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History

Explore the Vast Archive of the Museum of African American History and Culture Through Its New Digital Platform

November 23, 2021

Grace Ebert

Tintype of a young girl, 1870s. Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Gift of Oprah Winfrey

The latest in a slew of institutions launching virtual counterparts, the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture released a new platform that makes its archive accessible to those outside of its Washington, D.C. home. Displaying its lauded collection of Black history, the Searchable Museum is a digital trove of multimedia projects, videos, podcasts, and more than 40,000 3D renderings of its archive.

Its first exhibition, titled Slavery and Freedom, opens in 1400, an era before people were seen as goods to be bought and sold. “By the 1600s, an unanticipated shift took place. The primary commodity became enslaved African people. This is their story,” a statement says. The exhibition follows slavery’s trajectory—it speaks to the ways Black people shaped colonial North America and the hypocrisy inherent in the U.S.’s vows for freedom before culminating in an exploration of the Civil War and Reconstruction—through photos, banknotes, maps, illustrations, and a variety of other artifacts.

As its name suggests, the Searchable Museum offers multiple ways to peruse its archive, including an explore section with objects like Harriet Tubman’s shawl and the Point of Pines Slave Cabin, a relic from the plantation on Edisto Island, South Carolina, that was occupied from 1850 to the 1980s and is only viewable online. Other segments include glimpses into the stories of people who aren’t widely known but have profound impacts and the way history continues to shape life today. (via Hyperallergic)

 

Classroom, 1870. Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox, and Tilden Foundations

Anti-AIDS mural in New York City

Henrietta Lacks (HeLa): The Mother of Modern Medicine by Kadir Nelson, 2017. Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture and National Portrait Gallery, Gift from Kadir Nelson and the JKBN Group, LLC

March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, 1963. Library of Congress

 

 



Art

A Spectacular Collection of 40 Artist-Built Environments Are on Display in Sheboygan's Art Preserve

September 28, 2021

Grace Ebert

Emery Blagdon’s “The Healing Machine” at the Art Preserve. Photo by Rich Maciejewski, courtesy of John Michael Kohler Arts Center. All images shared with permission

On the edge of the city of Sheboygan in northeast Wisconsin is a new museum nestled into the hillside. Opened earlier this year, the Art Preserve of the John Michael Kohler Arts Center is home to 40 artist-built environments, or “spaces and places that have been significantly transformed by an artist to embody and express aspects of their history, place, and culture, their ideas and imagination.” The first of its kind, the spectacular, immersive space is an ode to the artists and their intellectual and creative trajectories, displaying a staggering array of installations, sculptures, paintings, and myriad works across mediums.

Ranging from Emery Blagdon’s suspended kinetic assemblages made of sheet metal, holiday lights, and other found objects to Nek Chand’s troupe of more than 150 mosaic figures, the artworks are eclectic in discipline, scale, and aesthetic. Each of the environments consists of thousands of objects, structural components, and ephemera that form a holistic, comprehensive view of the artist’s life and work. Around the circular pathway winding through Ray Yoshida’s reconstructed Chicago apartment, for example, are ritual masks from New Guinea, printed works, pieces of pop culture from Maxwell Street Market, and notes and letters, offering an intimate glimpse into his diverse collection and personal relationships.

In addition to the environments, the 56,000-square-foot space also houses 11 commissioned responses that included standalone works and projects literally embedded into the preserve’s structure. The Denver-based architecture studio Tres Birds designed the building, although the stairway was completed in collaboration with the late Ruth DeYoung Kohler II and uses concrete pavers that jut out beyond the walls to display a series of “hobo symbols,” or emblems travelers historically used to denote safety. Kohler conceived of the Art Preserve while director of the John Michael Kohler Arts Center, where she championed local and international artists and devoted herself to protecting their works and legacies.

Watch the video below for a tour of the expansive space, and dive into the full collection, which includes pieces from sites in Wisconsin, New York City, Mississippi, India, and other global locations, on its site.

 

Loy Bowlin’s “Beautiful Holy Jewel Home” in McComb, Mississippi

Installation view of works by Nek Chand at the Art Preserve (2021). Photo courtesy of John Michael Kohler Arts Center

The glittery “Beautiful Holy Jewel Home” by Loy Bowlin is flanked by an installation of paintings by Gregory Van Maanen at the Art Preserve. Photo by Rich Maciejewski, courtesy of John Michael Kohler Arts Center

Installation view of works by Jesse Howard at the Art Preserve. Photo by Rich Maciejewski, courtesy of John Michael Kohler Arts Center

Installation view of works by Ernest Hüpeden, Carl Peterson, Fred Smith, and Eugene Von Bruenchenhein at the Art Preserve, 2021. In the foreground is Fred Smith’s “Untitled,” concrete, glass, paint, and wood, 78 x 41 3/4 x 41 inches. Courtesy of John Michael Kohler Arts Center

 

 



Design

Massive Curved Vaults Mimicking Traditional Kilns House a Jingdezhen Museum Dedicated to Porcelain Production

April 9, 2021

Grace Ebert

All images © Studio Zhu-Pei

Jingdezhen, Jiangxi, China is widely recognized as the porcelain capital of the world with a more than 2,000-year history of producing prized ceramics. As an homage to that tradition, architects from Studio Zhu-Pei constructed an open-air structure with towering arches mimicking traditional kilns. The expansive brick vaults now house the northern city’s Imperial Kiln Museum, which sits adjacent to the production sites used during the Ming and Qing dynasties.

