Seminar students host museum exhibition

Students enrolled in Richmond's seminar in museum studies course will host a grand opening celebration of their own exhibition Wednesday, April 6, at the Carole Weinstein International Center.

The exhibition "Context and Object: Museum Studies Seminar Exhibition" will be displayed at the Lora Robins Gallery of Design from Nature with additional studio space at the Carole Weinstein International Center through May 26.

"Context and Object" will showcase two- and three-dimensional art and will compare and contrast the customs of different cultures, including sub-themes such as dining and drinking, music and dance and games and sports.

Richard Waller, executive director of university museums and professor of the course, said the execution of a museum exhibition usually took a number of months to several years to complete. For a class to undertake the creation of an exhibition in a semester is a huge accomplishment, he said.

"I think they will do a fabulous job," Waller said. "I know they will. I think it is very exciting because putting on an exhibition is a great opportunity - an unusual opportunity - for undergraduates."

Waller said he had started the semester by dividing the class into three groups: curatorial, marketing and programming education. He said he had then given the class a broad theme from which it had been asked to draw its own narrow focus.

He said this year's theme was context and objects.

Senior Amy Nicholas, a member of the marketing team, said the class had discussed how changing the context or location of an object might change its meaning or the values attached to it.

After much collaboration, she said, the class chose an international theme based on other global events occurring on campus this spring, including the Schola Cantorum Global Music Concert, the Global Sounds Festival and the University Players production "Things Fall Apart."

Nicholas said the marketing team had come up with innovative ways to advertise the exhibition at these other events by capitalizing on a shared international theme, including the creation of program inserts to be issued with programs for other campus events.

From a programming and education perspective, senior Julia Czech said her team had been working to draw in school groups, international speakers and dance troupes for an opening reception that would tie into the programs and themes of other organizations on campus.

Czech said the event she was most excited about was a campus-wide international day celebration on April 12.

Czech said she had worked with the Center for Civic Engagement and the Office of International Education to bring in a fifth grade group from Overby-Sheppard Elementary School on that day.

In addition to participating in the events of other organizations, she said, the students would take a tour through the museum exhibition.

Waller said the art included in the exhibition had been selected by the curatorial team from the collections of the three museums on campus, including the Lora Robins Gallery of Design from Nature, the Joel and Lila Harnett Museum of Art and the Joel and Lila Harnett Print Study Center.

By taking advantage of the university's resources, Waller said students were given the opportunity to explore new paths to developing an exclusive exhibition.

Kathryn Given, a member of the curatorial team, said it had been difficult to narrow down some of the objects to place in the exhibition considering the diversity of the collection at the Lora Robins Gallery of Design from Nature.

The gallery houses objects, paintings and sculptures from all over the world, Given said, and this exhibition gives the curatorial team the chance to showcase rare pieces that have been hidden for years.

Given said one of her favorite pieces was an ornate, wooden mancala game board from Africa.

"A lot of us grew up playing mancala on wooden or plastic boards, but this one is so much more elaborate," she said. "It's interesting to draw comparisons from your own childhood and those of different cultures."

Some of the dining and drinking pieces are fun too, she said. Among the pieces chosen, Given said, the team had selected a Faberge Russian vodka decanter and Japanese sake cups.

"We are just hoping to draw some cool cross-cultural comparisons by putting objects next to one another from all sorts of social customs," she said. "Because the collection is so diverse and unique, we want students to draw their own comparisons and [find] different or better meanings."

Waller said Museum Studies was offered every other year since its inception 10 years ago, but with increased popularity and a faculty desire to reach more students outside of the arts management concentration, the course would now be offered every year.

When considering the museum field, he said, it is very difficult to think of an academic discipline that doesn't have a corollary. Biology and chemistry students would be interested in conservation and business students could gain valuable experience as a marketer or program educator for a museum exhibition, Waller said.

The course ties in with Richmond's liberal arts mission and interdisciplinary focus, he said.

"When students talk about what they did during their undergraduate studies," Waller said, "being able to say that they curated an exhibition or did the marketing for an exhibition would be an incredible and substantial experience to have on a resume."

Contact reporter Kaylin Politzer at kaylin.politzer@richmond.edu