The Nelsonatkins Museum of Art Has a Relief Sculpture From the Temple of Assurnasirpal Ii
Past: Rachel Nicholson, Jocelyn Edens, and Ariana Chaivaranon
In our workshops with curatorial colleagues (which nosotros wrote nigh in the last post), we continually heard certain ideas rise to the surface virtually shared principles for interpretive text at the Nelson-Atkins. These included:
- Complication: a label can exist an invitation to explore the object and ideas further and does not need to offer a resolved story.
- Specificity regarding the object and language.
- Empathy especially for visitors, subjects, and makers who have been disempowered.
- Making deliberate choices to share the most interesting and relevant stories of an object.
- Thinking holistically nigh the experience of visiting a gallery and of visiting the museum.
Working off of these initial ideas, nosotros every bit an Interpretation Team decided to split and conquer, each taking on a different drove expanse and working with Curators to reimagine the labels they had identified. Each of us used "story jams" to explore new ideas for these objects. This model was shared with u.s. by Antenna, an audio and multimedia production visitor with whom nosotros work.
In each story jam, of which in that location were 3-four for each collection surface area, nosotros gathered colleagues and volunteers beyond the establishment with different areas of expertise and experiences with fine art including visitor services officers, access staff, and membership and social media specialists. Working collaboratively, we identified the most interesting and pressing stories that each object could tell. While our overall approaches were similar, there were likewise some differences since we worked with different colleagues and collections. Therefore, for this mail service, we'll each share a bit about our process and our learnings.
Jocelyn Edens, Interpretive Planner, worked with objects in our Chinese Art collection, focusing in one case on how to tell complex stories nearly objects that may take been reconstructed and are therefore non "original." Ariana Chaivaranon, Interpretive Planner, focused on our S and Southeast Asian Art collections, against questions of how to assistance visitors understand how an object's context can alter its reception. Lastly, Rachel Nicholson worked with objects in the European Art collection, tackling questions of fierce subject matter and how to admit 21st century experiences and understanding of topics such as sexual assault in the context of 17thursday century paintings.
Adding Complication to our Chinese Fine art Collection
In ane story jam for objects in the Chinese drove, we spent a lot of time discussing a limestone relief carving made in the Northern Wei Dynasty, around 522 C.E. Our curator identified the characterization for this object as needing a re-write for a few reasons: 1) information technology was physically worn and dirty, ii) information technology privileged stories virtually men that aren't fifty-fifty visible rather than focusing on the women in the object, and three) it was a slog for visitors to read at 346 words long (we aim for seventy-ninety words for object labels). Crucially, new inquiry showed that a large portion of the panel had been reconstructed in the 1930s, so writing a new characterization would give us an opportunity to exist transparent with visitors nigh the object's the life.
In discussion, we beginning raised questions about the object based on looking. Near of these questions focused on decoding the composition, the original context of the object, and its materials and techniques. When our curator introduced the story of its reconstruction, new questions and observations emerged: are objects in other museums from the same site in the same condition? Who were the artists who helped create this reconstruction? What can we glean about their mastery and skill, alongside that of the original carvers? What other objects in our collection can tell stories about copies and reconstructions?
As we develop a new characterization that incorporates this story and leans into complexity—that is, offers unresolved stories that invite more questions and farther exploration—our large question is how it will touch the way visitors make meaning from this object, likewise as others near it in the gallery. Will visitors experience empowered to ask new questions and explore these objects in all their complexity? Will they feel deceived or tricked or disappointed?
Specificity in the South and Southeast Asian Fine art Drove
The story jam participants for the Southward and Southeast Asian collection tackled some of the core tensions of the display of Hindu processional sculptures in U.S. encyclopedic art museums. An early 1200s sculpture of Shiva Nataraja is the centerpiece of one of the fictive "temple rooms" original to our 1932 building. Although not-Hindus often mistake the room for a temple reconstruction, the object display is far removed from its original religious context. Disallowment the opportunity for reinstallation, we set out to back up both Hindu and not-Hindu visitors' experiences through the characterization.
