Museopunks

Marshall McLuhan once proposed that new technologies introduce new habits of perception, new ways of seeing and interacting with the world. In this session, the Punks and their guests will tackle this theory head-on.

How do digital tools and technologies alter our habits of perception? What does it means to look at the world with one eye always glued to a screen? How is digital culture impacting our visual and written language, and are we cool with all of this?

Guests:

Beck Tench, Director for Innovation and Digital Engagement, Museum of Life and Science

Matthew Israel, Director of The Art Genome Project, Artsy

Nancy Proctor, Head of Mobile Strategy and Initiatives, Smithsonian Institution

This episode was recorded live at MCN2013 on November 23, 2013. Thank you to the Museum Computer Network for inviting us to be a part of the conference.

DigitalCitizenship.net cites nine individual elements of digital citizenship: access, commerce, communication, literacy, etiquette, law, rights & responsibilities, health & wellness, and security (self protection). Cultural institutions are doing well in some respects, but what about other areas? Could museum interactive experiences not only provide access to rich content, but also help increase the overall digital literacy of users? Can our digital projects travel parallel paths in pursuit of both curatorial mission and digital good? Should they?

Guests:

Darin Barney, Canada Research Chair in Technology & Citizenship, McGill University

Kyle Jaebker, Director IMA Lab, Indianapolis Museum of Art

Luis Marcelo Mendes, Communications Consultant for Museums, Fundação Roberto Marinho

This episode was recorded live at MCN 2013 on November 21, 2013. Thank you to the Museum Computer Network for making it possible, and inviting us to be a part of this conference.

Tyler Green (Modern Art Notes) recently wrote that “In the future, most American art museums — say, those with operating budgets of ~$7 million and up — will offer free general admission.” In this episode, the Punks talk to Green, and Maxwell L. Anderson, Director, Dallas Museum of Art, about just what it takes for museums to go free, and how new technologies, such as those that can collect extensive visitor data, make ‘free’ a new kind of proposition.

Of particular focus in this episode will be the DMA’s 2013 decision to go free, and to offer free membership. How has technology changed the conversation around free and open source materials, and access to museums – whether collections, or the museum experience itself? Is the museum re-imagined in its public capacity when it does move from a paid model to a free one? Do the data-collection possibilities of free membership programs like DMA Friends promise to change how sector-wide museum metrics are gathered, and if so, what does that mean for visitor modeling into the future?

One of the most interesting sessions at MCN2013 was on The Future of Museum Digital Departments, which featured staff from the Tate, the National Gallery, London, Imperial War Museums, and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and discussed the sometimes harsh realities of delivering a digital strategy within a complex organization. In the session, John Stack, Head of Digital Transformation at Tate, spoke about the museum’s recently adopted hub-and-spoke model for digital governance. In this episode, we break this idea down, and ask how different organisational structures can impact museums and digital organisations. How are museum digital departments integrated within broader institutional structures, and what impact does this have on digital’s place in the organisation?

For this discussion, the ‘punks are joined by Stack, and Keir Winesmith, Head of Web and Digital Platforms at SFMOMA. We talk about digital strategy, organisational structure, and the impact of the evolving digital landscape on the decision making process.

Museopunks regularly digs into some of the more innovative practice in museums, but so far, we’ve haven’t tackled curating. In this episode, Suse catches up with one of the most powerful people in the world of art – Paola Antonelli (@curiousoctopus), Senior Curator of Architecture & Design, Director of Research & Development, MoMA – to find out what innovative curating looks like. What does it mean to collect the @ symbol? Do museums need R&D departments? There are more and more entrepreneurial museum projects and labs beginning to pop up, like the Spark!Lab National Network, started at the Smithsonian in 2008, or the Indianapolis Museum of Arts IMA Lab (which we discussed during our recent MCN2013 session), but what do they offer the museum? And are such projects different when approached from curatorial position, than when driven from (say) the technology department? In this episode, we find out.

