Reflections

Part Four: Onward and Upward

Wow! What a journey! I am so grateful for the opportunities and exposure to positive pedagogy in a museum setting. I have left this experience much more grounded and confident in my teaching style. In correlation with the internship, the art education classes have really allowed me to focus on how one interprets art and the methods in teaching this. In the beginning, I struggled with finding strategies on how to create a language with my students. This was a challenging thing to do but I began to be flexible with my curriculum. This allowed me to figure out what works best in a museum environment and change my lessons to accommodate to the students in my classes. My background in art history and visual design assisted me in creating lessons using art methodologies techniques with all types of materials. I wanted to make sure the students understood and constructively interpreted the information on activities and lectures I included in my curriculum. As months went on through this journey, my own style changed and molded into what I will carry into my future exploration, experimentation, and application of art education.

Unfortunately, I was not able to work with the Greater Denton Arts Council this semester. I did get the opportunity to work as a registrar for a gallery in Dallas, continue to work at the library, and coordinate the upcoming exhibit showcasing new acquisitions at the Special Collections library at UNT. As for the GDAC, I do plan on jumping back on board when the Spring comes around.

I am proud and excited to be receiving the teaching certificate in Art Education. I am appreciative of the people I have met, the conversations I have had, and the lessons I have learned on my way to becoming an educator in art museums.

Arts After School

Part Three: The Continuation 

This is the time where I get to show what I learned in my studies and experience with this specific patron group. My supervisor and I created an after school program for children ages 5 to 10. This class would be once a week on Wednesdays and go from 3p to 5:30p. This class would mainly focus on curriculum centered around methodology, art movements, and artists that have made a major impact in the world of art. 

The first semester was all about methodologies and art movements. I believe this is a good way to introduce art and its relation to society. I taught them about space versus place, transforming 2D to 3D, line exploration, color theory, and the experimental ways of going about art composition. I wanted to broaden understanding of the terminology and methods that artists come across while interacting with the art world. I also wanted a basic knowledge of design elements and important principles and interpreting these skills into their own daily lives. The second semester (my favorite) was concentrated on artists from different parts of the world and time period throughout history. It was interesting and impressive that some of my students were actually familiar with some of these artists. Most of them were acquainted with specific works and have heard certain artists names, even the younger children. I was pleased to find this out and willing to explore what they know on top of my interpretation and knowledge on the subject. We learned critique and introduction to constructive ways to describe and interpret our classmates' work, especially in comparison to the artists we were learning about. For example, we learned about fauvism, suprematism, dadaism, and futurism. I think these movements are not mainly focused on in traditional education of art history. I would give the students "a upper hand", so to speak, on the spectrum of viable movements that correspond with society and its history. We discussed (yes, back to Dadaism) Tristan Tzara, Hannah Höch, and Hugo Ball's self-discovery at a time where censorship and government were at the height of history. I explained how anti-art made a huge impact in the art world and in the eyes of leaders and the academics of the time. We experimented with collage, sound poems, and fashion. I had a lot of fun teaching these topics and I think my students did too. 

Color Theory lesson

Fauvism at its finest

Abstract Expressionism

Hugo Ball's Karawane (I found this in Special Collections)

Of course I am going to collaborate
(that is Emily, my assistant) 

My favorite interpretation

This is Noah and his Hugo Ball inspired sound poem

    This is the second to last week at the Meadows Museum.  This week is a full one and I'm glad to say that we've had good response to our drop-in art.  Tomorrow is story-telling and I think we will be busier and will have to work efficiently to allow everyone to have a chance to participate in the very popular print-making aspect of the project.  Of course, we've had mostly children participate, but it has been great to see some adults get enthusiastically involved!  Adults are hesitant to participate.  They either lack self-confidence, believing they are not artistic, or are out of practice (something I've felt myself) or believe that the art making is for kids only.  The transformation in confidence and attitude is great to see.  Importantly, parents/guardians/grandparents who get involved learn or renew skills and go home and create an environment that encourages children to create art--a good thing for everyone involved!  Friday we will be able to see how the re-connections participants react and interact to story-telling in the gallery.  Hopefully they not only enjoy it but also are opened up to the idea of looking at and appreciating Cubist artworks.  I hope to continue contact with the Meadows and hopefully with the wonderful people I've met there.  I'm extremely grateful for having had this opportunity.

