Museum 2.0

DECEMBER 3, 2019

I love alternative history novels. I was thinking I’d do a few alternative histories of museums for the first post of the last month of the decade. As I imagined a world without the many museum tech projects of the decade, I felt inherently sad about the imagining away the successes that friends and colleagues have enjoying.

Museum 21

Museum Work Social Media Alternative 21

Museum 2.0

MARCH 29, 2011

Last month, I learned about a fabulous, simple participatory experiment called “Case by Case” at the San Diego Museum of Natural History that uses visitor feedback to develop more effective object labels. To date, the solution has been to put photos on the walls, pray for funding, and ignore the front-end evaluation bit.

San Diego 55

San Diego History Museum Participatory 55

VQ Strategies

MARCH 22, 2022

Reading this immediately reminded me of my years working in museums, developing exhibitions and training and supporting volunteers who worked as interpreters in our blockbuster shows. Our museum was well known for exceptionally beautiful and well executed signage (labels) in the galleries.

Museum 74

Museum Train Training Volunteer 74

Museum 2.0

DECEMBER 15, 2014

Gretchen Jennings convened a group of bloggers and colleagues online to develop a statement about museums'' responsibilities and opportunities in response to the events in Ferguson, Cleveland and Staten Island. Museums are a part of this educational and cultural network. Where do museums fit in? Here is our statement.

Museum 52

Museum Blogger Cleveland Missouri 52

Museum 2.0

MAY 21, 2014

I''ve now been the executive director of the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History for three years. I''m open to any questions you want to share in the comments. We talk a lot at our museum about empowering our visitors, collaborators, interns, and staff by making space for them to shine. In the meantime, here are some.

Museum 49

Museum Director Teen History 49

Nonprofit Tech for Good

OCTOBER 20, 2019

4) Art Institute of Chicago Museum Shop :: shop.artic.edu. The Art Institute of Chicago Museum Shop sells unique and beautiful objects from around the world in support of the arts. 6) Field Museum Store :: store.fieldmuseum.org. 18) SFMOMA Museum Store :: museumstore.sfmoma.org. 8) Getty Store :: shop.getty.edu.

Benefit 101

Benefit Online Asia Museum 101

Forum One

FEBRUARY 19, 2024

This Black History Month, we reflect on the strategy work that our team does through our partnership with the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture —much of which centers around expanding access. The outcome was an immensely successful event that attracted audiences from all corners of the country.

History 75

History Accessibility Museum Award 75

Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 26, 2012

Writing my masters thesis for Gothenburg University’s International Museum Studies program while also working four days a week as the Director of Community Programs at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History this spring was certainly a challenge but also an incredible opportunity.

Museum 49

Museum Program Participatory Community 49

Museum 2.0

MAY 2, 2012

Today is my one-year anniversary as the executive director of the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History. A year ago, I put my consultant hat on the shelf and decided to jump into museum management (a sentence I NEVER would have imagined writing five years ago). I'm open to any questions you want to raise in the comments.

Museum 55

Museum Director Participatory Culture 55

Museum 2.0

JULY 17, 2013

Last week, my museum hosted Hack the Museum Camp , a 2.5 day adventure in which teams of adults--75 people, of whom about half are museum professionals, half creative folks of various stripes--developed an experimental exhibition around our permanent collection in our largest gallery.

Museum 49

Museum Arts History Professional 49

Museum 2.0

AUGUST 14, 2013

One of the greatest gifts of my babymoon is the opportunity to share the Museum 2.0 First up is Beck Tench, a "simplifier, illustrator, story teller, and technologist" working at the Museum of Life & Science in Durham, NC. As a person who works for a science museum, I work in an environment that supports play.

Museum 51

Museum Roles Game Participatory 51

Amy Sample Ward

JUNE 21, 2011

Ruth Cohen – American Museum of natural History. Jason Eppink – Museum of the Moving Image. Involvement from the curators and staff to develop 100 quests that the public could participate in on the night of the 20th. Ruth Cohen – American Museum of natural History.

Game 140

Game Culture Museum Change 140

Museum 2.0

MAY 6, 2016

Five years ago, I left the consulting world to take the helm at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History (MAH) at a time of crisis and change. We have spent the past three years planning and raising money for a project to build a creative town square for our city on the front porch of the museum.

Museum 20

Museum Director Arts History 20

Museum 2.0

FEBRUARY 9, 2010

Recently, I was giving a presentation about participatory techniques at an art museum, when a staff member raised her hand and asked, "Did you have to look really hard to find examples from art museums? Aren't art museums less open to participation than other kinds of museums?" I was surprised by her question.

Museum 29

Museum Difference Participatory History 29

Museum 2.0

AUGUST 6, 2014

MuseumCamp is an annual professional development event at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History in which teams of diverse, creative people work on quick and dirty projects on a big theme. On the other hand, a photobooth where people were prompted to take a photo with a stranger they met at the museum was barely used.

Experiment 52

Experiment Impact Social Museum 52

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.

Museum 45

Museum Question Participatory Vietnam 45

Museum 2.0

MARCH 4, 2015

This week marks five years since the book The Participatory Museum was first released. Across the museum field, the questions about visitor participation have gone from "what?" Over the past four years, I''ve been running a small regional art and history museum in Santa Cruz, CA. and "why?" to "how?".

Participatory 20

Participatory Museum Empowerment Facilitation 20

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.

Museum 55

Museum Learning History Arts 55

Museum 2.0

OCTOBER 3, 2012

But Vi doesn't work in a science museum. Beth Harris and Steven Zucker, who are well known in museums for their excellent Smarthistory website and podcasts. Beth Harris and Steven Zucker's content about art history is social and dialogue-based in format. the way the best museums do.

