What can museums learn from each other?
Scott Sayre, of the Corning Museum of Glass, once said, “Science Museums make complex ideas simple and art museums make simple ideas complex.” (Hear more from Scott here). This comparison struck me as so incredibly powerful, not just for its succinctness, but also its insight. Both times of museums are two sides of one coin. …
Work Better: Foster your Curiosity
Two weeks into the year, and statistically speaking, you are probably a failure. Most people who make new year’s resolutions break then before their holiday decorations are down. Why is this? Start with the moment you make your plan. You focus on what is wrong in your life. You don’t exercise. You are not good …
Inequity in The Arts & Culture Economy Equation
The arts and culture present some serious funding challenges for society and represent some serious inequities. Production: The top of the pyramids, like the directors of museums or the owners of galleries, make much more money than those starting out. Many people cannot afford to work in the arts because of the low salaries. …
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Nickles, Dimes, and Tough Times : The Relationship between Visitors, Revenue, and Value
This post is a follow-up on a post last week about the Metropolitan Museum of Art instituting mandatory ticket fees. For many years, I ran a department in a free museum. Perennially patrons would ask for a free parking sticker stamp. If I had been a visitor, I, too, might have asked for this. After …
A Museum Christmas Carol
In which a museum director learns that he is leading badly. Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. This was nonsense! Jonathan still had work to do. Jonathan gazed upon the stack of Change of Status Forms weighing down his desk. They would need to …
A Museum Christmas Carol (Part 1)
A Museum Christmas Carol Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. This was nonsense! Jonathan still had work to do. Jonathan gazed upon the stack of Change of Status Forms weighing down his desk. They would need to wait until after the new year for his …
Are Museums Neutral? Or are they Neutered?
While I was going to do a round-up of our favorite blog posts of the year today, a recent post by Rebecca Herz made me want to return to one topic: #MuseumsarenotNeutral. I wrote a bit about it last month, and it was one of the five most popular posts. But, let’s dive in: Neutrality …
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Museum Education 2018 Trend Forecast
Last month, I put a call out on Twitter for museum professionals to share their predictions for 2018. Before we get into the trends, it is useful to share the respondents’ collective vision of museums and the field. What is a museum? I invited participants to share their definition of a museum in 140 words …
5 Ways that UX Designers Practice can Improve Museum Work
User Experience Design is the set of practices employed to create products that center the user. These designers focus on people to make products better. Their working practices also center people to foster collaboration and support. So, what can museum workers learn from UX Designers: Problem: You are working on a big project …
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How Best to Use Visuals
Visuals are incredibly powerful tools for teaching. But, you need to think about visuals alongside the text. Don’t make one element subsidiary to the other. Figure out what you need to get across and then develop a strategy for that idea. If you have ever written a label, you might have struggled on how to …