American Museums Research Articles

Art in the Time of Frugality: Scarcity, Cooperation, and Change in American Art Museums

Funding for American art museums has undergone significant changes in the past 20 years. In particular, federal and corporate giving have substantially declined following the Great Recession. These changes impact museums’ ability to secure funding for exhibitions. This study addresses how funding scarcity affects American art museums, specifically with regard to staff’s ability to execute their own tasks and the strategies of action they use to compensate for these changes. Drawing from literature on resource scarcity, I explore how funding declines have prompted museum staff to use “strategic cooperation” as a means of diversifying limited financial resources. Moreover, using interviews with curators and development officers, I identify three cooperative strategies they may use: coordinating inter‐professional activities, pooling professional knowledge, and finding creative financial solutions. These findings add to work on resource scarcity by identifying inter‐group cooperation as a diversification strategy. More importantly, I add to this literature by specifically identifying multiple forms of strategic cooperation individuals may employ to combat resource scarcity. Finally, while literature on the arts has focused on museums’ propensity for inter‐professional conflict during times of duress, my work demonstrates that, despite this, cooperative action is a present and viable strategy in cultural organizations.

List of amphibian species (Vertebrata, Tetrapoda) of Burkina Faso

We related the first commented list of the amphibian species of Burkina Faso. To obtain contemporary data, we investigated six sites from July 2017 to September 2018. The survey is unique for West Africa in combining a variety of different habitat types, e.g. Sahelian areas, grassland and woodland savannahs, floodplains, gallery forests and agricultural sites. Animals were found at varying spatial scales by opportunistic visual encounter surveys after sunset supplemented with acoustic searching. Further data were based on museum vouchers collected between the years 1959 and 2011 and deposited in European and American museums, and the literature review focusing on the country species. We listed 36 anuran species from 11 families. Surprisingly seven taxa, namely Arthroleptis poecilonotus Peters, 1863, Afrixalus vittiger (Peters, 1876), Afrixalus weidholzi (Mertens, 1938), Kassina cassinoides (Boulenger, 1903), Ptychadena schillukorum (Werner, 1908), Hyperolius lamottei Laurent, 1958 and Amnirana albolabris (west) (Jongsma et al. 2018), were new country records. A few rare, hard to record or little known species, including Arthroleptis poecilonotus, Hyperolius lamottei, Xenopus tropicalis (Gray, 1864) and Amnirana albolabris (west) can be confirmed. The origin of a specimen of Sclerophrys mauritanica (Schlegel, 1841) mentioned as coming from Burkina Faso deposited in the collections of MNHN must be considered as an error. We briefly discussed the taxonomy and indicated the habitats of all species mentioned in this country so far. The discovery of several new country records highlights that the amphibian fauna of Burkina Faso is still incompletely known and that many poorly explored sites may still harbour a high diversity.

NAGPRA at 30: The Effects of Repatriation

On November 16, 1990, US President George H.W. Bush signed into law the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA). This federal legislation marked the culmination of decades of debate among scientists, curators, and Native American leaders and activists over the control of ancestral human remains and sacred, funerary, and communally owned objects. Anthropologists have now investigated myriad aspects of NAGPRA, from its underlying philosophical arguments; to its legislative history, its legal ramifications and political effects, and the methods of its implementation; to how it has remade American museums, archaeologists, tribes, and federally funded repositories; and to how it has ushered in a new (even if imperfect) period of collaboration and partnership. This article reviews the last 50 years of scholarship on repatriation, with a particular focus on NAGPRA's last 30 years.

“The People Shall Continue”: Native American Museums as Archives of Futurity

AbstractIn the Western cultural archive from James Fenimore Cooper’s ‘noble savages’ to Gore Verbinsky’s 2013 reincarnation of The Lone Ranger, Indigenous American cultures have, for the longest time, been relegated to the past and framed in representations that either displace them into nostalgic folklore or declare them conveniently vanished. While non-Native cultural products such as literary texts, photographs, and paintings, as well as museum exhibitions have coded Indigenous identities as static opposites to modernity, and thus deprived them of a future in Western culture, contemporary Indigenous writers, artists, and curators use these same cultural channels to contest the semiotics of absence, to assert cultural sovereignty, and to empower alternative modes of knowledge. This article considers tribal museums as interventional archives of knowing – in Derrida’s sense of both “assigning residence or of entrusting so as to put into reserve” and of “consigning through gathering together signs” (1995/1996: 3; original emphasis). With examples from a Pueblo cultural context, including an exhibition at Disneyworld, Florida; the Sky City Cultural Center and Haak’u Museum in Acoma, New Mexico; as well as the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center in Albuquerque, New Mexico, I trace the ways in which Native American museums strategically undermine what Mark Rifkin has termed “settler time” (2017: 9) and claim instead presence, sovereignty, inclusion, modernity, and futurity. In their specific outlines, these exhibits serve simultaneously as archives of Pueblo cultural heritage and as construction sites of temporality itself.1