To preserve and demarcate the existing ruins on the grounds, Studio Zhu-Pei configured the new building around the remnants, like courtyards and monuments embedded in the ground, in a way that brings together history and contemporary culture in a single space. Each of the curved structures, which is comprised of both recycled and new bricks, differs in volume and length, allowing light to stream in at varying angles throughout the day. The museum’s entrance is on the ground level so that the “experience of people entering it is the same as the past artisans,” the architects say in a statement.

Find more of Studio Zhu-Pei’s designs on its site and Instagram. (via Yellow Trace)

 

 

 



History Science

Intrusive Clowns, Preserved Cats, and Centuries-Old Hair: Museums Are Sharing Their Creepiest Objects

April 23, 2020

Grace Ebert

Top left via GR Public Museum, bottom left via Yorkshire Museum, right via Bell Museum

If you’re not into clowns, taxidermied creatures, or centuries-old piles of hair, you probably should avoid the #CreepiestObject hashtag on Twitter. In recent days, museums worldwide have been digging into their nightmare-inducing archives to uncover the most disturbing pieces their collections have to offer. Findings include a preserved mermaid-like animal, a cross-section of a pregnant cat, and a children’s toy that’s rumored to move on its own.

Similar to the virtual bouquets and the challenge to recreate famous artworks, the movement is one of the ways shuttered museums are engaging with—and now terrifying—their quarantined audiences. We’ve gathered some of their picks below, but please consider this your warning before you scroll down or dive deeper into the hashtag. (via Hyperallergic)

 

 

 

“STEP ASIDE ALL. These are hand-made models of figures playing cards and of gold miners hauling gold nuggets to the surface. BUT the figures are made from crab’s legs and claws… Typical Victorians, they loved weird/creepy stuff. #CreepiestObject” —York Castle Museum

 

 

 

“Bringin’ our A-game for this #CURATORBATTLE! What is it? Just a CURSED CHILDREN’S TOY that we found inside the walls of a 155-year-old mansion. We call it ‘Wheelie’ – and it MOVES ON ITS OWN: Staff put it in one place and find it in another spot later on…. #Creepiestobject” —PEI Museum

 

 

“Imagine rummaging through an archive and unwrapping this Down pointing backhand index MC 490A: Broken Dolls head in many parts with fair hair c.1920 Found on the grounds of @StJudesHead . Let’s hope they treat the pupils better Face with tears of joy #CuratorBattle #CreepiestObject” —Egham Museum

 

 

 



Art

A Tiny Lizard Attends Miniature Gallery Opening to See 'American Gecko' and 'The Birth of Gecko'

April 17, 2020

Grace Ebert

All images © Jill Young

The Gecko Museum’s opening only had one visitor to consider its most prized pieces: a mango-loving crested gecko that goes by The Mayor. Arriving around 7 p.m., the nocturnal lizard visited his personal gallery earlier this week, stopping to contemplate “American Gecko” and “The Birth of Gecko.” Dallas-based Jill Young, who both painted and curated the miniature museum’s permanent collection as part of a humorous quarantine activity, told Hyperallergic that “The Mayor was particularly fond of my ‘American Gothic’ spoof, ‘American Gecko.’ I guess he’s in an American Modernism phase.”

Similar to the brothers, Pandoro and Tiramisù, that disregarded signs requesting they not chew on the furniture or artworks in The Gerbil Museum, The Mayor ignored the red rope cordoning off the artworks. “I now understand that The Mayor’s relationship to art is a necessarily tactile one, which I can appreciate,” Young said. Despite her gecko’s unconventional approach to art, though, Young hopes to see the small-scale trend continue. “Every pet deserves a cultural outing,” she said.

 

 



Art

Two Curious Gerbils Visit (and Chew on) a Miniature Art Museum Made by Their Quarantined Owners

April 7, 2020

Grace Ebert

All images © Filippo and Marianna

Stay-home orders around the world have inspired people to fill their time creatively—think the recreations of well-known artworks and “Coronavirus Tourism Bureau” posters we mentioned last week. But rather than fashion a mock art exhibition for themselves, this London couple thought a little bit smaller. Filippo and Marianna created The Gerbil Museum, a miniature gallery space for their two 9-month-old gerbils, Pandoro and Tiramisù.

Complete with cardboard benches and scribbled museum labels, the wood-floored gallery houses humorous versions of iconic works. The couple told Hyperallergic that at first they hoped to paint miniature productions of more obscure pieces but decided that portraying  “The Kiss,” “Girl with a Pearl Earring,” and other classics with gerbil subjects would be funnier.

As you can tell, though, Pandoro and Tiramisù lack museum etiquette and have been chewing on some of the furniture, despite the sign that advises restraint. (via Hyperallergic)

As promised, this is the full video of our gerbils visiting the museum. No gerbils or gallery assistants were harmed in the making of this. from r/aww

 

 

A Colossal

Highlight

Sailing Ship Kite

Sailing Ship Kite by Haptic Lab

Editor's Picks: Art

Highlights below. For the full collection click here.

Vibrant Tiled Mosaics by Ememem Repair Gouged Pavement and Fractured Sidewalks

Trees Burst from 100 Elementary Desks in Hugh Hayden’s Installation Addressing the Disparities of Public Education

Tender Embroidered Portraits by Ruth Miller Are Tinged with Expressive Colors

Complex Networks of Metallic Branches Shape Animal Sculptures by Kang Dong Hyun

Contrasting Shades of Gray with Vibrant Color, Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe Paints Bold, Subversive Portraits of Black Subjects

Concentric Vessels Nest Within Larger Forms in Matthew Chambers’ Perplexing Ceramic Sculptures

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