Final Post!

Hard to believe how fast this Summer flew by! This is my last posting, but I still have a few more weeks at the Amon Carter to finish cataloging the Artist's Materials Collection. I was given the exciting task to choose objects, create labels, and design the layout of a display case that will be shown at the Amon Carter's reading room! As a theme for the case I picked travel watercolor sets from the 19th century that I had worked with and cataloged. Its so exciting that I have the opportunity to create this display to show what I've been working on to others who may not be aware that this collection exists in the Amon Carter. Below is my rough design of the case with the objects included:

The top left sets include flasks for storing water for easy access designed by Winsor & Newton. The bottom is a G. Rowney & Co. sketchbook that is filled with watercolors we will include reproductions of. The top right has a set by G. Rowney & Co. and a tiny watercolor set made by Winsor & Newton.

If you're planning on visiting the Amon Carter, drop by the reading room to see the case and all the other great cases and books the Amon Carter's library has! I'm submitting labels this week, so it should be up later this month.

This opportunity was my first in an art museum, nearly all my previous experience was in within various roles at an academic library. It didn't take long for me to realize that it felt right to be in an art museum and working with objects and tasks related to art and history. Additionally, it showed me that I really enjoy cataloging and creating order out of disorder so that things may be easily found and used. Its definitely a behind the scenes job, which is something I enjoy about it. I'm hoping that I can continue to gain experience in cataloging and find more opportunities related to this in the future.

Final Week at The Madi!

        I can’t believe this is our last week at The Madi! As of today we have made our last wall label so now all we have left to do is hang them before our last day on Saturday. Even though we accomplished a lot, there were a few things Megan and I did not fully finish, mostly dealing with the museum’s archive. Thankfully one of the museum’s board members was very eager to hear about what we accomplished and wanted suggestions on how the museum can finish up these tasks, so I created a report of everything we did (and didn’t get to) over the course of the summer. 
        Reflecting back, I think one of the most difficult things for me was coming from working at the Center for Creative Connections because I was so use to seeing lots of visitors every day and having an array of programming at my fingertips, while visitors to the Madi are mostly first time visitors who just want to see the collection because of the unfamiliarity with the movement. Over the course of the summer we had about 7 or 8 school groups, and I got to implement one new program (the one that focused on John Henry), which the classes really enjoyed. I also went into this internship knowing I would need to be comfortable with working in other departments other than education, so any time Megan and I completed other small projects and tasks, we felt a great deal of accomplishment.
          If it is one thing I learned about this museum over the summer, it is not just the collection that makes it unique, but how this museum is set up and run. This small institution is very clearly run differently from places like the DMA, however the staff’s love and passion for the art is just as big. I look forward to coming back in the future to see how things have transformed and see new art acquisitions.

IT'S THE FINAL COUNTDOWN

As we come to a close on our internship I feel that I have learned more about myself than anything new in regards to the inner workings of a museum. Previously coming from an internship at the DMA I saw first hand and experienced just exactly how vastly different museums can be. However, I can say that my knowledge of MADI art has grown during my time here, which my inner art historian is extremely delighted about. But again, overall I feel that this Internship pushed me to grow more as a person than anything else. I came to understand my own limits a lot during my time here.

·      From working with Christianna the entire length of our Internship I can say that I can comfortably work well in a pair.

·      To learning how to communicate properly and clearly to a small staff of 5 people who are all from a much older generation that I am not used to interacting with outside of family.

·      Having my computer and technological skills put to the test almost daily to constantly fix their computers (Thank god for Google).

·      Having my organizational skills put to the test daily as well due to the obscene amount of a paper trail just two of the staff members seem to make in one day (No. Seriously. They print everything out, even emails, in multiple copies, daily).

