Sick day, shimk day.

I have, to be honest more than one occasion, been refered to as an "over-achiever". While I prefer Dr. Hitch's term "driven", the point still stands, I often push myself very hard. Most of the time, the outcome is very good. I get difficult jobs completed on time, my grades are high, and I don't tend to take no for an answer. Everyonce in a while though, it blows up in my face. Today was one of those days. Between hard deadlines at work and school, and a series of family health scares (two out of three of them ended with much better diagnosises than we thought, the third is scary, but temporary), I have brought myself down and became ill. Being the person I am, I hardly let that stop me.

I felt that going to work was a bad idea, but instead of laying in bed and watching movies, I laid in bed and edited Cal Humanities: Stories of Change videos. In preperation of facing some time sitting in hospital waiting rooms, and delivery rooms (my best friend is having a sweet baby boy!) I began to orginize my stuff so I can work on the go. I am so glad I did, because it gave me the option of resting today, so that I can hopefully recover quickly, and get back to making things happen.

The biggest take away from today is I need to remember to take better care of myself. Also, being prepped to work on the go does have it's benefits. And even a sick day, can be a productive day.

Exhibits: Design vs User

Marcie,

I have been evaluating the exhibits at the Museum of the Aleutians and your current discussion of exhibit development got me to thinking about how visitors use exhibits versus how exhibits are designed to be used.


The design documents here begin with Concept Design in February 2009, and end with the Exhibit Manual in October 2013. Everything seems to have been built according to the concept design except for one gallery: the Fishing History exhibit. The exhibit text panels were all produced according to the Design Development documents, but the room is totally reconfigured, and the panels are placed in an awkward layout that makes them user-unfriendly. There is a video produced in 1997 playing in the middle of the room. The exhibit has the lowest visitor stay time in the museum.

The exhibit looks like it was designed to be a photo station where you can dress up in rain gear and take your picture on the deck of a crab vessel, IE. Deadliest Catch. I tried this myself a couple days ago to see if I was right!

I have never seen a visitor try on the rain gear, however, let alone take a picture.

At first I thought this owed to the fact that there is no sign telling you to try on the clothes. But no, today I see that the words above the clothes tell you to try them on.

I have been in this gallery every day for 30 days and never noticed the sign telling you to try on the clothes. I am sure that when the exhibit was designed it made perfect sense and everyone thought it was clear and clever. But the lesson is that only by assessing the actual visitor experience can you really understand how your exhibit works. And in this case, you must make sure you can make changes or alterations that allow people to experience your learning objectives.

Otherwise, your exhibits will just be clothes hanging on a wall.

Memories in Art

~Marcie Rodriguez

Yesterday marked the opening of art exhibit I have been working on in a gallery design class at Imperial Valley College. It features two artists, Terry Arena and Matthew Picon. Terry's exhibit, Symbiotic Crisis: Southeast (Imperial Valley), features beautifully drawn pictures of bees on container lids. The artwork is delicate and precise, and presents a discussion of the destruction of bees in our environment. The artwork tries to make a statement about what bees mean to humans. Matthew's exhibit (which is the one I helped to install), Coyotes, Whiskey, and Fireworks, left a very powerful impression on me. 

Matthew’s work is complex, speaking to the layered nature of growing up in an area like the high desert. I saw much of my own feelings of growing up here in the Imperial Valley reflected in his work. When you look at his art from one direction you get one meaning, and from another, you have a completely different experience. I have some very vivid memories of a trip to the high desert with an old friend, Brian.  He passed away several years ago. Brian was from the High Desert and I was meeting someone there, so we drove up together. We spent the four hour trip talking about what it was like growing up in our respective deserts, both the similarities and the differences.  I thought about this while I was looking at the exhibit.. The exhibit has a touch a sadness to it, (the artist lost a friend in the high desert), but maybe this just reflected my own feelings on those bittersweet memories. 

My partners in crime and best friends,
Lesliee and Sharon, came with me to the
opening. 

Reflecting on this opening I realize exhibits are more engaging when you have some kind of personal connection to what you are viewing. We all bring the experience of our past into the exhibits we see. Coyotes, Whiskey, and Fireworks caused me to reflect on old memories and emotions, which caused me to reflect on the artwork. I know museum professionals think about this when designing exhibits, but how can we push the boundaries? I want to create exhibits with “deep” engagement and even deeper reflection. I don’t know how to do this yet, but I am going to start experimenting.