Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

APRIL 30, 2008

Last week I taught a social media workshop for artists and arts nonprofits and did some research on different arts organizations using social media effectively. The Brooklyn Museum kept coming up as a stellar example, particularly its Click Exhibition (Nina Simon wrote an analysis of the project here ). IMA Staffer Facebook Profile.

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Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

DECEMBER 1, 2010

Is that a Zen graffiti artist? She uses the word “curate&# which makes me imagine nonprofits as museum curators. Museum curators have expertise in a particular area of art, they know the ecosystem around the art – the artists, the patrons, other collectors, and other museum curators interested in that art form.

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Museum 2.0

OCTOBER 10, 2012

This citywide festival showcased work by 1,517 artists competing for a $200,000 top cash prize awarded by public vote. The Brooklyn Museum just finished the public stage of GO , a "community-curated open studio project." The Brooklyn Museum just finished the public stage of GO , a "community-curated open studio project."

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Museum 2.0

JULY 23, 2019

Me with a friend As I keep saying, I’ve been to a few museums of late. In reflecting on the sample, I’ve made some broad reflections on museum workers and visitors. Our visitors often see museums as a genre, not unlike hospitals or libraries. But, while adjacent, museums differ from formal classrooms in numerous ways.

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Amy Sample Ward

JUNE 21, 2011

Ruth Cohen – American Museum of natural History. Jason Eppink – Museum of the Moving Image. Ruth Cohen – American Museum of natural History. We are trying to change the visitors’ experience at the museum as well as ownership of what is in the museum, break down the walls between the public and the museum.

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Museum 2.0

DECEMBER 30, 2008

Dear Museums on Twitter, Thanks for experimenting in a new and largely uncharted online environment. So here is a list of suggestions that hopefully will improve the way your museum thinks about using Twitter. Or it's rainy so you suggest I visit the museum? I am a museum of Native Cultures and Art!" You could do better.

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Museum Twitter Open San Francisco 46

Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 18, 2013

This August/September, I am "rerunning" popular Museum 2.0 Originally posted in April of 2011, just before I hung up my consulting hat for my current job at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History. I''ve spent much of the past three years on the road giving workshops and talks about audience participation in museums.

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Museum Question Participatory Evaluation 45

Museum 2.0

APRIL 23, 2014

Museums, Politics, and Power is a new blog that lives up to its name. Sound familiar? Some serious parallels to curating exhibitions and performances, especially with living artists. As Brian puts it: "What happens when an artist’s inclinations towards her/his work conflict with her/his ability to sell and keep making it?"

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Museum 2.0

FEBRUARY 4, 2016

Photo by CLoé Zarifian, MAH Photo Intern We're working with a guest curator, Wes Modes , on an upcoming experimental project at our museum. Wes is an artist, and this is his first time running a museum exhibition development process. He asked staff and artist friends for feedback on the concept.

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Museum 2.0

OCTOBER 12, 2011

The title may sound innocuous. There's the barrier of artistic quality--funders, trustees, or staff members who argue that work by non-canonical artists is not up to the standards of the institution. Reading the report, I kept thinking of Rick Lowe, the artist and community activist behind Project Row Houses in Houston.

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Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 29, 2009

When you find a bar with your favorite song on the jukebox, or a museum room that feels like your grandmother's living room, you suddenly feel a strong affinity and are able to see yourself reflected in the space. Of course, the problem with all of this is that it sounds crazy from a business perspective.

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Museum 2.0

JUNE 12, 2013

TCG is the industry association for non-profit theaters, the way AAM is for museums. Given TCG''s multi-year Audience (R)evolution initiative, I took the opportunity to write a new talk about what revolution has looked like at our small museum in Santa Cruz. We heard again and again that the museum was cold and uncomfortable.

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Museum 2.0

FEBRUARY 13, 2013

I truly wish I could have attended Facing Race , which sounded like a completely awesome and transformative event this past fall in Baltimore. I recently met Jada Wright-Green, a museum professional who runs a site called Heritage Salon that looks at issues and possibilities in the African-American museum community.

