The museum website that I will be reviewing is the National Archives. The mission statement for this museum is to keep and maintain all the important documents, legal and historical, pertaining to American history and keep those documents in a safe environment so they can be used and learned from.
This website does a wonderful job of catering to everyone’s needs from the general public to researchers to genealogists to teachers. It has something for everyone and is set up so that everyone can find just what they are looking for. It also has a way of narrowing the subject from a broad over view of something to a specific book or document that a person needs. The links are very clear and let the person looking know exactly what is under the title and if they will find what they are looking for. For instance I found the mission statement in about 15 seconds. Usually mission statements are much harder to find than that. It is also helpful that the general architecture of the page is repeated in all the sub pages after you click on something on the home page, the links are always on the left the information you want to know in the middle and the search bar on the right.
Another handy tool that is on the main page is the “Español” button at the top. I think that this is a great addition to the page because as a country that harbors many languages it makes the page so much more accessible to people who may not speak or read English the best or at all.
I think that this website helps further the mission statement because it makes important documents like the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution available for everyone without having to travel to Washington D.C. to see them. Also with its online exhibits people can learn at home and see the exhibits again without having to travel to see them. Also having an online exhibit gives it a sense of interactivity and the person looking is more involved because they can choose what to look at and what to pass up.
Over all I think that this website is a great example of what museums should be doing, it is easy to navigate and the wording is simple so that everyday people can understand what they are looking at. It is consistent in its architecture and language and really brings the reader and audience into the museum without actually having to be there.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Music is a Connecton to the Past, Don't Lose it!
In the article “Museum Sets the Stage for Strings and Horns” by Daniel J. Wakin, he talks about the exhibit in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, focusing on stringed and wind instruments. Some of the article focuses on the renovation of the gallery and the history of the collection. The collection of musical instruments has been in the Met since 1889. The museum needed a proper place to show the collection and the gallery that it was supposed to be housed in had not been renovated in over 40 years. With the excuse of roof repairs the museum was able to shut down that gallery and refurbish so that it could properly display the collection. The collection has been expanded to include some items that most people have never seen and wouldn’t have seen if they were not displayed. Sadly however the entire collection could not be in the renovated space, many instruments have to be kept in the old, out dated cases.
Wakin goes on to talk about the place of instruments in museums, whether they should be considered art or historical objects. They could also be used to show technological advances in a culture or be used in anthropological ways. Yet the article makes the point that instruments are the makers of music and as such belong in an art or music museum. The exhibit itself features some key musicians along with other key figures in music history.
The article then moves to musical instrument galleries in danger and new ones moving in. One of the most noted music gallery shut downs happened in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London where they closed it to make more room for their fashion exhibits. They plan to break down their collection and give pieces to other British institutions that can use them. Conversely there is a new musical instrument museum opening in Phoenix focusing on Global traditions.
The rest of the article focuses on the collection itself boasting over 5,000 instruments and lists many of the oddities that reside in the collection, such as a narwhal tusk that can be a clarinet or a flute or also a walking stick, Benny Goodman’s last clarinet, a Stradivarius Violin, a harpsichord built in Rome and the oldest piano in existence.
Over all I found this article to be very enlightening and enjoyable. It brought to light some very interesting points of view and showed the public some things that most people wouldn’t think to put in a museum like musical instruments. I think that this is a great idea for a museum to have a musical instrument collection because it really helps embody history in a way. People in the past really did not have a lot to do so they listened to music. The instruments themselves provide that physical connection and it is something that we today can relate to, music.
Wakin goes on to talk about the place of instruments in museums, whether they should be considered art or historical objects. They could also be used to show technological advances in a culture or be used in anthropological ways. Yet the article makes the point that instruments are the makers of music and as such belong in an art or music museum. The exhibit itself features some key musicians along with other key figures in music history.
The article then moves to musical instrument galleries in danger and new ones moving in. One of the most noted music gallery shut downs happened in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London where they closed it to make more room for their fashion exhibits. They plan to break down their collection and give pieces to other British institutions that can use them. Conversely there is a new musical instrument museum opening in Phoenix focusing on Global traditions.
