Museum 2.0

OCTOBER 30, 2013

The book of the same title that he edited is rocking my world, both as a museum professional who cares about inclusion and as a new mother. So consider this just the first of many posts related to issues of cultural inclusion, evaluation, and impact. This blog is about shared learning, and I went to engineering school.

Measure 47

Measure Arts People Museum 47

Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 18, 2013

This August/September, I am "rerunning" popular Museum 2.0 Originally posted in April of 2011, just before I hung up my consulting hat for my current job at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History. I''ve spent much of the past three years on the road giving workshops and talks about audience participation in museums.

Museum 45

Museum Question Participatory Evaluation 45

Museum 2.0

MARCH 3, 2011

Thirteen students produced three projects that layered participatory activities onto an exhibition of artwork from the permanent collection of the Henry Art Gallery. The guiding principle is uncovering relationships between the works of art themselves rather than explicating information or theoretical concepts.

Participatory 51

Participatory Arts Audience Museum 51

Museum 2.0

FEBRUARY 18, 2015

Every few months, a major news outlet does an "expose" about data collection on museum visitors. These articles tend to portray museums as Big Brother, aggressively tracking visitors'' actions and interests across their visit. And then I started thinking: we do that all the time in museums. We''re trying to personalize.

Museum 20

Museum Experiment People Data 20

Museum 2.0

JANUARY 2, 2013

We just posted a part-time position at my museum for a Community Engagement/Marketing Associate. Does a Small Museum Really Need a Marketing Person? At our museum, we distribute marketing tasks--some with our membership director, our programs staff, and our visitor services staff. We don't "do" much with this content currently.

Job 51

Job Marketing Difference Museum 51

Museum 2.0

JANUARY 11, 2012

For years, I'd give talks about community participation in museums and cultural institutions, and I'd always get the inevitable question: "but what value does this really have when it comes to dollars and cents?" We're hearing on a daily basis that the museum has a new role in peoples' lives and in the identity of the county.

Audience 47

Audience Museum Participatory History 47

Museum 2.0

JANUARY 10, 2008

In the final installment of Museum 2.0’s s four part series on comfort in museums, we get down to the basics: creature comfort. When it comes to content , programs , and interactives (parts 1-3 of the series), the challenge is to push the barrier towards less comfort, not more. Why are museums so darn uncomfortable?

Museum 30

Museum Denver Arts Design 30

Museum 2.0

APRIL 25, 2011

I've spent much of the past three years on the road giving workshops and talks about audience participation in museums. The Museum 2.0 In 2008 and 2009, there were many conference sessions and and documents presenting participatory case studies, most notably Wendy Pollock and Kathy McLean's book Visitor Voices in Museum Exhibitions.

Question 49

Question Participatory Museum Evaluation 49

Museum 2.0

MARCH 25, 2015

This is the first in a two-part series about the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History’s new theory of change. This week, Ian David Moss and I are each writing blog posts about our collaborative process to develop a theory of change at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History. We had tripled our attendance.

Process 20

Process Change Develop Museum 20

Museum 2.0

MAY 15, 2013

I''m heading to the American Alliance of Museums'' annual conference this weekend, and I''m psyched to reconnect with friends and mentors and meet new people who can inspire and stimulate fresh ideas. It will be hosted by Eric Siegel, chief content officer at the New York Hall of Science and consummate rabble-rouser.

Baltimore 33

Baltimore Museum New York Mentoring 33

Museum 2.0

APRIL 19, 2016

We realized that we needed a systematic way to evaluate these kinds of requests--a tool that would help us evaluate when to say yes and why to say no. Our museum has already had several requests to lend our support to bond measures that will be on the ballot in 2016. We incubate a youth art and social change program.

Policy 20

Policy Advocacy Create Museum 20

Museum 2.0

AUGUST 18, 2008

I've long believed that museums have a special opportunity to support the community spirit of Web 2.0 This month brings three examples of museums hosting meetups for online communities: On 8.6.08, the Computer History Museum (Silicon Valley, CA) hosted a Yelp! Me: Have you ever been to this museum? meetup for Elite Yelp!

Museum 22

Museum Hosting Model Community 22

Museum 2.0

MARCH 16, 2012

The folks at the AAM Center for the Future of Museums have been experimenting with sharing ideas in several ways over the past couple of years--through their blog , their weekly newsletter , and a series of research reports. Each article includes museum examples along with a broader look at the trend.