Cultural Darwinism and the Perils of Privatization: The Case of American Museums

The basis for understanding public support for the arts in the United States is the absence of any precedent for direct national involvement (Larson 1983). The American approach to culture has rejected any collective state intervention. At root, laissez-faire is a philosophy or practice characterized by the deliberate abstention from direction or planning by the state. It is a policy of non-interference especially with what is seen as individual freedom of choice and action. The belief is that the free market is the best means for allocating values. This ideological stance is often criticized, however, for failing to address questions of representativeness in a heterogeneous society. Support for public culture, by contrast, typically argues for policies that would promote greater diversity in the nation’s cultural life with enhanced accessibility for broader segments of the public. What will be explored herein is a study of the implications of a ‘laissez-faire cultural policy’ for museums in the United States and the resulting specter of Cultural Darwinism from this privatization.

Design features of the Inca museum of culture

The paper deals with the development of a design concept for a museum of Inca culture in Ecuador. The current trends in the organization of historical museums in Latin America are presented. An overview of the graphic support of the Latin American museums of culture, archeology, and history is made. The historical foundations of the Museum of Inca culture are presented, the iconography of the Inca civilization of various periods is analyzed. The current state of the museum, the history of its foundation, prerequisites for creating a new brand are described. Associative graphic images for creating a new logo for the museum were considered, corporate colors were substantiated, and components of the brand were developed. This will strengthen the museum's brand and increase its social significance for the popularization of the Inca culture.

Museum Cooperation Between Africa and Europe: A New Field for Museum Studies edited by Thomas Laely, Marc Meyer, and Raphael Schwere

Museum Cooperation Between Africa and Europe: A New Field for Museum Studies edited by Thomas Laely, Marc Meyer, and Raphael Schwere

Earned Income and American Museums


 
 
 The basis of the American approach to culture eschews any collective state intervention. Cultural institutions, such as museums, originated as the beneficiaries of private donors. Such philanthropy benefits from a tax code that provides financial incentives for contributions to private organizations. For institutions, funds raised from ancillary activities, such as gift shops, also enjoy significant tax exemptions. Yet, despite these publicly financed tax deductions, cultural visions are privately conceived, and reflect the agendas of the donors. This attitude represents the basic principle of the American patronage system: one that is facilitated by a tax policy, not a cultural policy.
 
 

Evolution and research trends of inclusive museum studies: a bibliometric approach

Inclusion is defined as the opportunity disabled people have to fully participate in different contexts: education, work, consumption, entertainment, and other daily social activities. For an understanding of that, this study aims at examine the evolution and research trends of the field of inclusive museums in order propose a line of research that includes growing and emerging concepts in this area of knowledge. For that purpose, technological mapping was carried out by means of a bibliometric analysis that examined 284 publications indexed in Scopus from 1987 to 2018. Results indicate that 47 countries have carried out studies on inclusive museums, within the framework of the research lines inclusive education and education in museums. Research that has been disseminated in greater measure through American journals. This bibliometric study on inclusive museums enabled to shed light on the productivity, impact, and networking of researchers in this field. Finally, this study constitutes a relevant starting point that not only presents trends in the field of inclusive museums but also encourages university communities and cultural institutions (such as Latin American museums) to consider the role they play in said area, as well as the visibility of their research efforts.

Collection Related to the Omaguaca Indians from the Pucara de Tilcara Fortress, Northwestern Argentina, at the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography RAS, St. Petersburg: Tentative Findings

This study describes artifacts and human remains from the Pucara de Tilcara fortress, in the Province of Jujuy, Argentina, acquired by MAE RAN from the Ethnographic Museum in Buenos Aires in 1910 under the Russian-Argentinian exchange project. Unearthed in 1908-1910, many cultural and skeletal finds were shipped to American, European, and Asian museums. Later, scholars were unable to study the site in detail. The re-examination of those materials is all the more important because the habitation layers were destroyed in 1935 during the construction of the monument to the Pucara de Tilcara’s discoverers. The study of isolated parts of the collection and their typological analysis make it possible to narrow the date of the site and to assess certain aspects of technology. We examined archival sources owned by MAE RAN, SPbF ARAN, and the Juan B. Ambrosetti Ethnographic Museum. The comparative typological approach was used as well. In this article, we provide the first results of the attribution of artifacts, their typological classification, and a brief description of cranial finds. An important part of the study is the reconstruction of the occupations and knowledge system of those who lived at Pucara de Tilcara.

