creative curating: curatorial rules, and when to break them

8/9/2019 Creative Curating: Curatorial Rules, and When to Break Them

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Creative Curatation

Presentation to Catherine Whalen and Sarah Carter’s “Curatorial Practiceas Experiment

” course at Bard Graduate School

Steven Lubar February 2015

or, knowing the rules, and when to break the

m

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“…privilege experimentation, collaboration,

and interpretive risks … new and diverse

means of interacting with, studying, and

analyzing material things.”

—from the syllabus

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All curation is creative.

But it also follows certain rules.

What rules should we break, and when?

3 I don’t think they should all be broken - the key thing is not to take them asnatural .

Note: these rules are fairly recent - museum history can help us see them in

their cultural context. When did they come to be accepted? What

circumstance made them seem proper? Do those circumstances still stand?

talk for BGC Catherine Whalen class.key - February 6, 2015


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4 We all have a pretty good idea of traditional exhibits - what the rules are

—paintings on wall, objects in cases, narratives…

5 And we know when something breaks the rules:

— left, Chipstone installation at Milwaukee Art Musuem, right, Museum of

the City of London.

Some more examples at the end of the talk.

What are the rules?

6 Before you can break the rules, must know what they are…— a quick set - not definitive, but to get you thinking…

— and mostly these are good! Need to know when to break them.

I’ve exaggerated a bit here, for educational purposes!



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Curatorial rules

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Object rules

• Conservation and Preservation: Don’t use objects up.

• Museum objects should last forever and remain in

museum forever

• The museum shouldn’t alter objects

8 Good reason for all of these rules - but these are fairly recent, in the history

of museums - Some 18th century museums encouraged touching; some

19th century museums traded objects, dispersed them.

Collecting rules

• Interested in makers not users

• Biased toward objects in original state, unchanged by

use

• What counts as an object is narrowly defined

: “museum

quality”

• Build on strengths of collection

• Often based on interests of curator, not needs of

museum more generally

9 These more art museum rules; history museums have become moreinterested in the way objects are used.

To what extent are curators thinking of the big picture of the museum, to

what extent their own work? what structures shape collecting?



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Curator Rules

• The curator is the expert

• The curator is a specialist, not a generalist

• The curator is the leader of the exhibition team

• Subject-matter knowledge key to curation (curator as

academic)

• The curator is anonymous, the voice of the museum

• The curator is not part of the story

10 Curator as academic - audience he or she cares about most often an

academic one.

This is shaped by the way expertise is defined in museums - as subject

matter expertise, not audience expertise, and by defining curators as

specialists, not generalists.

The last rule seems so central to museums - but broken now in every other

medium - look at creative nonfiction writing for a strong contrast.

“The essence of professionalism is to be found inthe strong sense of high purpose and personal

responsibility and the strict intellectual integritythat motivate the individual and guide him in the

use of his specialized knowledge. These qualities .. . mark the museum curator and are the measure

of his stature. As a professional he is a strongholdof individual initiative and responsibility in a world

threatened by the ant heap of collectivism.”

—Remington Kellogg, Director, USNM, 1952

11 Curator as John Galt! last bulwark of individual initiative…

Exhibition rules

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Display rules

• Designed around looking (not other senses)

• Clear lines and divides between exhibit and visitors

• Designed to look good without people in the way

• Focus on objects, respectfully treated

• Conveys authority

13 Model is an old-fashioned university lecture!

Audience Rules

• Disinterested (it’s not about them)

• Visitors there only to look and learn; th ey’re just

audience, not author; they can’t change exhibit

• Audience either experts, like us, or Getty “art novice”

idea – 30 seconds, doesn’t know terminolgy,

undeveloped perceptual skills… but cares!

• Thinking beings (not so much feeling, social, etc.)

14 Nina Simon’s Museum 2.0 is best at this topic.

Story Rules

• One story, beginning to end

• Neutral, unbiased, single voice

• Moment in time or change over time

• Based on books and magazines (typeset, etc.)

