Short and Sweet: Skull Stories, The Art of Ancient Surgery
No need to read the panels! Skull Stories (from the San Diego Museum of Man) is concise enough that you can easily get the point without the written material.
I know how gory this whole skulls thing sounds like. Yet, this small exhibition was a treat.
In fact, I enjoyed the different exhibits so much (trephination tools, techniques, skull specimen, trephination world map,…) that I had to force myself spending the last 5 minutes going through the writings to make sure I didn’t miss anything.
Even though recycled from other exhibitions, the display cases and other educational props were particularly valuable as they helped cover the theme thoroughly. For example, a hand-on quiz introduced the 4 basic trephination techniques; for each technique, the visitor had to pick one of the 4 appropriate skull surgery holes, and then verify answers by pulling up the small wooden panels. On the other side of the room, past a case of trephination tools, also stood a giant map illustrating the presence of skull surgery in different places of the world including South America, Africa, Europe and Asia.
This easy to understand exhibition is one of the rare to deal with the Medical aspect of Physical Anthropology and should be seen by the whole family.
Kimono as Art Exhibition
This exhibition has two entranceways, but it is only after I was done contemplating the amazing kimonos that I realized that the way I entered may have been another person’s exit. After considering ‘my’ entrance, once more, I remembered a quote from French film maker Jean-Luc Godard which says that a story should have a beginning, a middle, and an end… but not necessarily in that order.
The conjoint San Diego Museum of Art/Timken’s newest exhibition follows this rule of thumb: whether you start your visit with the beginning or the end, the fullness of Itchiku Kubota’s kimono making skills would be uncovered evenly.
The culminating point of the exhibition is the Symphony of Light, a succession of 20 entirely hand-made kimonos representing the 4 seasons over mount Fuji and created over an eleven year time frame. This absolute piece of art is framed by two galleries working both as introduction and conclusion. The first one introduces artist Itchiku Kubota and gives the visitor a brief summary of his career, while the second is an attempt to illustrate the elaborate embellishment process.
This exemplar exhibition not only sets the trend to a visit where it is possible to start with the end or to finish with the beginning, but where all elements also make perfect sense.
The conjoint participation of Timken Museum was another brilliant concept, especially in a time where funds become rare and grants are less easily accessible.
links : SDMA, Timken Museum
Join the Google Group!
Don’t forget to join the Google Group to get updates on the exhibitions assignments! To do so, visit
http://groups.google.com/group/museum-cafe
and simply request to be added. This group is a nice way for members to meet the other participants as well as to communicate their interests, ideas, inputs for the next meetings.
The War Through Steichen’s Eyes
Before I introduce our next Museum Cafe topic, I’d like to thank those of you that could make it to our last meeting at BASSAM’s but also apologize to those that couldn’t find us as the meeting was running late.
This month, both photography and sea lovers will appreciate visiting the exhibition ”The War Through Steichen’s Eye” at the San Diego Maritime Museum. The museum closes at 8pm each night, so I thought that instead of meeting at the usually place we could, this time, visit the exhibition/boat together at around 6-6:30pm and then get dinner somewhere, maybe Little Italy. In any case, the Maritime Museum website will give the info on how to get there.
Let me know what you think!
A Day In Pompeii @ SDNHM
Since so many books, educational videos and museum exhibitions have already covered the topic, what makes A Day in Pompeii different?
For different reasons, traveling exhibitions have been quite fashionable these last couple of years. For instance, 2 Pompeii exhibitions are traveling the world currently. The first one is drawn from the collections of the National Archaeological Museum in Naples, has traveled since 2003 in Europe, Asia and North America and is currently presented at the Museum of Fine Art, Houston under the name Pompeii, Tales from an Eruption. The second one is a collaboration with the Soprintendenza Archeologica di Pompei, which has been to the Mobile Gulf’s Coast Exploreum and the Science Museum of Minnesota in 2007, is currently in San Diego, and will finally travel to Discovery Place in Charlotte, NC.