Learning 55

Learning Free Museum Online 55

Museum 2.0

MARCH 25, 2015

This is the first in a two-part series about the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History’s new theory of change. This week, Ian David Moss and I are each writing blog posts about our collaborative process to develop a theory of change at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History. We had tripled our attendance.

Process 20

Process Change Develop Museum 20

Museum 2.0

APRIL 1, 2015

Last week, Ian David Moss and I both blogged about the process of developing a theory of change for the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History. At the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History, one way we''re answering these questions is with a theory of change. Museum of Art and History social bridging'

Change 20

Change Museum History Arts 20

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.

Museum 35

Museum Participatory Interaction Classroom 35

Museum 2.0

MARCH 14, 2017

This is the second installation in a series of posts on the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History (MAH)'s development of Abbott Square , a new creative community plaza in downtown Santa Cruz. The MAH fundamentally has two jobs: we bring art and history out into our community, and we invite our community in.

Public 27

Public Museum Arts History 27

Museum 2.0

AUGUST 22, 2012

At the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History, we take our interns seriously, give them real responsibility, creative challenges, and meaningful work opportunities. We also have fabulous opportunities in Community Programs, Education, and Development - please check the website for all the options and information on how to apply.

Participatory 37

Participatory Museum Photography Unconference 37

Museum 2.0

JUNE 25, 2014

A man walks into a museum. Two years ago, we mounted one of our most successful participatory exhibits ever at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History: Memory Jars. Two years later, this project is still one of the most fondly remembered participatory experiences at the museum--by visitors and staff. He shares a story.

Participatory 52

Participatory Evaluation Project Museum 52

Museum 2.0

DECEMBER 2, 2015

The book is a deep account of repatriation of spiritual objects from museums to native people, written by museum people and Blackfoot people together. This story starts in 1960s, though of course, the story of the Blackfoot people and their dealings with museums started way before that. The museums were not.

Museum 20

Museum National Story Difference 20

Museum 2.0

FEBRUARY 29, 2012

Last month, MAH curator Susan Hillhouse and I sat down and wrote an exhibition philosophy for our museum. We wanted to share with people, in as clear and transparent a format as possible, our approach to developing exhibitions. We discussed research about how visitors experience museums.

Museum 38

Museum Artist Participatory History 38

Museum 2.0

OCTOBER 24, 2012

I like to ask myself this question periodically, challenging myself to find substantive ways for visitors to contribute to our museum. Visitors can comment on how we can improve or what they would like to see. We actively seek participation and develop structured opportunities for visitors to collaborate with us.

Platform 41

Platform Open Museum Participatory 41

Museum 2.0

JANUARY 11, 2012

For years, I'd give talks about community participation in museums and cultural institutions, and I'd always get the inevitable question: "but what value does this really have when it comes to dollars and cents?" We're hearing on a daily basis that the museum has a new role in peoples' lives and in the identity of the county.

Audience 47

Audience Museum Participatory History 47

Museum 2.0

DECEMBER 28, 2010

Every once in a while I come across a project I wish I could have included in The Participatory Museum. For one year, a group of twelve schoolchildren age 9-11 were invited to work with staff at the Wallace Collection to develop a family-focused exhibition using the museum's artifacts. it's a Secret! , What made Shh.

Children 46

Children Museum Create Project 46

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

MAY 7, 2010

Nina has written a fantastic book engagement called The Participatory Museum. If you want a chance of winning a copy, leave a comment saying how you might apply some of the science of participation to your social media strategy. Despite its long history, few researchers studied the use and impact of citizen science until the 1980s.

Model 98

Model Activities Active Activism 98

Museum 2.0

AUGUST 8, 2012

A woman walks into your museum. They wrote a comment about their experience that got turned into a bird by other visitors in the public sculpture hanging in the middle of the museum. You remember seeing them stand in front of the magic mirror in the history gallery, laughing as they made themselves into giants in the glass.

Museum 42

Museum Boston Track Celebrate 42

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? Many exhibit developers create thoughtful interactives intended for all ages and then discover that old familiar pattern--kids engaging while parents stand back and watch.

Interaction 47

Interaction Design Museum Participatory 47

Museum 2.0

JUNE 8, 2010

This guest post was written by Rebecca Lawrence, Museum Educator, Schwenkfelder Library & Heritage Center in Pennsylvania. You can join the conversation in the blog comments, or on the Museum 2.0 The Schwenkfelder Library & Heritage Center (SLHC) is a small museum located in Pennsburg, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania.

Place 27

Place Museum Discussion Pennsylvania 27

Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 12, 2012

In the spirit of a popular post written earlier this year , I want to share the behind the scenes on our current almost-museumwide exhibition at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History, Santa Cruz Collects. As always, I welcome your questions and comments. I hope there's something in here you can use.

Participatory 44

Participatory Museum History International 44

Museum 2.0

JANUARY 16, 2013

It's not every day that a visitor buys pizza for everyone in the museum. Then again, Saturday was hardly normal at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History. The museum itself was well-integrated into the event. Or that visitors form a spontaneous "laugh circle" on the floor. Online to onsite migration isn't always easy.

Reflection 43

Reflection Community Museum Participatory 43

Museum 2.0

DECEMBER 19, 2012

We're looking for an Exhibitions Manager to join our team here at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History. You Can't Do That in Museums Camp is filling up. You do not have to be a museum professional to be part of this--we'd like a diverse mix of participants. Come to Camp. If you are interested, please apply soon !

Participatory 32

Participatory Museum Blended History 32