Net neutrality is a hot topic at the moment, in light of changes proposed by US Federal Communication Commission (FCC) Chairman Tom Wheeler that would allow Internet Service Providers to charge a premium for those who can afford to pay to deliver their content better and faster to their online audiences.

This issue has many in the museum sector concerned, with a post by Nancy Proctor on the Museums and the Web site noting that “It’s not hard to imagine a scenario in which the only way museum content gets seen online is if the museum has done a deal with a major online publisher.” Similarly, the Museum Computer Group (UK) have written that “every audience member and institution we work with would be affected if net neutrality was lost and non-discriminatory access to information was put at risk in the United States of America.”

In this episode, the Punks are joined by Titus Bicknell from Museums and the Web, and Chief Digital Officer for RLJ Entertainment, to unpack the concept of net neutrality, and find out what the proposed changes might mean for museums

Also in the show: Suse shares some big news, and Jeff previews his session at the AAM Conference, on in Seattle May 18-21.

Discussions about 3D scanning and printing technologies have started to gain momentum in the museum world, as they seem to offer museums significant new ways to engage with their collections, and audiences. Whether its 3D Hackathons (held to some consternation) or experimentation to replicate a 19th-century statue with 21st century technology, museums are seeing new possibilities for enabling new forms of access to collections, and fresh ways to engage with the public.

In this episode, the Punks talk to Liz Neely, formerly of the Art Institution of Chicago and President-Elect for the Museum Computer Network (MCN) board and Secretary/Treasurer for the New Media Consortium (NMC) board, and Tom Burtonwood, the first Ryan Center Artist-in-Residence at The Art Institute of Chicago, to unpack digital fabrication processes in museums, and discover how and why museums might want to invest in a 3D printer.

For those wanting a primer on all things 3D in museums, Liz Neely and Miriam Langer’s MW2013 paper Please Feel the Museum: The Emergence of 3D printing and scanning is a great place to start.

What does it mean to be a museum professional with an active online presence? How does blogging, Twitter, and other forms of social media communication give shape to a professional identity in the digital age? In this episode, the Punks talk to Nina Simon, Executive Director of the Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History, prolific blogger, and author of the book The Participatory Museum, and Ed Rodley, Associate Director of Integrated Media at Peabody Essex Museum and author of Thinking About Museums, about the impact that an active online and social media presence can have on museum work broadly, and on professional identity. What does it mean to “grow up professionally” in the public eye, or to enter into an online discourse with an already-established professional identity? How does the kind of professional discourse that social media makes possible give shape to new ways of thinking and perceiving museum work? And what are the long-term ramifications of living a professional life online for all to see?

What role does language have in dictating the way we talk and think about the future – and present – in museums? Does talking about the future hold museums back in the present? Do terms like “innovation” and “forward-thinking” actually promote the behaviours they connote? In this episode, the Punks talk to Colleen Dilenschneider, Chief Market Engagement Officer for IMPACTS, and Jeff Grabill, Professor of Rhetoric and Professional Writing and Chair of the Department of Writing, Rhetoric, and American Cultures at Michigan State University, about language, rhetoric, and the power of words in creating our world.

In 2008, AAM (now the American Alliance of Museums) established the Center for the Future of Museums to help museums understand the cultural, political, economic, environmental, and technological trends shaping the world, and envision how museums can help their communities thrive in coming decades. Why is this important? As CFM Founding Director Elizabeth Merritt wrote in 2011: ‘The biggest challenge in preparing for the future is imagining what it will be like. One of the most important roles of futures studies is to help people write stories of the future that, like all good fiction, tell the truth about something that hasn’t actually happened yet.’

This is one reason why Intel Futurist Brian David Johnson uses science fiction as a design tool for the development of technology and new products. In the introduction to The Tomorrow Project, Johnson writes that, ‘Each story is a kind of conversation about the future, a way to develop a deeper understanding, explore the opportunities and examine the hazards of a future that is not quite set but does get closer and closer each day.’

In this episode, the Punks go forecasting with Elizabeth Merritt and imagine what the impact of current cultural, economic and technological trends could be for museums. Also, the unexpected return of badgers!