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Arts Question North Carolina Museum 48

Museum 2.0

OCTOBER 30, 2013

The book of the same title that he edited is rocking my world, both as a museum professional who cares about inclusion and as a new mother. I realize that I may sound like a college freshman who just discovered Psych 101, but heck. This blog is about shared learning, and I went to engineering school. Implicit Associations test.

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Museum 2.0

APRIL 2, 2014

It is what it sounds like: a book of original sheet music, beautifully designed and complemented with artwork and text. There are many artistic projects that offer a template for participation, whether a printed play, an orchestral score, or a visual artwork that involves an instructional set (from community murals to Sol LeWitt).

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Museum 2.0

MAY 10, 2011

It's my second week as the Executive Director at The Museum of Art & History in Santa Cruz, CA, and boy is my everything tired. And despite the fact that I've enjoyed being at the museum for 12 hours plus for ten days in a row, I'm quickly realizing that if I want to really get some fun participatory projects going, I need some help.

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Museum 2.0

NOVEMBER 18, 2014

I''ve mostly seen museums employ one of two methods for formal community advisors: Create special "spots" on the board of trustees for certain kinds of community representatives. CON: can feel disconnected from the primary governance of the museum or can feel like a second-class board overall. I struggle with both these options.

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Museum 2.0

FEBRUARY 15, 2012

We've gotten a little more organized at The Museum of Art & History , and we've now released opportunities for summer internships. These are unpaid part-time and full-time opportunities to help design public programs, develop new uses for the museum, perform visitor research, and pursue unusual projects. Sounds good?

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Museum 2.0

MARCH 3, 2007

But I’d been scribbling notes for an art museum label post for awhile, and then yesterday, the NY Times had a review of a new show at MOMA, Comic Abstraction. The collection is disaggregated, grouped by floor (Painting and Sculpture 1) rather than artist, movement, time period, or geography. MOMA has standard art museum labels.

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Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 9, 2009

Between high-altitude hijinks, run-ins with wildlife, and very long days of hiking, I finished John Falk's new book, Identity and the Museum Visitor Experience. In other words, if you are a curious person, you will go to museums to learn new things.

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Museum 2.0

JUNE 19, 2013

These might sound obvious, but when you think about how they relate to bad participatory processes, it becomes apparent where things can break down. This is an issue we are actively grappling with at our museum. At many museums, the curatorial process is completely closed and undiscoverable --"don''t call us, we''ll call you."

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Museum 2.0

JANUARY 18, 2012

When talking about active audience engagement with friends in the museum field, I often hear one frustrated question: how can we get adults to participate? In children's museums and science centers, this relationship is at its most extreme. And yet in the museum world, we still see interactives as being mostly for kids.

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Everyaction

MARCH 22, 2018

Anyone briefly strolling through this park will likely hear the sound of a brass band and see local artists scattered along the sidewalk. Voodoo Museum. Established in 1721 during French colonial rule of the city, for nearly 300 years Jackson Square has been the heart and soul of the French Quarter. The Audubon Zoo. Swamp Tours.

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Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

JULY 1, 2009

Submitted by Nina Simon, publisher of Museum 2.0. I’ve had it with museums’ obsession with open-ended self-expression. I know this sounds strange coming from someone writing an admittedly self-expressive blog post, but hear me out. And yet many museums are fixated on creators. This is a problem for two reasons.

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Museum 2.0

MARCH 8, 2011

Last month, artist and game designer Nikki Pugh led an utterly charming, often hilarious community residency at the City Gallery in Leicester, UK. There was a large mind map on the wall with a prompt in the middle encouraging visitors to imagine a slightly distant future with no staff present to enforce the rules in galleries or museums.

