This page contains a list of non-MMA workshops and programs that you may find helpful.
Community, Identity and the Jewish Museum in Postwar New York
Jeffrey Abt, Associate Professor, Art and Art History, Wayne State University
Deborah Dash Moore, Frederick G. L. Huetwell Professor of History & Director, Jean and Samuel Frankel Center for Judaic Studies, UM
November 20, 2011 2:00 pm
Michigan League, Hussey Room
The Jewish Museum of New York was established within the Jewish Theological Seminary in 1904 but it began building a separate and prominent cultural presence when it moved to its present location on Fifth Avenue in 1947. Among the exhibits celebrating the tenth anniversary of that move was a show surveying the second generation of "New York School" abstract-expressionist painters. The exhibited works were decidedly non-Jewish in content and most of the artists were not Jewish. The show inaugurated the Jewish Museum's foray into two decades of avant-garde exhibitions that made the museum the place for New York's art-world denizens to see the freshest, most adventuresome art.
These avant-garde exhibits also provoked debates within the New York Jewish community about the purposes of the Jewish Museum, which, in turn, raised difficult questions about the nature of Jewish identity in postwar America. This clash of ideas occurred just as concepts of "identity" and "ethnicity" were entering mainstream-American social thought. The issues underlying the Jewish community's debates provide early and telling evidence of American society encountering the rocky terrain of identity politics. That they arose in the context of the Jewish Museum's avant-garde programs augured controversies in subsequent decades when museums increasingly became flashpoints as they were expected to either preserve or break down boundaries of religious, ethnic, racial, or national identities across Americaundefinedchallenges that endure today.
Abt and Moore will consider the following issues in their conversation:
- Why did midcentury American Jews feel a particular affinity for avant-garde art?
- Why did they choose to express that affinity through the Jewish Museum?
- How did attitudes toward assimilation or acculturation, or communal integration or separation, during that period affect New York Jews’ approaches to cultural participation in contemporary art?
- Why did the Jewish Museum’s avant-garde exhibition program end in the late 1970s?
Read More >>
posted on 11/3/2011
For the Public Good: Libraries, Archives, Museums and Issues of Social Responsibility
Margaret Hedstrom, Associate Dean & Professor, School of Information, UM
Bradley Taylor, Associate Director, Museum Studies Program, UM
October 23, 2011 2:00 pm
Universityof Michigan, Michigan League, Hussey Room
Collecting institutions have entered the 21st century with traditional assumptions about their place in society a matter of some debate. Changes in both the public and private funding of libraries, archives, and museums as well as our national economic malaise have caused institutions to innovate, collaborate, and adapt. It has also caused them to reduce program offerings, terminate services, lay off employees, sell collections (often under controversial circumstances), and even close permanently.
At the same time, the demand for access to information has never been higher. While collecting institutions struggle to find their footing, generations weaned on the web, YouTube, and FaceBook increasingly demand information that is immediate, personally relevant, and malleable. As a result of these sea changes, collecting institutions have renewed their interest in users/audience and in a broader role in society at large, returning momentarily to earlier exhortations that such institutions exist fundamentally to serve “the public good.”
This conversation will explore the following questions:
- What obligations do collecting institutions have to provide intellectual and physical access to their collections?
- What role should professional organizations play in articulating a larger vision of social responsibility to the public?
- As publicly supported institutions, what is the responsibility of libraries, archives, and museums to their users/audiences? To society at large?
- To what extent are social change and activism consistent with a mandate for cultural institutions to serve the public good?
Read More >>
posted on 10/4/2011
The Michigan Council for the Social Studies is proud to announce that the Michigan Geographic Alliance (MGA), the Michigan Council for History Education (MCHE), Michigan Center for Civic Education, and the Michigan Council on Economic Education (MCEE), will be joining them to host the 56th Annual State Professional Development Conference November 5-6, 2011 at the Causeway Bay Hotel in Lansing, Michigan.
Exhibit space is limited , so hurry! For full details and a PDF of the Exhibitor Prospectus, go to:
http://www.mcssmi.org/
If you have any questions, do not hesitate to give me a call. I look forward to working with you and you being a part of the conference!
Sue Campbell
MCSS Conference Coordinator
scampbell@managedbyamr.com
The Association of Midwest Museums Launches Midwest Leadership Academy
Are you looking to advance your career? Are you looking for the skills and tools to take your career to the next level? Are you interested in leading your own institution? The Association of Midwest Museums is launching the Midwest Leadership Academy, a week-long training program for aspiring museum leaders. The Academy is scheduled for September 18-23, 2011 at the world-famous Interlochen Center for the Arts in beautiful Traverse City, Michigan. Based on the popular week-long management training program developed by Vic Danilov, the AMM program will provide affordable and accessible training to prepare tomorrow's museum leaders.
"We're extremely excited about this program," said AMM Executive Director Brian Bray. "It aligns with our core mission to provide affordable and accessible programs to meet the needs of the museum profession. Most leadership programs require a significant investment in time and resources. We felt it was important to create an quality program at an affordable price point. We wanted to create a training program that wouldn't require participants to be away from their offices or families for an extended period. We're also addressing an important need in the museum profession because we anticipate a significant gap in leadership as baby boomers approach retirement."
For more information about the Leadership Academy, visit the AMM Web site at www.midwestmuseums.org to download a program and a registration form. You may also contact AMM Executive Director Brian Bray at bbray@midwestmuseums.org or at 314-746-4557.
