair of the American Association of Museums’ Media and Technology professional committee. Prior to his work with museums, Scott was an Applications Specialist at the University of Minnesota's Telecommunications Development Center. He has a PhD in education from the University of Minnesota, as well as an MEd in training and a BA in visual communications technology.
	David T. Schaller, Pricipal, EduWeb Dave Schaller has been a media developer since first picking up a Super-8 camera in the third grade. Two decades later he founded eduweb, a developer of digital learning games and interactives, where he is responsible for the company’s perpetual quest for the spot where learning theory, digital media, and fun meet. As principal of eduweb, he has led the development of award-winning media projects for museums and educational organizations around the country. He is currently working on several 3-D learning games including WolfQuest, funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). He recently completed an NSF-funded research study examining learning styles and digital interactives. Dave has nearly 20 years of experience in natural history and social science interpretation, working in print, exhibit and digital media. He holds a BA in humanities and an MA in geography and museum studies.
	Angela T. Spinazze, Principal, ATSPIN Consulting Angela Spinazze founded ATSPIN consulting in 1997, and has worked with institutions worldwide on integrating technologies into the museum ecology to improve access to collections information for both staff and public audiences. She began her career in the development office at the Art Institute of Chicago, where she joined a multidisciplinary team to inventory and design a database for the museum’s collections. Angela managed the conversion of the index card file (representing approximately 150,000 works of art) into electronic form and helped develop the application architecture and user interface. Angela also served as director of marketing for a leading collections management system developer, where she managed all marketing and sales activities worldwide. Angela received a bachelor’s degree from Miami University in 1986 and a master’s degree in art history, theory and criticism from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1992.
	Daniel Spock, Director, History Center Museum, Minnesota Historical Society Daniel Spock has spent 24 years in the museum field, starting as a planetarium guide. Over the course of his career he has worked as an exhibition designer and developer, including 13 years at the Boston Children’s Museum, before moving into the realm of administration and program leadership at the Minnesota Historical Society, where he is now the director of the History Center Museum. Daniel is an ardent proponent of visitor-centered, experiential interpretive approaches that value visitors as active learners. He has consulted and lectured at a variety of museum and learning institutions. Daniel has a BA in art from Antioch College.
	Robert Stein, Chief Information Officer, Director of MIS, IMA It's My Art, Indianapolis Museum of Art Robert Stein is the chief information officer and director of museum information systems at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, where he has developed public uses of technology in the museum and online as a way of informing and engaging visitors with art. A long-time proponent of unique interface technology, Robert joined the museum in 2006 after spending several years as the assistant director of the Visualization and Interactive Spaces Lab, one of the Pervasive Technology Labs at Indiana University. His research there involved the integration of scientific visualization practices with novel interface technologies to share information from a variety of domains. Prior to joining Indiana University, Robert served as a senior visualization specialist at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois. There, he developed custom visualization software for domain specialists. Currently he serves as technical lead and project manager on the open source project, steve, which supports social tagging for art museums.
	Leonard Steinbach, Principal, Cultural Technology Strategies Leonard Steinbach is technology strategist for the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore and principal of Cultural Technology Strategies, which provides technology consultation services to a broad range of cultural institutions. Previously he was chief information officer at the Cleveland Museum of Art, where he was responsible for developing and implementing information technology initiatives. These activities garnered two American Association of Museum Media and Technology Committee MUSE Awards for the museum, among other national recognition. He has been president of the Museum Computer Network and chaired its national conference and served on advisory boards for the New Media Consortium’s Horizon Report on Technology and Higher Education, Internet2’s K20 Initiative, various museums and other cultural and civic institutions. Leonard was the former chief technology officer for the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. He has spent more than 20 years in technology management in higher education, research and the arts and is an outspoken advocate for professional, creative and cost-effective IT management in the museum and cultural communities.
	Larry Swiader, Chief Information Officer, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Lawrence Swiader joined the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 1998 and established an award-winning museum website that receives millions of visitors every year from more than 100 countries daily. As chief information officer, he oversees programs ranging from business process and customer relationship management, e-government and collections digitization, to the creation of the museum’s websites, televised programs and podcasts. He participates in several CIO councils and speaks regularly at conferences and events with emphasis on the intersection of technology and education. Lawrence has worked on various multimedia projects including kiosks for the Athens Metro and the Foundation of the Hellenic World’s websites on Greek history. He graduated from the S. I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University in 1989 with a degree in television, radio and film and in 1993 earned a master’s degree in instructional design, development and evaluation from Syracuse University’s School of Education.
	Selma Thomas, President, Watertown Productions, Inc. Selma Thomas is the founder and president of Watertown Productions, Inc., a media design and production firm based in Washington, D.C. A filmmaker with a background in history, Selma produced several award-winning public television documentaries before beginning her work with museums and libraries. She has designed and produced interpretive media, both site- and Web-based, for cultural institutions throughout the United States. A frequent lecturer and author, Selma is particularly interested in the many ways that media defines and alters the relationship between museums and their multiple audiences. Selma co-edited and contributed to The Virtual and the Real (AAM, 1998) and is media editor of Curator: The Museum Journal.
	Holly Witchey, Director, New Media Initiatives, The Cleveland Museum of Art Holly Witchey is currently director of interpretations technology at the Cleveland Museum of Art and immediate past chair of the American Association of Museum’s Media and Technology Standing Professional Committee. In addition, she serves as a member of the board of directors of Museum Computer Network, and is an AAM-appointed member to the National Committee for Archives, Libraries, and Museums. Holly has a doctorate in fifteenth-century Italian painting and sculpture, and was associate curator of European art at the San Diego Museum of Art, where she developed projects for museums using new technologies. In 2000 she left the curatorial world to start the New Media Department at the Cleveland Museum of Art. Holly writes and speaks about museum ethics, accessibility and issues that arise with the use of new technologies in museum settings.