Trend 33

Trend Program Denver Museum 33

Museum 2.0

DECEMBER 28, 2010

Every once in a while I come across a project I wish I could have included in The Participatory Museum. an exhibition produced with schoolchildren at the Wallace Collection in London, is a lovely example of co-creation that demonstrates the multiple benefits of inviting audience members to act as partners in arts organizations.

Children 46

Children Museum Create Project 46

Museum 2.0

MARCH 15, 2010

People often ask me which museums are my favorite. I visit lots of perfectly nice, perfectly forgettable museums. In some cases, that's based on subject matter, as at the Museum of Jurassic Technology or the American Visionary Art Museum. Some are scrappy and iconoclastic, like the City Museum in St.

Support 41

Support Museum St. Louis NSF 41

Nonprofit Tech for Good

DECEMBER 14, 2022

For example, if you join a modern art museum, there is a good chance you won’t have to pay admission to other modern art museums. Creative stuff: Things unique to your organization including the ability to create art, music, poetry, dance, etc. help to evaluate resumes of kids). It was super cool.

Donor 330

Donor Sponsor Accessibility Music 330

Museum 2.0

JUNE 22, 2011

This was an aha moment for me at the time about self-confidence and self-evaluation, and it's one I've carried into my career. I've often argued that art and history museums should adopt this approach and encourage visitors to explore their potential as artists or historians, not just audiences for content.

Artist 48

Artist Museum Raise History 48

Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 22, 2009

They provide detailed case studies of projects in each area, including project descriptions, informal science education goals, participant training techniques, and evaluation outcomes. I've added a fourth model to this citizen science typology, one may be more appropriate to facilities like museums than to scientific organizations: co-option.

Public 36

Public Research Participatory Report 36

Museum 2.0

AUGUST 14, 2007

Inventory isn't a museum activity that inspires curiosity in many visitors. This summer, the Austrian Museum of Folk Life and Folk Art ( Österreichisches Museum für Volkskunde) is trying to change that. People often talk about non-collecting museums as the museums of the future.

Museum 20

Museum Conservancy Registration Project 20

Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 12, 2012

In the spirit of a popular post written earlier this year , I want to share the behind the scenes on our current almost-museumwide exhibition at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History, Santa Cruz Collects. The content focuses on the question of WHY we collect and how our collections reflect our individual and community identities.

Participatory 44

Participatory Museum History International 44

Museum 2.0

APRIL 16, 2008

I've written before about the inspiring work that the Brooklyn Museum of Art is doing with their community-focused efforts. Click is an exhibition process in three parts: The Museum solicited photographs from artists via an open call on their website, Facebook group, Flickr groups, and outreach to Brooklyn-based arts organizations.

Museum 24

Museum Participatory Artist Arts 24

Museum 2.0

JUNE 9, 2009

Yesterday, I enjoyed three hours of graduate students' presentations of social media plans for museums in the Pacific Northwest. There are three parts: the institution or initiative's content and audience goals, the institution's assets, and the project concept that will match goals to resources in an achievable way. For example.

Social Media 43

Social Media Develop Media Museum 43

Museum 2.0

DECEMBER 14, 2009

Unsurprisingly, some of my favorite museums are small, funky places run by iconoclasts—but that’s not useful to most professionals who work for organizations in which they have little control over size or leadership matters. There are several good resources on evaluating participation. It’s nice to have both.

Project 22

Project Museum Teen North Carolina 22

Museum 2.0

AUGUST 3, 2009

Last month, the Christian Science Monitor published an article entitled, "Museums' new mantra: Connect with community." It took me a couple weeks (and various museum blog responses ) to realize what bugs me about this article--it treats "connecting with community" as a marketing ploy, a "mantra" rather than a mission.

Community 22

Community Museum San Diego San Francisco 22

Museum 2.0

NOVEMBER 10, 2009

Exhibit labels in science centers ask more questions than any other kinds of museums, and yet the questions are often awful--teacherly, overly rhetorical, and totally meaningless. asked by a cop or mother, garners the full attention of asker and askee alike, museum questions like "what is nanotechnology?," Download our slides here.

