Indianapolis Museum of Art Blog

An art museum provides a very specific sort of context for its contents.  As a visitor walks through the collections, there is a kind of underlying thesis at work: these things all fit, in one way or another, into a broad category.

It isn’t as simple as “If it’s in a museum, it must be art”, but then again… it almost is that simple.  I think that idea explains why we all sometimes respond so strongly when we encounter an element of an exhibition that doesn’t immediately fit our own perception of what the parameters for contents of the “Things that Go in an Art Museum” category of objects are (or should be).

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Both Thomas Jefferson (The Declaration of Independence) and Trey Parker (Team America: World Police) have said it in so many words: Freedom isn’t free.

Ask IMA CEO Maxwell Anderson about the price of freedom. He’ll tell you about the IMA’s successful challenge to a law passed by the Indiana legislature this year forcing any entity selling materials deemed “harmful to minors” to register with the State and pay a fee to do so. If Judge Sarah Evans Barker had not agreed with the IMA, Big Hat Books, and other plaintiffs and struck down the restrictive law, every school with a sex ed text book—or art museum gift shop with books featuring the nude form—would have had to pay up and be policed.

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My last day at the IMA did nothing for my stomach.

After a few last minute tasks in the morning, Meg, my internship mentor for the summer, and I strolled over to our escape vehicle from the great indoors. A single key, a nine-person van and one destination: MUG n’ BUN Drive-in.

Most of the Marketing department decided to join us on our journey to Indianapolis’s west side. Some were hoping to relive memories of root beer and corn dogs, and others, like myself, to experience the glory of this drive-in for the first time. We were a sight to behold in our office regalia. We scarfed down the mountain of delicious food before us: Chocolate malts, fries, root beer, burgers, coney dogs, corn dogs and cole slaw. All morsels of an afternoon at MUG n’ BUN. Read the rest of this entry »

In Star Studio, we spend a lot of time explaining to visitors that the drop-in art making space is not a “kids’ area” where parents sit while their children make artwork…it is a space for all of our visitors. The idea of the space is that any visitor (even grown-ups) can stop by and make something in response to the work on display. Many people take us up on the offer (you can see the results here), but often we meet adults who seem to think of the production of art as a child’s endeavor, something that you leave behind when you get a job and a mortgage.

In the years since Star Studio opened, countless visitors have declined the invitation to make something in the drop-in studio by saying “Oh no, I’m not creative.” Huh. I’ve never had a child say that, though. Read the rest of this entry »

The drop-in art making area of Star Studio starts each show looking pretty spare…white walls, gray cabinets, gray tables, overhead fluorescent lights…very clean and very empty. Once each show opens the same thing invariably happens…an impromptu visitor-generated installation begins to form in the space. Visitors stop in, make works of art, and ask to display them. We tape the work to the wall, or arrange it on the counters and watch the space change over the run of the show.

Don’t get me wrong, the majority of artwork that visitors make goes home with them, but a percentage always gets donated. Often visitors will make more than one piece, so that they have one to take home and one to add to the collection. We didn’t start out asking people to leave their work, but it always happened. Now, we build it into the consideration of the activities that will be offered in the space. It isn’t really like the formal artist-displaying-work model that is in evidence throughout the museum…the work is typically anonymous and individual pieces aren’t highlighted.

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