I’ve only seen the San Diego exhibition so far, but here’s my 2 cents on the pros and cons of this exhibition if compared with some old school European permanent exhibitions.
- A day in Pompeii is very good if you know little about roman history since it will explain different facets of daily life and does synchronize the city chronologically with the rest of roman history.
- This exhibition is also very poignant as it shows body casts of volcano’s victims.
- A good deal of room-size frescoes, sculptures, jewelry,… and even a carbonated bread are exhibited to evoke the richness and daily life in Pompeii, yet the quality of these samples is unimpressive compared to what archaeologists have dug in the past.
Above is a stereoview depicting the Stabienne Street, one of Pompeii’s commercial street back then.
Our First Fieldtrip @ MoPA
Later, we decided to migrate to the Museum of Photographic Arts for their POP-THURSDAY event where some of us chose to visit the new exhibitions while other preferred watching the featured movie : Harold and Maude.
Either way, thanks Karen, Laura, Fany, Jason, Felicia, Meg and Christian for your contributions! Let’s meet again next month! And let me all know if there’s something you’d like to see posted on this web-site (since it is really only just a sandbox so far) and share with me your brilliant ideas!
Soundwaves : The Art of Sampling
February 21rst, right after work, meet at Bassam Coffee Shop! Along with other hot topics (online exhibitions, music integration in exhibition,…), we will be discussing the show Soundwaves : The Art of Sampling currently displayed at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (La Jolla Location) and accessible online.
About this invitation. What looks like an electronic device is the face section of a Kaoss Pad, a very popular DJ tool. In fact, when you visit the exhibition web-site, you might want to look for artist Julio César Morales who used a Kaoss Pad to create his Undocumented Interventions video-mix!
Feed Back on Ancient Egypt Exhibition
First of all, thanks to those who were able to make it on the 17th! Your support was greatly appreciated!!
Couldn’t make it? Here are some points we discussed :
- The overall atmosphere of the Ancient Egypt exhibition. Massive glass doors are protecting the entrance to the exhibit, which creates a feeling of separation from the rest of the museum.
- The theme. Some of us were under the impression that the exhibit would entirely focus on Egypt and Egyptian mummies rituals. Despite the importance of showing mummification techniques, it was not quite clear, for instance, why mummies from Europe or South America were displayed.
- The unifying thread. Some informations that could have simplified the theme understanding were given towards the end of the visit.
We also discussed a bit about current and upcoming exhibitions in Balboa Park as well as practical details about future Museum Café meetings (time, place, advertising,…)
Next meeting will start at 5pm on Feb 21rst (BASSAM Coffee Shop). This time we’ll be discussing The Soundwaves :The Art of Sampling exhibition (MCASD La Jolla) and its web-site http://www.mcasd.org/soundwaves/
Case Study : When neighbourghood museums share the same mission
Consider the following case.
A is a small museum which, for the past 2 decades or so, has been emphasizing the presentation, collection and preservation of photography.
B is a neighbourhood museum which mission is to collect, preserve, exhibit and interpret outstanding works of art (any type of art). Due to the increasing interest for photography, B recently decided to expand its scope into the 15th art.
In spite of the attempted competition, who could blame B for developing a new marketing strategy? or for seeking new sources of financing?
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In the book Marketing Culture and the Arts (2001), author François Colbert attempts to explain why museums should supplement each other rather than covet each other’s ideas, missions or potential contributors.
According to him, virtually 100% of the population consumes at least one type of cultural product in any given year. The cultural product, in its broadest sense encompasses everything from high art to popular art (CDs, movies, books, theater,… and museums…)
Depending on their social profile, some people are interested by one form of art but not necessary the other. For instance, consumers may choose a museum to attend with friends because it fulfills their social needs more than any other activities.
Now, Colbert’s idea is that museum’s real enemy is not the museum down the street but the other cultural options. Hence, in our case study, Colbert would argue that A and B are attempting to aim the same marketing pool when they should in fact reach a public that would not normally come to museums.
Do you agree with Colbert? Why or why not?
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