Should Public and Nonprofit Museums Have Free Admission?

A common pricing structure for American art museums is to offer a choice between an admission fee for a single visit, and the purchase of an annual membership that would allow the member an unlimited number of visits with no additional charge. This paper evaluates this particular method of museum pricing in terms of efficiency and equity. It concludes, drawing from the economic analysis of two-part pricing, that there is a strong rationale for the membership model, and that this is so even in cases where the museum experiences an increase in unrestricted endowment such that “free” membership would be financially sustainable.

Native Nations and Museums: Developing an Institutional Framework for Cultural Sovereignty

This article examines the changing relationships between museums and indigenous peoples over the past two centuries, with a specific focus upon the relationship of American museums to Native peoples within the United States. In the 19th century, the role of the American Museum was to acquire objects that could offer knowledge about natural history or world cultures to facilitate certain public values. With respect to Native peoples, the 19th century practices of American museum often institutionalized a hierarchical relationship consistent with the exploitative tenets of European colonialism and Imperialism. In comparison, modern museums must engage the multiple experiences of the diverse groups that are present within the nation-state, as well as disparate populations across the globe. Groups often disagree about the meaning of the past, as well as the articulation of their contemporary identity. In this respect, modern museums often participate in reshaping public values through the combined processes of repatriation and reconciliation. Through the process of repatriation, museums honor the human rights of Native peoples by transferring possession of ancestral human remains and cultural objects that were wrongfully appropriated in the past. Through the process of reconciliation, museums foster new relationships between Native peoples and the nation-state that more accurately reflect their distinctive historical experience and contemporary identity as separate sovereigns. This article argues that museums have an important role to play in the contemporary effort of Native Nations to assert their cultural sovereignty and reclaim their own histories. Specifically, the article examines the role of the National Museum of the American Indian and the role of tribal museums in fostering tribal cultural sovereignty.

The restitution of illicitly exported cultural properties: Recent Italian cases

The question of restitution of removed cultural properties to which existing treaties do not apply for chronological or other reasons, is far from being settled under customary international law. It seems that an evolutionary trend is developing in present customary international law according to which claims related to the movements of cultural properties should be addressed in order to achieve an equitable solution, taking into account all relevant circumstances. These circumstances include: factors surrounding the removal of the cultural property from the state of origin, in particular the legality of the removal under the law of the state of origin or the substantive injustice of the removal; the importance of the cultural property for the state of origin, including its emblematic character; harm to the integrity of the cultural context from which the cultural property was removed; the amount of time since the cultural property was removed from the state of origin; the appreciation for and the care used to preserve the cultural property in the state of destination; the state of origin’s commitment to care for the preservation of the cultural property if it is returned to it. Agreements between the Italian Ministry of Cultural Properties and activities by American museums are aimed at resolving disputes over the return of cultural properties in order to reach an equitable solution taking into account all relevant circumstances. This objective should govern relations between states of origin and states of destination of cultural properties, and should also be shared, if this is the case, also by nonstate entities concerned. Non-adversarial procedures, such as negotiation, mediation or conciliation, should be put in place to achieve the objective.

To Kitchen


 
 
 The word kitchen has done as much work in the English language as the people who have toiled in the space the word names. The Bard himself, William Shakespeare, “verbed” the term in 1623, using kitchen to mean serving the food in the space in which it was prepared: “There is a fat friend at your master’s house, That kitchin’d me for you to day at dinner.” A century later, Scots used the term as a synonym for both pleasurable eating and frugality—for seasoning food and for budgeting and provisioning food beyond harvest. By the end of the nineteenth century, kitchening was interchangeable with cooking, food service, and the related work undertaken in this domestic production space.
 Existing examinations of the American kitchen emphasize the architectural design of the space, often pointing to technological and energy innovations as factors for the space’s changing design over the centuries. Historians of women and labor also stress mechanization, arguing that the technologies touted as labor saving were, in reality, not—in many cases, new technology raised standards and increased women’s work. Understanding this, scholars have focused on women’s decisions about kitchen design and cookery, seeking evidence in diaries, letters, and recipes. Rising research interest in food studies has renewed scholarly attention to the kitchen and its contents and occupants, linking in interesting ways food, material culture, labor, and consumption.
 In this presentation I discuss how attention to the material and visual evidence of American women’s kitchening, from making food to (re)modeling the workspace of the kitchen itself, improves our understanding of the history of the kitchen derived from prescriptive literature such as household manuals and home economics texts. I consider the related changes in domestic kitchens and American foodways in the United States since the 1840s, when the processes of industrialization shifted the ways Americans worked and ate. Last, I devote attention to the ways in which American museums have and continue to collect and display kitchen objects. Museums depicting preindustrial kitchens often feature cooking demonstrations utilizing the era’s tools and foodways or emphasize the dining experience, while museums with industrial and postindustrial collections display the kitchen and its mass-produced material culture as aesthetically delightful products of design divorced from the foods these objects help to prepare. I hope this presentation may elicit a discussion about what museums should be collecting to represent kitchening in the 21st century.
 
