Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service

Conservation of Space Objects

During the first two Moon landings, astronauts did not have access to drinking water unless they returned to the lander. Starting with Apollo 13, however, spacesuits were equipped with a new accessory: an in-suit Teflon bag with a drinking tube. These drinking devices are the predecessor to today's CamelBak water bottles.

One of the most fragile and unique artifacts traveling with SITES' new Suited for Space exhibition is a rare example of these early drinking devices. Although the device has been stored in a climate-controlled environment since being acquired by the Smithsonian, it has deteriorated over the past 30 years. The object is so fragile, in fact, that conservators from the National Air and Space Museum expect it to have disintegrated almost entirely by the time the national tour of Suited is complete.

So, you might wonder, if the object is in such precarious condition, why is it traveling at all? Smithsonian conservators are closely monitoring this artifact to learn about its deterioration process. After the Suited tour, the artifact will be de-accessioned and studied in more detail. Conservators will take what they learn from the gradual deterioration of the drinking device and use it to improve their conservation of other artifacts made from similar materials. The visible deterioration of this device over time reinforces the importance of artifact conservation and helps visitors better understand why photographs and x-rays of spacesuits--rather than the fragile objects themselves--are included in the exhibition.

Suited for Space will be on tour for several years. There is also a facebook page with tons of extras. The national tour of Suited for Space is generously sponsored by DuPont.

--Robin Meyer, SITES publications intern

American Work History Told in New Exhibit

Opening this September, The Way We Worked explores the causes and effects of the many changes to the American workforce and work environments over the past 150 years. 

Transforming a show comprised of 80 black-and-white archival photographs into a colorful, free-standing exhibition complete with objects, audio, and video is no easy task. But SITES' Museum on Main Street (MoMS) team has done it again! The Way We Worked began as an exhibition at the National Archives and then traveled with SITES in its original format for four years. Now the MoMS crew, together with the show's original curator and the folks at the Smithsonian Office of Exhibits Central (OEC), has created a spectacular new version of the show that hits the road this fall. The exhibition will travel to 180 communities in 30 states over its six years on the road.

The MoMS version of the show offers a fresh take on the exhibition content and a bold new experience for viewers. MoMS project director Robbie Davis said "moving away from framed photographs hanging on walls gave us a great deal of freedom to present the story in a new way." I recently visited OEC where the MoMS displays are created and assembled, and the photographs do indeed reveal new secrets when blown-up to life size, cropped to highlight small details, and presented as silhouetted forms. In addition, reproducing the photographs digitally allows for creative overlapping of images, juxtapositions, and comparisons with posters, murals, and advertisements. The new version of The Way We Worked has over twice as many photographs as the original--including color images of contemporary jobs--but the dynamic new display keeps the viewer's attention focused and engaged.


Bruce Bustard, the curator from the National Archives, was with me on my visit to OEC. As one
accustomed to working primarily with documents and photographs, he was especially impressed by the clever use of objects, noting that they "add texture to the exhibit while still keeping its original spirit." There are some objects which are familiar to viewers (a Blackberry smartPhone, for example), and others with which many will be unfamiliar. (Two I had never seen before were a secretary's shorthand practice book and computer punch cards.)

A special technology grant from the Smithsonian has allowed the MoMS team to transform the exhibition even more than they originally dreamed possible. Come September, the exhibition will have specially mounted video screens displaying archival video footage and fresh interviews documenting the role of work in Americans' lives. In addition, a cell phone-based audio guide, with information adapted to each state will be available to visitors, who will also be able to use their cell phones to add their own stories to an online oral history archive. 

For more information about MoMS, please visit the website. 

--Robin Meyer, SITES publications intern

 

Letters to the Home Front

"My dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, and as my last breath escapes me on the battlefield, it will whisper your name . . . If the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you . . . "

This excerpt is from a letter written on the eve of the First Battle of Bull Run--150 years ago last Wednesday--by Union soldier Sullivan Ballou to his wife, Sarah. While Sullivan could not know his fate with certainty while writing this letter, he was mortally wounded in the battle and died without putting his final letter in the mail.  The letter, recently published in an article in The Washington Post, was delivered to Sarah along with her husband's personal effects after his death. 

SITES is planning a new exhibition that examines just this sort of epistilary drama. Mail Call, an exhibition created in partnership with the National Postal Museum, investigates all aspects of communication between the home front and the front lines, from the Revolutionary War to the present.  