The rest of the article focuses on the collection itself boasting over 5,000 instruments and lists many of the oddities that reside in the collection, such as a narwhal tusk that can be a clarinet or a flute or also a walking stick, Benny Goodman’s last clarinet, a Stradivarius Violin, a harpsichord built in Rome and the oldest piano in existence.
Over all I found this article to be very enlightening and enjoyable. It brought to light some very interesting points of view and showed the public some things that most people wouldn’t think to put in a museum like musical instruments. I think that this is a great idea for a museum to have a musical instrument collection because it really helps embody history in a way. People in the past really did not have a lot to do so they listened to music. The instruments themselves provide that physical connection and it is something that we today can relate to, music.
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
"When we build, let us think that we build for ever."
Quote by: John Ruskin
I talked a lot about architecture in my last post but allow me to further my thinking on the subject. I think that architecture has a huge effect on museums and how people perceive the materials in them. I have always liked history museums not just because I am a history major but because they have an era or style that they replicate in the architecture of the building and it makes the viewer feel like they are a part of the experience rather than looking through a window at it. Also I seem to have an aversion to art museums if you can’t tell by my other posts. It has to do with many things and one is the architecture used. I feel bored in art museums, there is not a whole lot to look at, the walls are white and there is no detail, just a white box. One can only look at a piece of art for so long before getting bored especially with our society today where everything is so fast paced and everything is everywhere all at once, people are losing the concentration that it takes to look at art the way that people used to. I think that the experience of the museum is different based on the museum structure itself but I don’t think that it hinders it at all, it is just different. The architecture of the building has the ability to transcend the viewer to another time and lets the audience truly experience that object for what it really is. I feel that the architecture of the building can enhance the objects that it holds and help the viewer better understand the time that the museum is trying to represent.
I talked a lot about architecture in my last post but allow me to further my thinking on the subject. I think that architecture has a huge effect on museums and how people perceive the materials in them. I have always liked history museums not just because I am a history major but because they have an era or style that they replicate in the architecture of the building and it makes the viewer feel like they are a part of the experience rather than looking through a window at it. Also I seem to have an aversion to art museums if you can’t tell by my other posts. It has to do with many things and one is the architecture used. I feel bored in art museums, there is not a whole lot to look at, the walls are white and there is no detail, just a white box. One can only look at a piece of art for so long before getting bored especially with our society today where everything is so fast paced and everything is everywhere all at once, people are losing the concentration that it takes to look at art the way that people used to. I think that the experience of the museum is different based on the museum structure itself but I don’t think that it hinders it at all, it is just different. The architecture of the building has the ability to transcend the viewer to another time and lets the audience truly experience that object for what it really is. I feel that the architecture of the building can enhance the objects that it holds and help the viewer better understand the time that the museum is trying to represent.
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
the habitat is quintessential
I think that one of the most important thing that a museum needs to be effective is environment that the museum puts people into. Environment meaning: lighting, décor, architecture etc. this gets people more involved in the exhibit and thus helps people appreciate the content that they are enjoying. The environment is especially important because the audience needs to be involved but not distracted by it. That is why many museums have trouble with this aspect, it is a fine line between not enough and too much. Many museums are on the too little end of the line. Many museums think that the less they have outside the exhibits the more people will be interested in them but that is not true. If I were to own a museum I would decorate it in the style of the era that the museum is focused, literally enveloping my audience in the experience of that time period. That would be much more memorable that simply looking at artifacts and art from behind a pane of glass. The lighting is a very important part of the environment because it allows, or disallows, people to see what is being displayed. Art museums tend to go overboard with lighting. They love to display the art so much that they often leave the walkways and halls poorly illuminated, I remember tripping trying to get around in a particular art museum. Also art museums tend to rely heavily on natural light and sometimes the light that comes from the large windows is not advantageous to the viewer depending on the angle of the light and the intensity.