·      Our Art historical backgrounds got to shine the most, as we were quick to doubt anything without a verifiable and credible source. With this our research skills came into play and were key to finding the majority of information that was wrong or missing altogether (Thank you KDW).

Regarding the label project we had been working on, we were able to do a majority of the wall labels, however, we were unable to do as much as we had hoped due to time constraints and other issues. We did not replace any of the labels for pieces in the downstairs women’s bathroom, downstairs offices, gift shop, storage, and upstairs law firm areas. Honestly, this shouldn’t have taken us two months to only partially complete this project, and I’m a little bummed out about it. What was made clear to us through this is that data management, and information management in general, is severely lacking as there was A LOT of miss information on A LOT of the pieces we had to sift through. In the coming last four days, we have at the museum we will be working to tie any loose ends with this project and finally get to printing, laminating, and putting up all of the labels we’ve worked hard to correct and complete.

My one main take away from here is how I was reminded of my preference to working with kids over adults.

The teacher workshop seemed very successful yesterday,  they had been enthusiastic while viewing and discussing the cubist works by Picasso, Rivera and others in the morning half.  They reported that they enjoyed learning more about the context, Paris, war, rivalries and etc., and that the addition of the human factor made the art more interesting to them.   After breaking for lunch, they did one of the art projects that we have planned for drop-in art during the opening of the new Cubist exhibition.  They seemed to get very absorbed in this and I think they thoroughly enjoyed the chance to make a little art!   The discussion afterwards indicated that they were thinking of ways to introduce this project into their curriculum.  All in all, I think the day was successful and enjoyed by all!

    Beginning this internship I hoped that I would start to get re-acclimated to a museum work environment and participate in as many activities as possible with the hopes of learning/observing/participating in aspects of museum work that I had not previously been exposed to as well as re-learning and coming back up to speed with the museum education practices that I was already familiar with.
    Today has been an excellent opportunity to work with a group of 25 art teachers sent by their school districts, a practice that I am new to.   It is not unlike any tour/workshop except that they have a background for lively and interesting discussion. 
     It is interesting to observe the different teachers, their reactions, ideas, insight and the different levels at which they participate.  It is plain that, for a very few, their minds or maybe their hearts are elsewhere.  However, the interim director of education here is so extremely knowledgeable (and animated) about Spanish art that almost everyone gets pulled into the conversation.  And there is conversation, this is not a lecture but directed viewing and discussion among the whole group with everyone's ideas given attention.  It was effective to use four different worksheets, each spotlighting 2-3 works, with questions concerning stylistic similarities and differences and the use of elements and principles of art.  This got everyone going and contemplating, it was an excellent way to help the group engage and focus.  This afternoon they will be practicing the project we will implement next week for drop-in art geared for the public.  This will be an excellent opportunity to fine tune this project through the groups feedback and I look forward to that.

Spring Break/Summer Art Camps

Part Two: The Beginning

It all started a year ago that I was inducted into the wide world of teaching in an art museum setting at the Greater Denton Arts Council. This was my chance to really explore my passion for this specific pedagogy and my background in art history, art creating, and creative expression. Also this is my chance to pass this discovery on to my students. Not going to lie, I was nervous. It was an opportunity to take charge and have a lot of responsibility. This meant the importance of involvement from "my kids", their concept of art making and its history, and after all, their safety. My objectives were stated simply but it was a challenge to actually implement them. I wanted to broaden their intellectual understanding of relevant terminology in the art world through art projects, gallery visits, lectures/presentations, and group discussion/critiques. A basic development of the capability to see and translate visual relationships onto two and three dimensional surfaces, in hopes to enable students of creating communication and personal interpretation. 

The GDAC Summer/Spring Break Camps consisted of particular themes that introduces basic methods through enjoyable and simple art making. For example, I created an Art and Nature Camp that took pieces of natural elements and incorporated them into an art museum setting. I wanted to teach them all the strange and wonderful things that Mother Nature had to offer and compare it to the wide and weird world of art. We had fun learning about interesting plants around the world. From there, we created our own classifications of made-up plants. You should of heard the imaginative responses I got from this project. We developed our fictional plants and created a narrative to go along with it. With this activity, I wanted to involve my favorite art movement (Dadaism) and let students build off of one another through the surrealist game Exquisite Corpse. To my delight, my students were actually learning and developing a sense of how nature plays a huge part in expressing oneself through art.