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Interview Museum Badge Game 37

Museum 2.0

MARCH 16, 2009

I’ve had it with museums’ obsession with open-ended self-expression. I know this sounds strange coming from someone writing an admittedly self-expressive blog post, but hear me out. And yet many museums are fixated on creators. Museums see open-ended self-expression as the be-all of participatory experiences.

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Museum 2.0

JANUARY 24, 2011

This post features an interview with Sarah Schultz, a museum staffer at one of the institutions Light profiled in the book (the Walker Art Center). Guard staff who are willing to let an artist step between two panes of glass to perform. A crew that has the capacity to build a sign at the last minute. It's inherent in what we do.

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Connection Cafe

AUGUST 3, 2015

When I attended, the theme was “Inkery”, so besides getting access to all the standard interactive exhibits, I was also able to get a caricature drawn, get ‘inked’ at a squid dissection, get a henna tattoo, decorate a sugar cookie with natural food dyes, and enjoy light snacks and drinks – all while a DJ mixed top tracks over the sound system.

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Audience Austin Test Portland 20

Everyaction

JULY 12, 2018

Anyone briefly strolling through this park will likely hear the sound of a brass band and see local artists scattered along the sidewalk. Voodoo Museum. Established in 1721 during French colonial rule of the city, for nearly 300 years Jackson Square has been the heart and soul of the French Quarter. The Audubon Zoo. Swamp Tours.

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Local Louisiana Turkey Guide 47

Nonprofit Tech for Good

DECEMBER 14, 2022

For example, if you join a modern art museum, there is a good chance you won’t have to pay admission to other modern art museums. A creative fundraiser can make any of these items sound attractive to the donor. Sometimes a nonprofit has access to world-class chefs, celebrities, artists, or architects or well-known lawmakers.

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Museum 2.0

FEBRUARY 22, 2012

What happens when a formal art museum invites a group of collaborative, participatory artists to be in residence for a year? Will the artists ruin the museum with their plant vacations and coatroom concerts? Will the bureaucracy of the institution drown the artists in red tape? No, this is not a reality TV show.

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Museum 2.0

JUNE 17, 2010

This morning, I gave the keynote address for the Washington Museums Association annual conference. It features lots of museum-based examples. But in this post, I wanted to highlight a goofy little (non-museum) project that inspires me in its simplicity and openness to mass collaboration. It's called One Million Giraffes.

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Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 20, 2010

Audience segmentation and research has become a hot topic in museums, especially when it comes to crafting appealing offerings that are customized to different kinds of visitors. I sat down with Kristen Denner, Director of Membership and Annual Fund, to learn more about the program's development and the museum's goals for its future.

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NTEN

JUNE 21, 2011

The speakers for this panel include: Tracy Fullerton - Electronics Arts Game Innovation Lab Ruth Cohen - American Museum of natural History Elaine Charnov - The NY Public Library Jason Eppink - Museum of the Moving Image Syed Salahuddin - Babycastles Elaine Cohen: The New York Public Library 100 Years of the flagship library in New York.

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Museum 2.0

APRIL 25, 2011

I've spent much of the past three years on the road giving workshops and talks about audience participation in museums. The Museum 2.0 In 2008 and 2009, there were many conference sessions and and documents presenting participatory case studies, most notably Wendy Pollock and Kathy McLean's book Visitor Voices in Museum Exhibitions.

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Have Fun - Do Good

MAY 15, 2009

Listen/subscribe on iTunes Tranquility du jour with Kimberly Wilson Kimberly Wilson, author of Hip Tranquil Chick: A Guide to Life On and Off the Yoga Mat , interviews artists, creative entrepreneurs, yoga teachers, and other hip tranquil chicks. Some shows feature young "digital diarists" sharing their opinions and ideas.

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Museum 2.0

APRIL 16, 2008

I've written before about the inspiring work that the Brooklyn Museum of Art is doing with their community-focused efforts. Click is an exhibition process in three parts: The Museum solicited photographs from artists via an open call on their website, Facebook group, Flickr groups, and outreach to Brooklyn-based arts organizations.

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