Civil War artifacts, including hand-written letters like the Sullivan Ballou letter, stamps, envelopes and Confederate “adversity covers” (envelopes fashioned from old letters and scraps of paper) are included in Mail Call. In addition, the exhibition explores several important changes in the postal system which got their start during the Civil War.  

For example, money orders--a secure way to send relatively small amounts of money via the postal system--emerged during the war as a way for soldiers to send money home, and they continue to be used by both military personnel and civilians today. In addition, sorting mail on a moving train car (a difficult feat) began as an experiment during the Civil War. The change increased the efficiency of mail delivery to soldiers in Missouri so much so that after the war, it became standard procedure on all mail trains in the U.S.  

But, not all Civil War-era changes in the postal system were inspired by a need for efficiency or security. One aspect of the postal system which I’ve always taken for granted—home delivery—began during the Civil War as an act of kindness toward women. Each day, women flocked to the Cleveland post office in anticipation of letters from their loved ones in battle, but the contents of the letters they received were often highly personal and difficult to bear. Sensing that these women might prefer to receive such news in the privacy of their own homes rather than in front of the assembled masses, a creative postman organized a system for delivering letters to individuals at home.  

The excitement around the Civil War anniversary this year has caused us to take special note of the exhibition’s Civil War content, but this is just one piece of the Mail Call story. The exhibition goes on to explore related technical innovation and social change in the 20th and 21st centuries while paying special attention to those aspects of the story that are the same in all times. The distance and danger involved in military pursuits continue to inspire heartfelt correspondence like the “Sullivan Ballou letter," and letters and packages—and the dedication, courage, compassion, and ingenuity of everyone involved in transporting them—continue to be a vital source of communication and strength for our military personnel and their families around the globe. 

The National Postal Museum will open a permanent Mail Call exhibition in November 2011. Check out the exhibition website. For information about hosting SITES's traveling version of Mail Call, please contact Ed Liskey at liskeye@si.edu.

--Robin Meyer, SITES publications intern

Sweet and Sour: Chinese Food from Chinatown to Main Street

Sweet and Sour is an emerging collaboration between SITES and the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History on Chinese food in America.

Something about Chinese food always draws a crowd, and this morning's Sweet and Sour team meeting was no exception. We found ourselves cramming 11 people around a table meant for six to brainstorm and discuss the content of this epicurean exhibition. All that was missing was the lazy Susan!

Our meeting began with a somewhat counter-intuitive declaration: Chinese food is American food. But really, who doesn't have memories of family dinners at a local Chinese restaurant? From Jewish-American traditions of Chinese food on Christmas to television shows like Yan Can Cook to the 41,000 Chinese restaurants in the U.S. (more than all burger joints combined!), Chinese food has become not just an integral part of American food culture but a quintessentially American food.

When Chinese restaurants (which emerged in the mid-19th century as small kitchens offering Chinese immigrants a taste of home) began catering to the American palate, recipes changed.  According to Cedric Yeh, the curatorial advisor for this project (and Deputy Chair and Associate Curator in the Division of Armed Forces History in the National Museum of American History), "They were selling the exotic. They were selling China. We haven't eaten Chinese food in over 100 years." Since we've been introduced to the cuisine, our familiarity with "Chinese food" has reached the point that all connotations of "the exotic" have been erased and the ubiquitous Chinese takeout box has come to symbolize a typical American meal in movies and TV.

Sweet and Sour will document this transition and, in doing so, provide a glimpse into the long history of Chinese immigration, exclusion, exoticism, and perseverance in the U.S. The exhibition will highlight the fact that Chinese food today is a uniquely American tradition.

As the discussion turned to ideas for objects and props that would communicate either the "all-American" nature of Chinese food or its historical roots, Cedric laid out a challenge: "There has to be a strong intellectual grounding to the exhibition, but also some flash." After listening to his ideas, Project Director Deborah Macanic smiled and asked, "Cedric, do you believe in kismet?"  As it turns out, SITES already has strong connections from previous exhibitions which may help turn Cedric's biggest "wish-list items" into reality.