Monday, January 25, 2010
viewing: an active verb when in museums
In Svetlana Alpers’ article titled “The Museum as a Way of Seeing” she observes the interesting feeling that we all have experienced when in a museum. This is a strange occurrence and I will talk about my take on this phenomenon.
I have been to my fair share of museums and they all have different effects based on a few different components. The first would be the content of the museum. The effect of the museum will be greater if it has something interesting to the specific person who is going. For example I, myself, favor historical museums (particularly American history) so obviously a museum like that will get me more excited than an art museum. I have been to most of the important sites of the revolution and civil war, subjects that I love most of all in American history. The experience started far before we got to the museum. I was very excited to go and see all old battle fields and the artifacts that have been found and displayed. When I got there my eyes were opened and ready to see all these things and to hear about each one of them from a museum worker. However the experience goes both ways, I remember I went to the glass museum and I had been dreading it for the whole day. These effects the way people perceive museums, even if the museum is arranged nicely and has a lot of information about the objects or in my case the works of art, the observer will still come away with a negative impression because the subject of the museum was not interesting to that individual.
The next two factors of perception of a museum I have already mentioned, arrangement and information. These are not as important as the focus of the museum but they still have the ability of changing a good experience at a museum in to a bland and forgettable day trip. Arrangement of the items in a museum will get the viewers attention or not. Also the question of “how much information?” is crucial to the success of the museum in the spectator’s eyes.
I have been to my fair share of museums and they all have different effects based on a few different components. The first would be the content of the museum. The effect of the museum will be greater if it has something interesting to the specific person who is going. For example I, myself, favor historical museums (particularly American history) so obviously a museum like that will get me more excited than an art museum. I have been to most of the important sites of the revolution and civil war, subjects that I love most of all in American history. The experience started far before we got to the museum. I was very excited to go and see all old battle fields and the artifacts that have been found and displayed. When I got there my eyes were opened and ready to see all these things and to hear about each one of them from a museum worker. However the experience goes both ways, I remember I went to the glass museum and I had been dreading it for the whole day. These effects the way people perceive museums, even if the museum is arranged nicely and has a lot of information about the objects or in my case the works of art, the observer will still come away with a negative impression because the subject of the museum was not interesting to that individual.
The next two factors of perception of a museum I have already mentioned, arrangement and information. These are not as important as the focus of the museum but they still have the ability of changing a good experience at a museum in to a bland and forgettable day trip. Arrangement of the items in a museum will get the viewers attention or not. Also the question of “how much information?” is crucial to the success of the museum in the spectator’s eyes.
Monday, January 18, 2010
Spiral Jetty
There have been many questions surrounding the famous Spiral Jetty that resides in The Great Salt Lake in Utah. Because it is art and it lives in the lake does that make the Great Salt Lake a museum or did the artist intend for Spiral Jetty to eventually erode to show some artistic concept? Well, I think that Spiral Jetty is not a museum. This is because if the artist wanted it to be preserved he would have left some writing behind that said so and that we should try to keep it from disappearing. Also he would have put it in a better and less corrosive place. The Great Salt Lake is a very harsh environment for anything really, so my conclusion has to be that the artist meant for the work to represent some type of transcending truth about the temporary nature of life.
Of course the argument that Spiral Jetty is not a museum raises the question of “what about national parks?”. Believe it or not there is a very simple answer to this. Spiral Jetty was man made by an artist with a specific reason in mind when he created the design. However National Parks were created naturally over millions of years and because they cannot be moved they have to be preserved. Also there is no one who can say that they were created for a particular reason to represent something therefore we must take care of them for future generations.
Of course the argument that Spiral Jetty is not a museum raises the question of “what about national parks?”. Believe it or not there is a very simple answer to this. Spiral Jetty was man made by an artist with a specific reason in mind when he created the design. However National Parks were created naturally over millions of years and because they cannot be moved they have to be preserved. Also there is no one who can say that they were created for a particular reason to represent something therefore we must take care of them for future generations.
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