Internship Update - Week 10?

I haven't done an internship update in a while, so I figured I'd get you up to speed on what I've been up to! 

Things have really picked up for me as an intern. I'm helping out with the Arts/Industry program now, so I'm transcribing interviews with artists in residence. There have been nearly 400 artists, so I have my work cut out for me! It's been really awesome listening to what the artists have gleaned from the program and how things they did in the residency made an impact on the rest of the career. One of the artists talked about how before she worked in the factory, she almost always worked on the pottery wheel exclusively and that the factory really opened her eyes to mold making and expanded her knowledge base in pottery. It's really fascinating hearing so many points of view on the same program. It's all in the same place with relatively the same structure, yet every artist has a completely unique experience. Those experiences really come out in the interviews and I like being able to share in those memories.

Another thing I've been doing is helping install exhibitions. The first exhibition install that I observed was Kate McDowell. She created these toads during her residency with Arts/Industry and the install process was pretty intense. The toads were really fragile and had to be attached so that no one could just pick one up and walk off with it. It was a really interesting process to watch.

Photo courtesy of John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan. Artist: Kate MacDowell

With Lauren Fensterstock's exhibit, I was able to take a more active role and help with placing grass as part of her installation Celebration of Formal Effects, Whether Natural or Artificial. It was a really amazing experience to be able to work closely with an established artist. I'm also preparing for my senior seminar gallery show with my peers, so it's been an eyeopening experience to witness what happens in the gallery during an install of an exhibit. 

John Michael Kohler Arts Center is in the process of installing a series of new exhibitions under the name Uncommon Ground, which has a lot to do with ecological art. If you've been following the blog at all, you know that's my thing! One of the exhibits in this theme is John Grade's Capacitor, which is such an amazing idea, I'm going to save it for it's very own post. I've been helping install that and it's been a crazy, complicated process but it's definitely going to be worth it! 

Here's a sneak peek of what we're dealing with. I've been posting stuff on my instagram page pretty often so if you want to check it out, my name is _jenny_bee_. 

What's John Grade got going on? Guess you'll have to wait and see!

Other than helping install and transcribing interviews, I've been doing research on objects in folk art like memory jugs and smoking stands. 

I've been pretty busy here, but it's so great. I'm learning a lot and having fun!

Internship Update - Week 2

My internship is two days a week (Mondays and Wednesdays). On Mondays we are in the warehouse and on Wednesday we're at the arts center getting down to business.

This past Monday was my first day at the warehouse and now that I've done it for a whole day I think I can be better prepared for this next monday. What we're doing there is assigning each item an accession number, so that everything is cataloged and can be easily found and put in the right place. With the Ray Yoshida collection, everything is organized in tableaus, which is how Ray had his house set up. He would go to the Maxwell St. Market in Chicago and buy often overlooked items and give them new life in his house. He had a massive collection and would rotate his items, to keep his walls looking interesting. 

Those pictures to the left and right are good examples of Ray Yoshida's tableaus. This picture is from an exhibit of Ray Yoshida and his influences. 

I bet you're all saying "What was IN the tableaus, Jenny? I WANT TO KNOW!" Well, there are masks and ships and furniture and little ceramics people and a little under life-size baby statue and about a million other things that range from silent butlers to a set of wrenches.

One of the most interesting things I came across while checking the first tableaus was some 2-D work given to Ray by Jim Nutt, another Chicago Imagist. On the back, Jim had written notes to Ray. I love that part of art. So many times you'll only see one side of the picture and in this case it's literal. On the back side, there is a real person. Also, Jim Nutt seems hilarious to me. I can't exactly remember what it said, but it was something like "This is for Ray, because he had it cumming to him" and then there was a little picture of a splat. 

Ice cream manwich, perhaps? This is an example of a Jim Nutt piece.

On Wednesday, I worked on doing a little research on starting a museum blog. Starting this blog was fairly simple, but starting a blog for an institution is turning out to be quite a process. and, as with most things with museums, just because it seems like a good idea doesn't mean it's going anywhere fast. There's so much to consider when introducing social media to a business. What should you post, what shouldn't you post and with museums you also have to consider copyrights. I'm interested to see if the blog gets up and going or not. I like doing the research for the potential posts though! 

Next weekend, I'm going down to Chicago and hopefully will be visiting the Roger Brown Memorial Collection (another friend of Ray Yoshida) and I'll definitely be visiting Intuit, the museum where they have a replica of Henry Darger's apartment. I'm so excited! 

I'm planning a few posts this week, one about Mary Nohl and maybe one about John Grade; so be sure to check back!

Internship Update: Day 1

Today was my first day as an Exhibitions/Collections intern at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center. I was an intern there a couple years ago in the education department. I'm excited to be back there so I can get a well-rounded view of what working at a museum is all about. 

I'm working on a couple different projects. One of my main projects is helping the E/C department organize the objects in the Ray Yoshida exhibit. We went to the warehouse today, where they are storing them and organizing them before the exhibit and it was really exciting. It's bizarre to see art stored like that though, instead of being in a pristine gallery. Ray Yoshida is a fascinating artist, so stay tuned for at least a few posts about him. I have a feeling I'll be doing plenty of research about him.

One of Ray Yoshida's tableaus, which we'll be recreating in the museum this fall. 

I'm also doing a little in the world of social media. I'm going to be doing object-specific posts on the John Michael Kohler Facebook page, so if you're feeling like you want something interesting on your news feed - you should like it! I'm trying to increase the web/social media presence of the JMKAC. 

I'm going back there on Monday and we're working in the warehouse. I wish I could take pictures but alas, no photography allowed. Hopefully I'll be posting about a couple artists over the weekend, so check back!