In addition to these items, the exhibition will include artifacts form the National Museum of American History's new Sweet and Sour collecting initiative. Research specialist Noriko Sanefuji reported back on her recent trip to San Francisco's Chinatown where she went to gather background information for the project. While in SF, she met with Cecilia Chiang, P.F. Chang's mother and a pioneering restaurateur in her own right, along with several other restaurant owners and local historians. Interns are already hard at work scanning the photographs and menus that were given to Noriko on her trip. Keep a lookout for the images in the upcoming issue of Siteline!

It was smiles (and a few stomach rumbles) all around as we ended our meeting. Things are really cooking! Now, where are those fortune cookies?

--Robin Meyer, SITES Publications Intern

Let's Get this Show on the Road!

If you know our registrar Ruth Trevarrow, you'll know that she's as hilarious as she is knowledgable, and that sense of humor came through in her recent AAM discussion called, "Registrars: Let's Get this Show on the Road." Presented with several colleagues from other institutions, the session was delivered as a skit. Trevarrow says, "Questions and comments afterward reflected audience appreciation for humor, honesty, resources, and helpful turns of phrase to use with shippers and contractors. For added flavor, we scripted all of the shippers to speak like pirates." Aye matey! Want more information? Feel free to contact us!

Session summary: An interactive session that follows several recent exhibitions on the road through the lenses of their organizing and exhibiting registrars. The presenters will offer a novel roadmap (a model and resources) for navigating the challenges of traveling exhibitions. Leave with the knowledge and confidence to successfully manage traveling exhibitions and apply best practice techniques.

Relevance: Many museums are involved in the receiving end of traveling exhibitions while many others are beginning to consider traveling exhibitions as alternate sources of profit. Best practice techniques have not been established for all stages of preparing for traveling exhibitions; this presentation will identify and address these gaps. Four exhibit registrars with recent experience from the California Academy of Sciences, Field Museum, Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, and American Museum of Natural History will share their internal practices. This collaboration will mark the start of an ongoing effort to standardize steps in the traveling exhibition process.

Audience: Most registrars, at some point in their careers, will have worked on traveling exhibitions, whether as organizers, lenders, or exhibitors. This session is designed to reach as many registrars as possible, in particular those who are new or mid-career. Large-scale, object-based exhibitions that have traveled to museums of a variety of discipline types and sizes will be featured. Covering the basics of organizing, preparing for, and receiving traveling exhibitions, this session will provide best practice techniques and considerations. The presenters, who have been on both sides of organizing and receiving traveling exhibitions, will share, through skits and dialogue, tips for successfully navigating this often daunting process. 

Focus: Traveling exhibitions are a popular part of most museum programs, and the registrars’ role in their management is critical to their success on the road. This session will provide insight into the roles and responsibilities, unique and shared, between organizing and exhibiting registrars. Rebecca Buck and Jean Gilmore’s seminal book On the Road Again and other current literature provide an excellent foundation for practice. This session will expand upon their work by offering a model schedule and key practical tools. Through a dramatized discussion, presenters will showcase tried and true processes for traveling current large-scale exhibitions.

Seniors and social media, according to Elvis

What do think . . . is social media just for the young? Well, according to our stats, seniors are more active than ever. Take a look at the age demographics on one of our popular Facebook pages.

 

Ages of Facebook users:
13-17=.80%
18-24=8%
25-34=13%
35-44=15%
45-54=17%
55+=23%

That means 40% of our audience is over 45 (not exactly senior citizens but pretty close in the technology world). Why is this the case? Are older users more inclined to follow cultural organizations? Do they have more time to devote to such activities? Or, is it more about the the topic of conservation?

We'll argue that it may be all of these, but my inclination is to suggest that the latter is the biggest contributing factor. This particular Facebook page is all about Elvis, a complement to the traveling exhibition Elvis at 21, Photographs by Alfred Wertheimer, and everyday is something new about the rock-n-roll legend--trivia, curatorial insight, photographic history, videos, etc.

Not that Elvis doesn't have a younger following. Indeed, some of the most rabid fans are under 25, but those who are most engaged on our Facebook page fall into the more mature crowd; they are the folks who listened to Elvis as a kid or sat in the front row at one of his concerts. They are the ones who know Elvis inside and out; in fact, these fans have taught us a thing or two on more than one occasion.