 

NETWORKING MUSEUMS, OLDER PEOPLE, AND COMMUNITIES: UNCOVERING AND SUSTAINING STRENGTHS IN AGING

Museums, like other cultural institutions, are beginning to embrace a new role: facilitating creativity of older adults through education programs. A cohort of 20 American museums from Alaska to Puerto Rico are embarking on an ambitious two-year program, funded by Aroha Philanthropies, to develop successful creative aging programs in their communities. The cohort includes art museums, history centers, botanical gardens and a science museum. The group has received extensive training and technical assistance to build their capacity and awareness of needs and desires of older adults. The American Alliance of Museums (AAM), a partner in this initiative, is leading a deep dive into the potential of museums to enable older adults to learn, make and share the arts. With Aroha’s support, AAM has created a two-year position, the Aroha Senior Fellowship in Museums and Creative Aging to lead an exploration of how museums can deepen their engagement with creative aging.

“The Twenty-Four-Inch Box in Your Living Room is Not a Museum” – Early Experiments in Museum Television

ABSTRACTIn the early 1950s television was the hot new broadcast media. The post-war economic boom meant that more and more American households were purchasing televisions, and television programming was growing to meet demand. The moment was rife with the potential to reach more and more people through the dazzling allure of television. Many American museums saw the potential to expand their audiences beyond their building to reach people who had never stepped foot inside a museum, effectively expanding the reaching of the museum into American living rooms. This idea was not without controversy. In fact, larger debates circulated at the time about whether or not television could be educational as well as entertaining. This essay examines three museum television programs that debuted in 1951–1952 and were amongst the first television program produced by museums. Produced by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, The Penn Museum, and The Museum of Modern Art, each program reveals individual approaches to the use of emerging technology for educational purposes. This essay considers the value of history in understanding and responding to contemporary debates about technology and change.

Art of Asia Acquired by North American Museums, 2017–2018

Art of Asia Acquired by North American Museums, 2017–2018

High culture, black culture: Strategic assimilation and cultural steering in museum philanthropy

This article provides a case study of race and big-gift cultural patronage, a theoretically and empirically understudied phenomenon, by investigating million-dollar donations to the Smithsonian Institution by black patrons. I find that large donations by black supporters are concentrated at one Smithsonian museum – the National Museum of African American History and Culture. To explain this distinctive pattern of cultural consumption, I draw on ethnographic data and archival texts related to patronage at African American museums. Gifts to the National Museum of African American History and Culture can be partly explained by strategic acculturation, or an impulse to articulate and nurture black identity through consuming black culture. However, cultural steering also played a key role. Black donors were identified and cultivated via a robust fundraising infrastructure where market research cast them as key constituents of the National Museum of African American History and Culture and taste-making strategies that constructed the museum as worthy reinforced their attraction to the museum. By conceptually and empirically elaborating cultural steering, this analysis offers a more complete model of black middle- and upper-class consumption of black culture.

Slavery and Public History at the Big House

Abstract This article considers the public history of slavery at plantation museums in the US South and at country houses in Britain. Drawing on original research, the authors critique recent and current efforts to bring connections between these “Big Houses” and the history of slavery to the fore through different methods of interpretation. These elite residences are argued to have largely obscured such connections historically through distancing, distortion, and denial. However, some notable efforts have been made in recent years to diversify public history narratives and more fully represent histories of enslavement. Comparing these American and British house museums, this article contextualizes public history work at these sites and proposes possible lessons from this research, presenting some points to be taken forward which emerge from this transatlantic comparison.

Późnoantyczne tkaniny jedwabne z Achmim w zbiorach Muzeum Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego w Krakowie

Late Antique silk fabrics from Akhmim in the collection of the Jagiellonian University in Kraków The paper presents so-far unpublished fragments of Late Antique silk fabrics in the Jagiellonian University Museum (MUJ). According to the archival documentation they derive from the collection of the Alsatian archaeologist, Robert Forrer (1866–1947), who was one of the pioneering collectors and dealers in Late Antique textiles from Egypt. Silks in the MUJ belong to the group of “Zachariasstoffe”, said to be found in Akhmim in Upper Egypt. Parallel fragments can be found in many European and American museums.