Posts
Curatorial Practice
Why We’re Covering the Opioid Crisis at the Indiana State Museum
As museums look to the future, it is paramount that we stay relevant to our visitors and continue to meet their needs. Instead of only serving as stewards of the past, museums can put …
Silent No More: The new Lucy Burns Museum speaks to the centennial of suffrage
Suffragists are recorded as the first in US history to use silence as protest, calling themselves “Silent Sentinels.” US suffragists (rather than British suffragettes) were also the first …
Kayne Davis, 13, helps curate Mia photography show
This article goes behind the scenes of a new exhibition at the Minneapolis Institute of Art that was co-curated with middle and high school students. The children and teens helped select …
Making Space for Community Partners
The 2019 AAM Annual Meeting was hosted in Louisiana—a state known for its rich culinary and musical traditions that attract droves of tourists. But another notable, though less touristy, …
Design Shows Take On the Future. And It’s Not Pretty.
The New York Times examines the trend of museum design exhibitions that portray the future as fraught and ambiguous, replacing the convention of optimistic futurism, including the …
Forging Deeper Connections
This article originally appeared in the January/February 2020 issue of Museum magazine, a benefit of AAM membership. A look at two museums that are successfully engaging their audiences …
A Modest Proposal for Museum Collections: Apply the principle of direct costs for deaccessioning
Some years ago, shortly before I assumed the directorship of the Ringling Museum of Art—the state art museum of Florida—the leader of the Florida Legislature declared, “I love Rubens.” The …
Curators Take Flight: Four curators cast a wide eye on the shifting landscape for curatorial practice
This article originally appeared in the January/February 2020 issue of Museum magazine, a benefit of AAM membership. It’s an exciting time to be a curator. The role is evolving and the …
The Museum Inside Out: The Chicago History Museum’s three decades of transformation offers a window into the changing role of curators and community engagement.
This article originally appeared in the January/February 2020 issue of Museum magazine, a benefit of AAM membership. Founded in 1856, the Chicago Historical Society was imagined at a time …
Knowing Better, Doing Better: The San Diego Museum of Man takes a holistic approach to decolonization
This article originally appeared in the January/February 2020 issue of Museum magazine, a benefit of AAM membership. As museum professionals, we typically think of the word “curate” as a …
Speechless: A sensory exhibition charts a new path to accessibility in learning
Museums are constantly experimenting with how we can present content in ways that engage and inform a wide audience. Part of the challenge is to consider issues of accessibility and …
Making a Museum in the Age of 3D Digital Models
In 2005, not long after the advent of tabletop 3D printing technology, the University of Michigan Museum of Paleontology (UMMP; a research institution) used this approach to generate …