Switching fields a bit, we also have a Twitter account for the exhibition @elvisat21, but this platform doesn't seem to attract the same number of older followers. When we've mentioned the Twitter page to our Facebook fans, the usual response is "Oh, I'm not on Twitter," or "I don't really know how to do Twitter." Even when we baited the platform with free Elvis giveaways or trivia contests, the leap never occurred. Most of our mature Facebook users were happy to stay put, even if it meant missing out on some rare exhibition-related freebies.

The exhibition continues its national tour through 2013, and the Facebook/Twitter accounts will be there along the way, so the final verdict is still out, but it's certainly interesting to see how the social media world is embracing (or not) a new audience.

 

Ready for the AAM Museum Conference?

It's that time again: butterflies, pollen, and AAM. This year's conference for everything in the known museum world will be held in Houston, Texas, from May 22 to 25th. And, as usual, SITES will be there to talk shop. Here's our agenda:

Sunday, May 22, 4:15 – 5:30 p.m.
Session: Collections Databases: Welcome to the World of Tomorrow
If you’ve never tackled researching a new database program, or have experienced the agonies of the task, join us and pick up some pointers for choosing a system that will grow with your institution.
Chair: Darlene Bialowski, Independent Registrar and Head of the AAM Registrars Committee Presenters: Amy Duke, Collections Manager and Registrar, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art Heather Thorvald, Registrar, Denver Museum of Nature and Science
Cheryl Washer, Project Director and Registrar, SITES

Monday, May 23, 7:30 – 8:30 a.m.
Event: Traveling Exhibitions Professional Interest Committee Annual Breakfast
Join us for this popular ticketed networking event where guest speakers discuss topics of interest to both producers and hosts of traveling exhibitions.
Attending: Shavonne Harding, Scheduling & Exhibitor Relations Coordinator, SITES
Ed Liskey, Senior Scheduling & Exhibitor Relations Coordinator, SITES

Monday, May 23, 2:15 – 3:30 p.m.
Session: The Greenest Show on Earth: Creating and Distributing Digital Exhibitions
Find out how the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago and SITES created their first digital temporary exhibition, which lowered their carbon footprint, involved communities in exhibition development, and shared information and resources around the country in an entirely green way. Chair: Devra Wexler, Project Director, SITES
Presenters: Shavonne Harding, SITES
Lindsey Koren, Public Relations Coordinator, SITES
Angela Williams, Manager, Design & Exhibit Development, Museum of Science and Industry
Peter Kao, Member, Board of Directors, Bob Jones Nature Center, Texas

Monday, May 23, 3:30 – 5:30 p.m.
Event: Marketplace of Ideas
At this forum, AAM Standing Professional Committees exchange and present information and new ideas for all types of museums and museum professionals.
Participant: Ruth Trevarrow, Registrar, SITES

Tuesday, May 24, 7:30-8:45 a.m.
Event: Traveling Exhibitions Forum
This roundtable will feature brief presentations by both producers of traveling exhibitions and potential hosts. Connect with colleagues in the industry, pick up some information on the latest traveling exhibits, and stay for the free coffee, tea and bagels!
Attending: Shavonne Harding, SITES
Ed Liskey, SITES

Tuesday, May 24, 9 – 10:15 a.m.
Session: Hitting the Road: Traveling Exhibitions and Small Museums
This session will provide logistics of how small museums can start their own program and how to find and host traveling exhibitions from other institutions.
Chair: Nathan Stalvey, Curator/Exhibitions Director, Louisville Slugger Museum & Factory Presenters: Zinnia Willits, Director of Collections Administration, Gibbes Museum of Art
Ed Liskey, SITES

Tuesday, May 24, 3 – 3:30 p.m.
Event: Ice Cream Social in the Expo Hall, hosted by SITES
Take a break from the conference madness and enjoy some refreshing ice cream, our treat! Representatives from our Exhibitions, Public Relations, and Scheduling departments will be on hand to greet you and share what’s new in SITES program.

Tuesday, May 24, 3:45 – 5 p.m.
Session: Registrars: Let’s Get this Show on the Road!
This session will provide insight into the roles and responsibilities, unique and shared, between organizing and exhibiting registrars.
Presenters: Annette Gavigan, Exhibits Registrar, California Academy of Sciences
Jenn Cooper, Traveling Exhibitions Registrar, The Field Museum
Ruth Trevarrow, Registrar, SITES

Need to schedule a meeting with a SITES staff member while in Houston? Contact our Director of Exhibits, Fredie Adelman, who will be available during the conference to meet with exhibitors and potential collaborators.