Reflection 20

Reflection Research Question Museum 20

Museum 2.0

FEBRUARY 5, 2014

Research and assessment is rare in the arts, and it tends to focus on "proving" our value. Studies of how arts participation affects student test scores. And given what I''ve seen on micro and macro-levels in arts funding and power, I don''t think this strategy is working. Economic impact studies. She needed money.

Arts 55

Arts Museum Arkansas Student 55

Museum 2.0

MAY 5, 2009

I just returned from the American Association of Museums (AAM) annual meeting in Philadelphia. I led two sessions, one on visitor co-created museum experiences, and the other on design inspirations from outside museums. what is the value of the exhibition experience to non-participants, that is, regular museum visitors?

Slides 20

Slides Participatory Museum Children 20

Museum 2.0

JUNE 27, 2008

Joe explains some of the planned intentional dialogue events: First, for the opening night dinner, we hired a local dance company that is putting together pieces about visiting museums, punctuated by an actor/dancer asking provocative questions to the group. Where do our eyes go to in art? Are you headed to Houston?

Studies 20

Studies Associations Houston Museum 20

Museum 2.0

AUGUST 27, 2007

Heck, sign me up for a ticket to the zombie museum. But when I took off my “entertainment” glasses and put on my museum eyes, my reaction wasn’t amusement. I imagined museum folks reading the article and snapping the paper closed with smug smiles on their faces: "See. It was distaste. This is why we have to avoid Disneyfication."

Model 20

Model Museum Blended New York 20

Museum 2.0

AUGUST 21, 2008

In this post, an exploration of ways that museums can support promoters, convert detractors, and generally energize visitors to share their experience with others. Supporting Promoters Somewhere out there, there are people who love your museum. Ratings and Reviews Imagine a visitor who leaves your museum enthused about her experience.

Museum 20

Museum Review Rate Voice 20

Museum 2.0

DECEMBER 8, 2006

Elisa’s focus is interactive arts, media design, and cultural management, and she has been involved in many pertinent projects, such as MUVI (the Virtual Museum of the Collective Memory of Lombardia). Environmentalists, the Museum of Natural History at CU, they all responded very enthusiastically to this.

Interview 20

Interview Museum Culture Sound 20

Museum 2.0

OCTOBER 21, 2007

No one would contest the idea that most museum exhibitions, art shows, films, books, in short, most content experiences, have value both for the new and return user. There’s no expectation that the content will have evolved in your absence; instead, the user evolves, and brings new meaning-making to the content experience.

Experiment 20

Experiment Create Museum Amazon 20

Museum 2.0

JUNE 24, 2015

I’ve always been inspired by the creative ways the Brooklyn Museum uses technology to connect visitors to museum content. ASK is part of an overall effort to rethink the museum visitor experience. We began with a series of internal meetings to evaluate our current visitor experience and set a goal for the project.

Museum 20

Museum Arts Interview Test 20

Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 24, 2014

Two weeks ago, I wrote about t he use of the word "quality" in the arts and its many forms. Inspired by Stacy, I wanted to share some of the work we are doing at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History to clarify what we mean by engagement. This is a big year for us in naming and evaluating our work. Engagement?

Goal 48

Goal Museum Evaluation History 48

Museum 2.0

NOVEMBER 5, 2013

"The words we use in attempting to change museum directions matter. Our museum in Santa Cruz has been slammed by those who believe participatory experiences have gone too far. I am glad this conversation is happening and that both museum professionals and local Santa Cruzans are engaged. Some people commune with the art.

Participatory 53

Participatory Museum Arts History 53

Museum 2.0

MARCH 17, 2010

This is the second in a four-part series about writing The Participatory Museum. Several hundred people contributed their opinions, stories, suggestions, and edits to The Participatory Museum as it was written. But there were 52 people who spent several hours working on the project as content reviewers or copy-editors.

Participatory 32

Participatory Museum Process Experiment 32

Museum 2.0

OCTOBER 16, 2013

When you count attendance to your museum, do you include: people who eat in the cafe? people who engage with your content online? Louis Post-Dispatch published the kind of "how sausage is made" story that rarely gets written about the arts. It''s about museum attendance and how the five big, free museums in St.

St. Louis 55

St. Louis Impact Museum Denver 55