• Clear distinction of narrator/audience/subject

•

Based on academic interests and taxonomies

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Space and time rules

• In one place

• At one time

• Once it’s done, it’s done; doesn’t change over time

• Digital follows physical

16 Exhibits are designed around traditional museum spaces. Those spaces are

changing as museums change, and especially as the material and the virtual

begin to overlap. How should the exhibition rules change?

Structure rules

• Clear distinction between what’s an exhibition andwhat isn’t

• Front-of-house (exhibits, public space) and back-of-

house (storage, research) clearly separate

• Curatorial, design, and educations separate

• You can read the bureaucratic structure of the

museum in the exhibitions

17 Why such a strong distinction between exhibit and shop?

Why hide the rest of the museum?

On the final rule: If you can read the museum’s organizational structure -

either divisions between curatorial and other departments, or the waycuratorial departments divide up subject matter - in the exhibition, that’s bad.

Some Examples

18 Catherine asked me to talk about recent work at Brown - a bit hesitantbecause it’s often creative because we’re working outside of a traditional

museum structure… so, some Brown projects, some other projects I’ve

admired



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Haffenreffer

Museum,

“Exquisite

Objects,”

curated by Ian

Alden Russell

19 Ha#enre#er Museum at Brown - Ian Russell exhibition. what is odd here: not

in museum, writing not typeset, on outside of case, no single narrative,

visitors could add their interpretation. More information at

exquisitethings.info

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21



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“The Lost Museum,”

curated by the

Jenks Society; Mark

Dion, visiting artist

22 More information at jenksmuseum.org. Rules broken include: not in museum;

arranged by degree of decay, not usual taxonomies; language of labels;

artists created new work for history exhibition; reimagined period room as

story space.

23 Consider the very untraditional voice

24 Order by decay - not by categories of use. But very carefully organized!



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26 An imagined reconstruction - as imagined by artist - a biographical sketch in

objects.

27 New work from about 80 artists, based on information about the collectionsof the museum.



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Haitian Voodoo,

Haffnreffer Museum

28 Decentralized structure - working with voodoo priestess, an art collection on

loan, a scholar interested in contemporary Haitian religion… anthropology

museums have flexibility.

29 The altar: Haitian mambo mined our collections - not Haitian collections - for

objects she thought spoke to the spirit of La Sirene.

Remember the Old Times: Cape

Verdean Community in Fox Point

30 The exhibition included a bar that was really a bar!



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Baltimore Museum of Industry

31 Historic machines run, used as shop as well as exhibition.

Mark Dion installation,

Johns Hopkins

University Library

32 An artist’s installation: artifacts from across the university, displays so that

they are not individually visible but form an ensemble

“At Home,” Minnesota Historical

Society, Benjamine Filene, Curator

33 Not “authentic” artifacts from the house; words and artifacts mixedpromiscuously; many di#erent voices overlapping.



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“One Room,” RISD Museum, curated

Deb Clemons and S. Hollis Mickey

34 A fascinating cross between exhibition and program; artists given space to

work, talk, present. Photos courtesy S. Hollis Mickey, RISD Museum

America on the

Move, NMAH

35 Breaking down barriers between visitor and exhibit

Holocaust Memorial Museum

36 Breaking down barriers between museum and memorial. See also the 9/11Museum.



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“Party Time,” by Yinka

Shinobara, Newark Museum

37 An artist re-imagines a period room. Breaks most of the rules! Feet on the

table! Images from presentation by Franklin Vagnone, Executive Director of

The Historic House Trust of New York City

“Maira Kalman

Selects,” at Cooper

Hewitt Museum

38 Handwritten labels, ipad cut into back of chair!

Breaking Rules

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Rules for Breaking Rules

• Let go. Shared authority. “It’s not about you”

• Put the audience first

• Overcome bureacratic structures

• Think about balance of present and future

• Bring in artists

40 my seven rules for public humanists

Models to consider

• Children’s museums

• Theme parks and themed retail

• Indigenous museums

• Memorial museums

• Anarchist’s guide to historic house museums

• Fringe museums (Morbid Anatomy Museum, popup museums)

• Public art

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creative curating: curatorial rules, and when to break them

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