My first weeks at the museum have been filled with introductions.  In addition to meeting new coworkers, there were plenty of new places to get to know as part of the job.  Work-related travel has included a day trip to the Miller House in Columbus, Indiana to examine furniture in storage, condition checking the Mary Miss installation FLOW: Can You See The River? in 100 Acres, and a behind-the-scenes tour of the historic Oldfields-Lilly House and Gardens.

My introduction to the museum’s collection of African Art, however, is proving to be the most complicated. One of my main responsibilities at the IMA is to help prepare that collection for reinstallation early next year. This will involve months of surveying, testing and treating objects in that collection, as well as consulting on matters of storage and display. To begin to tackle this project, I wanted to assemble a list of the objects in the IMA’s collection of African Art, in order to ensure that my survey is thorough.

That practical, seemingly simple, request led me straight into questions of how African Art is defined at the IMA. If the answer seems apparent–that African Art is defined as art that comes from Africa–then consider the following example. The IMA owns two works by the living artist El Anatsui, who was born in Ghana and currently works in Nigeria. One work, Sacred Comb, is on display in the Eiteljorg suite of African Art. However, the other piece, Duvor (Communal Cloth) is displayed in the museum’s Contemporary Art galleries.

Which artwork by El Anatsui is classified as African Art at the IMA?

Because these two curatorial departments use different criteria to define their collections (geography vs. time period), both can claim either work.  Furthermore, the IMA’s department of Textiles and Fashion Arts uses still different parameters for defining their collection–those of medium and use.  As a work that references traditional West African strip-woven textiles, Duvor (Communal Cloth) is actually catalogued as part of the Textiles and Fashion Arts collection.

Does it matter for the objects that the IMA holds Egungun masker’s garments in both Textiles and Fashion Arts and in African Art?  Or that wooden masks, which are also used as part of the Egungun masquerade, are only held in the African Art collection and not associated with Textiles and Fashion Arts?

The context of the collection certainly shapes how the objects are discussed in wall texts and displayed in the galleries, with different emphasis on the aesthetic or functional qualities of the works.

During my internship, only works held in the collection of African Art will be surveyed.  Therefore, these African pieces will receive different treatment than those in other collections. For example, as a first step in the reinstallation, pre-program intern Nicole Peters, and I have been conducting x-ray fluorescence testing (XRF) on objects in the African galleries.

IMA intern Nicole Peters and IMA fellow Kristen Adsit conduct XRF testing of a face mask from the We culture in the Eiteljorg suite of African Art.

This analytical method reveals the elemental composition of the surface tested. We have been using it to look for traces of inorganic pesticides, which may have been applied historically to objects in the African collection, including remnants of toxic heavy metal compounds. Though African works held in the Textiles and Fashion Arts collections may also have been treated with these compounds, they are not included in this survey and will not be tested at this time.

Classifications can also help identify historical treatment of an object, since works in the same collection are likely to share a certain amount of history.  In contrast to the African and Textiles collections, it is unlikely that contemporary works by African artists would have been treated with heavy metal pesticides, as they have been made after such compounds have been widely replaced with organic ones.

The IMA is among many major art museums grappling with these issues.  Far from theoretical, how collections are defined at an institution raises practical questions that must be addressed thoughtfully as part of our daily work.

Flight:  This is the first project you see as you enter the museum and the last project to be installed in the galleries. It was a hair-puller.  As you may or may not know, my business, Indianapolis Fabrications, built the sculptural works in my exhibition, as well as built and installed the Mary Miss Flow project, which opened to the public two weeks after my opening. If building two monumental exhibitions wasn’t bad enough, my business partner, Randy Domeck, had a wedding to attend that kept him out of the shop the two weeks before my opening. Add to that, my teaching contract at Herron School of Art and Design also started around that same time. Most of my work was installed by this point, but I was in a panic trying to manage everything going on. Luckily, we have responsible employees at iFab and Randy found time to handle some management of the business projects remotely.  He arrived in Indianapolis the day before my opening and we installed Flight in one day – the Wednesday before the preview and artist talk.  Phew!

Space Suits:  I had every intention of making these suits myself, but the scope of the exhibition quickly made me realize that in order to complete the work on time, I needed more help. Kyle Perry and Adam Buente of PROJECTiONE offered to help make a model of the space helmet. They found a 3D model of the space suit on the NASA website and were able to use that file to CNC cut the foam model, making my helmets very accurate reproductions of the original. Once I had the model, I made the mold and cast the helmets. Patrick Fitzpatrick had been a graduate student of mine at the School at the Art Institute of Chicago and he CNC cut a form for vacuum forming the visors. Meanwhile, I wasn’t home enough to do the sewing and knew that many of the parents at my son Angus’ school (IPS #84 CFI) were gifted craftspeople, so Donna and I started asking around if anyone would want to take on the project of sewing the suits.  Thank goodness Beth Hannan stepped up and said she could do it. I gave her my reference material and she did the rest in awesome detail.