All and all, this was a good introduction on how to successfully engage with this particular audience. 

I think the pictures are a good depiction of the students excitement throughout these camps.

Our morning meeting before our activities began.

We included a river to run through our camp site. If you can look closely, you can spot a pikachu wading in the water. (Big involvement with Pokemon, since Go! just came out)

These students working together on their collaboration of the exquisite corpse game.

Another excellent example of the collaboration through dadaism. Pure wackiness! It is a krabichu. (In case you were wondering)

We made brooches and this particular student included his knowledge on the illuminati. (Which I am still baffled about to this day)

    This summer I've had the privilege of interning at the Meadows Museum in Dallas.  I've been working with members of the educational department who have been wonderful and I've had the pleasure of working with an undergraduate intern with a degree in art history.  The first day was a meeting with the docent board which gave some insight into the dynamics of this very dedicated group and the museum in general.  Shortly after this, we participated in was an art teachers workshop using an exhibit of prints associated with war by Goya and Picasso as well as propaganda posters from the time of Picasso's prints. The Meadows has a spectacular collection of Goya prints and finding associations between Goya, Picasso and the posters made for good discussion between the teachers in the gallery.
    As part of my research into the inclusion of elders in the art museum world, I had the opportunity of speaking with a docent after a tour of such an audience.  Her frustrations were normal for someone expecting this age group to react as a younger audience might.  Her observations of this audience were in line with research on the matter and further casual chats with the tour group revealed mostly positive responses but also expected complaints, all of which can be cleared up by a few small changes in tour design.  At a later date I will have the opportunity to give a talk to the docents as a group and I hope to help alleviate their apprehensions and insecurities with working with this age group.  I will also be participating in an observation at an elder facility that wishes the museum to expand their Alzheimer/dementia program as well as working with the lead for this program on the upcoming program next week.
    Coming up next week we will be very busy with activities centered around the museum's new exhibit Picasso/Rivera: Still Life and the Precedence of Form.  There will be drop-in art projects in two areas using collage and print-making, story telling, a teacher's workshop and a Re-connections (Alzheimer/dementia) program.  It will be a very busy week! 
    In the meantime I've been studying Francisco de Zurbaran and writing materials to be included in education materials for the upcoming exhibit Zurbaran: Jacob and His Twelve Sons, Paintings from Auckland Castle.
   Another highlight of the summer was the opportunity to visit the CROW and sit in on a meeting of the DFW Museum Educator's Roundtable about Equity, Diversity and Inclusion.  It was good to see Dr. Kraehe and Dr. Evans there and it's good to know our community is thinking about these things although the use of the term cane by one person and quickly picked up by another as a disabling symbol for an elder was disturbing and shows that ageism is easily accepted in our society.
    I look forward to the last couple of weeks that will end like a forth of July finale with a very busy schedule of engaging and interesting projects and programs. 

Artists' Materials Collection Continued (With Pictures!)

Time is definitely flying by at the Amon Carter, and a lot of progress has been made on cataloging the Artists' Materials Collection! As of now, I have reached accession number 266 (so about 266 sets have been cataloged) and the overall records completed are about 1,600. At this point, I am just over halfway through the collection and will hopefully be able to complete it by time the internship ends (August 25th). In addition, I am creating a cataloging manual that will serve as a guide on how to catalog any future entries that are added to the collection. The manual is pretty much complete, I just need to add a few more things and discuss it with the archivists to see what needs to be corrected. I started the second big cart of objects and took a "before and after" of the box full of objects not cataloged and the previous box that has been completed and ready to be stored:

Here are some of the interesting objects that I have cataloged recently (including my little paper numbers to show which object is which):

This is a Devoe & Raynolds photo oil set that was used to paint black and white photos. There have been a couple sets that were designed for this purpose, this is the only one I've cataloged so far that is in a wooden box. The set included 16 colors, medium, turpentine, varnish, and some other tools.

