We challenged America to submit to be the IMA’s next top blogger and America answered.  Over the course of the next month, we’ll post the finalists in the IMA’s “So You Think You Can Blog” contest. After we’ve posted all five entries, we’ll let our blog readers vote for the winner. First up: Meet Jessica Hancock.

Tell Us A Little About Yourself:

Well, hello!  My name is Jessica Hancock and you’ve asked me to tell you a little about myself.  This is always a struggle as it’s easier to do in person, but the point of a “blogger” is to be as electronically-concise and as catchy as possible.  So, here goes…

I was born and raised in an Indianapolis suburb boasting mansions and cornfields, which did suit me well until I realized the world was a bigger place. Yep, it really is.  I convinced myself to pick up and study abroad in Londontown where my cultural education was based solely on gallery-hopping, pint-gulping and boarding cheap airlines to other countries, all while scraping the bottom of my bank account to mere pennies. ‘Twas a time! Fast forward through college, I am now a fundraiser by occupational trade and love being involved in the local community.  I’m stoked to say that, at the ripe age of 27, I proudly serve on two local Boards – Bicycle Indiana and more recently, I was invited to serve on the Earth House Collective Board.  How do I spend my time, you ask?  Easy. Picture me attending a smattering of as many live concerts as possible, traveling traveling traveling, monthly volunteering at the IMA, drinking copious amounts of black tea with cream & sugar, riding my bikes aimlessly through the streets of Indy and dallying about my new house.  I became a home owner this summer!  I count my blessings daily and never have forgotten where I came from [ahem, the sticks of Boone County]. Read the rest of this entry »

Thank you to all who applied to be the IMA’s new blogger. We had nearly 2 dozen submissions and there wasn’t a bad one in the entire lot. It was exciting to read everyone’s stories and profiles, and very difficult to narrow down to a final list. The blog committee a.k.a. part of The Social Media Committee of Excellence a.k.a. Daniel Incandela, Kate Franzman, and I each voted for our top 5 picks and tallied the votes.

This is a crown, but not the actual crown that the winning blogger will receive.

And the Nominees Are… Read the rest of this entry »

This post was written by Ben Masbaum, New Media intern.

Ben Masbaum

With this being my first blog for the IMA, I implore you to scroll away if you consider yourself one of those people who doesn’t particularly hold noobies in high regard. If you’ve stuck around, allow me to share a few thoughts on music videos as an art form.

I remember sitting in my living room when I was thirteen years old: voice cracking, flannel shirt around my waist with my combat boots on the coffee table and my mother urging me to wash my hair.  I couldn’t, of course, because I was busy watching MTV, pre-Real World and before the internet we know of today.  I would stare the wild camera effects of the music videos and think to myself, “Wow!  I love this!” It seemed easy to do and I wanted to be a part of it.

Read the rest of this entry »

Here is a post from one of my summer interns, Lucie Alig, that speaks for itself.

My desk in the conservation lab was situated amongst Renaissance sculptures, ornately painted vases, African artifacts, and yet I was there to devote myself to one specific artwork far too large for any lab: Robert Indiana’s 1970 sculpture, LOVE. Needless to say, it is a piece that prompts a nod of recognition. Whether identifiable from its centralized positioning on the grounds of the IMA, or through its plastic incarnation as a dangling, mass-produced key chain, most everyone seems familiar with the trademark tilt of LOVE’s “O,” as it has been so hopefully interpreted to symbolize a movement forward or—in the case of my research of LOVE’s conservation history—a rather complicated stepping back.

Lucie Alig considers LOVE

Read the rest of this entry »