At first, story jam participants without a noesis of Hinduism commented on the sculpture's perfectly cast and precisely proportioned bronze torso. Their interests shifted when Hindu story jam participants or those familiar with Hindu practices noted that to them, Shiva appeared undressed in the museum. In its original home in a South Indian temple, the sculpture would have been adorned daily with oils, cloth, and flowers. Our revised label invites visitors to reflect on the differing practices of seeing the sculpture in the museum context, in a temple, and in a religious festival procession.
The revised label also prompts visitors to consider the embodied experience of aspects of Hindu worship, such as dance, moving around the object, and darshan (mutual seeing between a worshiper and a sacred image). We replaced unspecific, harmful language that incorrectly described Apasmarapurusha, the figure crushed by Shiva's dancing anxiety, as a "dwarf," invited directed looking, and used non-ableist verbs to encourage visitors to "circle" the sculpture, taking it in from all angles. Ultimately, we hope to inspire visitors to reverberate on their personal, spiritual, and bodily relationships to this sculpture of Shiva today.
Thinking Holistically nearly our European Fine art Collection
Our European fine art curators identified nearly 30 labels to be replaced. Rather than workshopping all of them, nosotros broke them downwards into themes and chose objects that embodied each large idea. These themes included: violent subject matter, unacknowledged power dynamics, and harmful tropes.
For 1 specific label, we tackled a bailiwick mutual in many European fine art collections: Europa and the Balderdash. In this story from the aboriginal Roman poet Ovid'south Metamorphosis, the god Jupiter transforms himself into a bull, seduces and abducts Europa. Our current label focused by and large on the artist and his style and did footling to accost the story. What arose from our story jam, however, were lots of questions about the scene itself: why is the balderdash the central figure? Who is the victim in this story? Why does the balderdash wait "Disneyfied"?
First, we spent fourth dimension looking closely at the painting and noticed that the bull is looking straight at viewers and almost winking. For many in the room, this felt like the style into the story. Nosotros could outset with the specific object, move to the story of how Jupiter tricked Europa, and so affect upon broader ideas effectually gender and power dynamics in myths. Our curator shared that the title of the painting had also changed throughout time, from The Abduction of Europa to Europa and the Bull, opening a conversation about an object'due south life and how our agreement of these myths and paintings can shift.
We also realized that the broader discussion of power dynamics would be meliorate to include in a section panel in the gallery, near an archway. This would allow usa to address these ideas upfront, without having to so echo ourselves on every specific object characterization in the gallery that dealt with a similar myth. In creating a broader theme panel, nosotros could spend time in specific object labels focusing on the work of art itself. This push to recall holistically near a whole gallery experience rather than merely ane label helped alleviate some pressure on all object labels, opening space to touch big themes while as well being specific in our interpretation of specific objects.
What's next?
This procedure continues to evolve and correct now nosotros are in the midst of codifying label principles and evaluating these new labels. We hope to share more about where we're headed in the adjacent mail.
About the Authors
Rachel Nicholson is the Director, Interpretation, Evaluation & Visitor Research at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. You tin accomplish her at rnicholson@nelson-atkins.org.Every 2 weeks throughout April and May 2021, Rachel will share her team'south efforts to rewrite the Nelson-Atkins' permanent collection gallery labels through a harm reduction lens. Read her first two posts hither.
Jocelyn Edens, is an Interpretive Planner at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.
Ariana Chaivaranon is an artist and an Interpretive Planner at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. Born in Thailand, Chaivaranon studied Visual and Ecology Studies and the History of Art at Harvard. Chaivaranon is a board member of Plug, a curatorial collaboration and exhibition space supporting emerging artists in Kansas Urban center.
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Source: https://rka-learnwithus.com/improving-our-museum-labels-through-a-harm-reduction-lens-part-3/
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