This is a Victorian watercolor set that includes 12 colors, a marble palette, metal water dish, two sticks of Sumi ink (many watercolor kits from this era included Sumi ink), and a paint brush.

Additionally, I have been working on a blog posting that will be included on the Amon Carter's blog and will soon be helping create label text for one of the exhibit cases that is in the Library at the Amon Carter. These last few weeks are going to be very busy, but I am very excited to continue and hopefully finish the catalog soon! 

We're almost done!

Hi everyone! It's crazy to think that Megan and I only have 2 more weeks at The Madi, it has gone by so fast! This week especially has been very interesting. This weekend the new show, Origins in Geometry, will be opening so we got to help out with a bunch of the behind the scenes work for it. One thing that was most exciting was to make the wall labels for all the pieces. This worked perfectly since we had already been working on the wall labels for the museum in general. We also got to see the planning and placement process for the pieces, which was obviously a very exciting experience. Megan and I also ran into a bunch of the artists that were accepted into this show (both from Dallas and as far as Venezuela) which I never would have expected to happen at the beginning of our internship. Getting to work so closely on an exhibit is something I have never had the chance to do, so this was an amazing first experience. I think this was most fulfilling coming from an art history background. I remember when we first started, Megan and I were so overwhelmed with all the art in the museum, but now we can easily look at most of the pieces and be able to talk its history and know who the artists are :)

I am also excited because next week we will be having FOUR workshops, which is the most we have had in a week so far. Since the new show will be up and running, I think this will be a great experience for the classes. An activity I would like to test out is to have the students do The Madi's usual program where they get to make their own work inspired by Madi art, and then have a discussion about how Madi and geometric art is connected. This will involve the classes to go through the show with the pieces they create and then form discussion groups where they can point out similarities and differences in both kinds of art. I believe this will be quite interesting because we have elementary through high school aged groups coming so I am looking forward to the varying discussions the groups will have.

I think this new exhibit and all of the workshops next week will make a great close to our internship :)

Another month bites the dust!

Hello again everybody! Things are kicking off at the MADI! We are currently in the heart of remaking all the wall labels! So far we have finished all the ones that had previously been missing a label, and are now about halfway done verifying and correcting information to replace all of the existing wall labels. We hope to have this done by the end of next week as well as already have the more complex labels for the bigger pieces done. We decided to keep the wall labels simple and laminate them so that they would be able to last multiple moves. We also found “Museum Wax” on Amazon that has turned out to be exactly what we were looking for as a gentle adhesive. It’s a bit more of an oily wax then candle wax (Meaning it leaves your hands feeling awfully gross afterwards) and we have just been warming up two, half of a pea size, balls to stick on the back of the labels and place on the wall. It holds the labels on the wall well allowing for multiple adjustments if needed and doesn’t leave any residue behind or take up any of the paint. It’s also extremely easy to remove and reuse if need be so it’s a 10/10 total win in my book.

On the topic of labels still, Christianna and I get to say that we made all of the MADI’s Biennial: Origins in Geometry wall labels. The exhibition is open as of tonight and houses 33 pieces with a large number of them coming from Venezuela!!! Christianna and I actually got to meet and talk with one of the Venezuelan artists just this past Tuesday as well as see three other artists from the US that are in it. (WHICH WAS SUPER DUPER COOOOOL!!!!!!)

On a different note we got to participate in our first all staff meeting earlier this month, which was really just a room with all seven of us sitting in it discussing preparations for the Biennial. I took note of this because it really reminded me how small the staff here at the MADI is. It was an odd feeling to actually all be seated in one small office space, far different from the staff meetings I got to be apart of at the DMA.

Introduction

Part One: Reminiscent of the Past

Hello! I am Caitlyn Hood, an Information Science Grad student, concentrating on Archival Studies and Digital Processing. I am also getting the certificate in Art Museum Education. I have a bachelor's in Art History and work at Special Collections in the Willis Library at the University of North Texas in Denton.