A Blending of Photography and X-Rays

When spacesuit expert Amanda Young and I were working on photographing our spacesuits for her book, she told me that a series of test x-rays had been taken of small objects such as gloves, boots, and helmets. She wanted to have a whole spacesuit x-rayed next, if it could be done. She asked my advice on how the radiologist, Roland “Ron” Cunningham at the Smithsonian's Museum Support Center, could combine a lot of small sheets of x-ray film together into one big piece.

The largest film available for x-rays is 14 x 17". I suggested that they get some 4 x8' feet foam core board, which is extremely light, strong, and stiff, and tape or tack the unexposed film onto the board. I also advised them to be sure to overlap the film at least one inch, so there would be no spaces in between any of the films.

Ron took my advice and set the film up on the foam core, with three sheets of film across and five sheets down, for 15 sheets total, which is roughly 50 x 70". Then he laid the spacesuit on top of it. The x-ray machine was raised high enough to “zap” the entire suit. After the film had been exposed, it was processed and dried before being sent to me.

My job was to scan the x-ray films to create one digital image. First, I laid out the film on the light table and made sure I lined them up correctly before I started the scanning. It was like working with a jigsaw puzzle. I used the Epson Expression 10000XL photo flatbed scanner with the transparency unit. The scanner can cover 13 x 17", but the films were 14 x 17". So, I had to make two scans of each film by scanning at one end of the film, then rotating it 180 degrees to scan the other end. After I scanned all 15 sheets like this, I ended up with a total of 30 images.

With Photoshop, I opened all of the images, rotating half of the scans to the right orientation to match with the rest, and then “stitched” them together with the “photomerge” application. Then, I started with the row of three images of the head area, stitched them together, followed by the next three images of the chest, lower abdomen, legs, and finally the feet area. Finally, I stitched the five rows of images all together into one complete image.

This process took an entire day, but it was worth it after seeing such a gorgeous result. I was excited to work on more spacesuit x-rays after that first one. These days, like many of us photographers who no longer use film to shoot images, radiologists are now using digital x-ray machines instead of film. They also have new software to put together sections of the larger object into one image without going through the tedious process I used.

 --Mark Avino, chief of photographic services for the National Air and Space Museum

"Sk8 Tuff" and other truisms learned at the Smithsonian

If you talk the talk, you gotta walk the walk, right? But if we're talking about Ramp It Up: Skateboard Culture in Native America, the upcoming exhibition that's sure to lure both surf and skate enthusiasts, then NMAI exhibition curator Betsy Gordon has got the right idea:

 
 Betsy taking the quick route to the fax machine.

And in true collaborative skater spirit, Betsy was so generous as to gift the SITES Ramp It Up exhibition team (incidentally, all women) with a specially-signed deck of our own:

   
"To the mighty gals of SITES, Sk8 tuff! Betsy"

Oh, and did we mention that the exhibition was recently mentioned in Thrasher magazine?

 

 

Ready, set, INSTALL!

As a Project Director for traveling exhibitions, I don't often get to see my shows while they're on the road, much less have a hand in installing them.  So it's a real treat for me when one of our exhibitions goes on view at a Washington, DC, venue.  I knew that The White House Garden 
would look great in the expansive space of its current home, the White House Visitor Center, and lucky for me, our fantastic registrars were happy to have an extra set of hands to help with the installation.

The crates were waiting for us in the morning. (They'd already been sniffed down by a K-9 team. You never know what you're going to get when working in DC federal buildings). And our team of five was ready to go. We first unpacked all the crates, laying the components out on the floor, and then got to work putting together the metal structure (those base plates are HEAVY, let me tell you!)  When the structure was finished, we hung the fabric panels and added the finishing touch . . . overhead lattice with a bit of greenery to give it a "garden" feel.

We had barely put the last piece in place before visitors were already crowding around--both to view the exhibition, and to take in the behind-the-scenes installation work the public rarely gets to see. Since I was new to the installation process too, I'll share a few lessons learned: always wear sneakers when installing an exhibition (thankfully, my sandaled toes weren't squashed by those base plates!), have an assortment of extra tools handy, and don't tighten the screws TOO much (since you'll probably be the one who has to UNscrew them when the exhibition closes!)

To see a photo album of start-to-finish installation shots, visit our Facebook page.