This blog will catch everyone up on what I have done and accomplished at the Greater Denton Arts Council in Denton, Texas. For the past year and a half, I have been interning as the one and only art teacher for children ages six to ten. I have interned for the Education Coordinator at The Modern in Fort Worth prior and found a love for teaching these specific patrons, especially in an art museum setting. At The Modern, I worked with other interns on mostly "chaperoning" groups of children throughout the museum and into projects that drew inspiration from the works on display. As I stepped in to the role of the main teacher at the GDAC, I could see challenges that I would have to overcome. I needed to get used to instructing students as well as developing curriculum for each semester, as well as, summer and spring break camp. I talk about these camps separately due to the curriculum was focused around a particular theme. (I will go over some examples as I continue my blog).

I am enthusiastic to continue my process as the art teacher at the GDAC even though my internship is done. The new semester will start in September and I already have students signed up that have been in my classes throughout my time there. These blog entries will include my cohort in my growth and technique as well as get me pumped for the upcoming semesters. 

Artists' Materials Collection

During my internship at the Amon Carter, I am working on the cataloging, photographing, and housing of artists’ materials that have been collected over several years by the Amon Carter’s paper conservator. She has scoured the internet for various materials from the 19th century to the early 20th century, purchased the items, and now wishes to use the collection as an educational resource for both museum visitors and the employees within the Amon Carter. The educational goal of this collection is to gain an understanding of what types of materials were available to artists in the past and how they used these objects to create artworks. Much of the materials predate modern materials like acrylics, so many are primarily composed of organic or inorganic (minerals) pigments and materials.

Watercolor boxes and kits have been a recurring object of many shapes, sizes, and materials. Many are of brands that are still utilized today such as Reeves and Winsor & Newton. Most contain the same colors, but with slight variations of name depending on the brand. Boxes of tempera paints have also been collected, composed of glass jar containers and wooden boxes. Many of these objects are relatively fragile, some have never been used so the paint is still in the bottles and many are composed of lead paints, so they must be handled with caution. There are a number of paintbrushes in the collection of varying condition, shape, size, and brand. It is a very large and diverse collection.

As I handle these objects, I’m noting the information that the objects provide. In an Excel spreadsheet, I am creating a full listing and catalog of the objects within the collection. Each object is assigned an accession number, which is essentially a unique record number to find the object in a catalog and physically (ex. A201X.00X.001). From there, the object is named and described through brand, manufacturer, type of object, medium, measurements, and label text. For sets such as watercolor kits, a “parent” record is assigned for the entirety of the contents and then broken down by its components and given unique numbers under the parent accession number (ex. A201X.00X.001.001). Everything is cataloged within the object. If it is a painting kit, every color in that kit will receive a record. I have completed about 122 objects/sets, but since the records for each object within a set get their own record as well, I have done over 600 records so far. So far I am about halfway (maybe) through the first enormous box of boxes, and there is a second full one as well.

Once the record is completed, the objects must be photographed. The accession numbers must be visible to determine what the object is, as well as all the components of the object. The objects are laid down on paper where the accession number is written below as a label. Since the numbers are constantly changing, I have cut out numbers to provide a label as to what is what on the object.

When the full record is created and photographed, the object must be properly prepared for storage. Archival paper is used to wrap and protect the object. Using a label maker, we print out the accession number and place it on the tissue paper so the object can be easily identified. After the object is wrapped and labeled, it is placed within an archival box that is labeled and input as the location of the object in its record. The object is placed in the box as well as other objects until the box is full. More archival paper is used to cushion the objects from any potential harm from being moved. Once the box is full, it is placed with the other completed boxes and is ready for storage.

Creating this catalog has been a very interesting venture that I have enjoyed very much so far. I am doing my work in the conservation lab and collaborate with the paper conservator as well as the archivists to determine what the best way to describe and store the objects is. During breaks, the archivists and conservationists have shown me some of the work that they do within the museum and have shown me other departments and the storage areas. It’s a lot of information to take in, but it’s all been very exciting!