Phoom: I built this project while at Sculpture Space in Utica, NY. Once I made the sculpture and it was ready to be painted, I was nervous about getting a finish that approximated flesh as closely as I wanted, never having airbrushed something like this before (this was also my first figurative sculpture).  The administration at Sculpture Space suggested that I go to the Golden Paints headquarters, which was only 45 minutes away in New Berlin, NY.  At Golden, Michael Townsend spent the afternoon training me to use Golden products and instructing me on using an airbrush. The other thing I needed help with was hair.  Yvonne at Yvonne’s Hair Designs in Whitesboro, NY makes custom wigs for cancer patients and was game to help get my sculpture wigged. It was a pretty funny moment to haul the sculpture into a typical hair salon for its first and only haircut. I often get curious looks when making my work.

Altered Self-Portraits: My wife Donna hates these. They were early in the process of developing the exhibition – even pivotal.  There was a point when she was stomping around the house yelling at me, insisting that “They are not art!” She thought I was insane to think of exhibiting them in the museum. I often talk to my students about artists whose work was met with contempt, or who were discouraged when they did something that was outside of the establishment of the time, and then somehow managed to persevere with an idea. I don’t especially imagine myself as that radical, but sometimes I gauge the value of an idea by how much my wife doesn’t like it.  Shhh – don’t let her know.

Brian McCutcheon "Capsule," 2011. Commissioned by the Indianapolis Museum of Art Courtesy of the Artist .

Capsule: Now that I think about it, this project really came together without much drama. It did have two important moments. The first was the chair. Randy (my business partner) has a tendency to order 20 parts when we need one.  That same attitude had us building two lawn chairs instead of one for Splashdown as a back-up in case something unexpected happened to the finished work. To determine the floor height in the capsule, we put in a lawn chair that was used as a reference for the aluminum one.  That is when it occurred to me that it should be a lawn chair in the capsule, which would help tie it to the backyard and to Splashdown in the final room of the exhibition. The other moment was painting the back panel. There was some argument in the shop about how that might be painted (or let’s call it discussion since ultimately it was my work). The decision to paint the alternating stripes came at 3am, right when they were going into the booth. I am a little resistant to tell this, but earlier in the week I followed a fire truck down College Avenue and was amazed by the striped design on the back that was made from different colored reflectors.  That is where the pattern came from.

Donut:  Everyone asks – so here are the answers. Yes, we did more than one take. I think we did six takes. I limited it to two donuts per outing – there are only so many donuts that should be given to an eight year old at a sitting. No one got nauseous. I did the filming – I have a small travel tripod that I held in place by stuffing Zone: Fragments for a History of the Human Body Part Two along with a couple other art texts in between the dash and windshield of my 1963 Ford Falcon Ranchero. I ended up using the first take. I bought an audio recorder and captured the sound separately and Daniel Beyer did my editing.

 Orbit:  Imagine completing the sculpture, pristine and freshly painted, and then having an eight year old climb into it in a space suit, also just completed and flawless, and start to shake and hop it around the shop to simulate liftoff. A priceless moment. The space suits have many aluminum parts including cuffs, so we had to tape up anything that might rub between the suits and the capsule. We just happened to have green tape. Angus really took on each “role” with great focus. I had the camera screen flipped so he could see himself and told him to keep his helmet centered in the image and stop us if he saw any green parts in the frame. As I watched him reenact the flight through a crack in the door, he was flipping imaginary switches and who knows what, stopping us once because he noticed there was green in the frame. Daniel dropped the green from the video so it really ended up not being a concern. Also, we could only do short takes so our helmets didn’t fog and I found myself holding my breath for most of the take. Try to look natural, but don’t breathe….

Probe:  Mike Lyons at !WowHuh? CNC cut one pie section of the dish, then made the mold and cast 16 parts to make the dish form. And it all fit. The other thing that is pretty cool is that Colors, Inc. anodized the aluminum in grey tones to simulate black and white TV. Mostly people question the film clip. It is an excerpt of a 1938 Clark Gable film called Test Pilot. In the clip, Myrna Loy is at her wit’s end as each of Clark Gable’s flights become more and more dangerous.  She chants “still living” which I looped to mimic a clock ticking (I considered “tic tock” as a title). The film is about recklessness and risk taking to achieve new standards in flight – but maybe it is more about irrationally pursuing an idea at the cost of normal human relationships (a parallel to art practice should not be lost here).  The probe is based on the Pioneer probe, which was the first manmade vehicle to leave the solar system and is still traveling in deep space. Pioneer carries a message from humankind, including a plaque designed by Carl Sagan and Frank Drake and prepared by Sagan’s wife Linda Salzman Sagan.  My project straddles several generations because it is digitally produced, handmade, includes an early film reference, and the video runs mechanically, not digitally.  If you spend a little time with the project the “still living” chant will sync and un-sync because the dvd players do not run at the same exact rate.

Brian McCutcheon, "Splashdown," 2011. Commissioned by the Indianapolis Museum of Art, Courtesy of the Artist.

Splashdown:  Mike also did the casting for the balloons. This was the first big project to be completed and I think of it as something I did single-handedly, though that isn’t exactly the case. I had a student, Heather Mathes, ask if she could work for me when I first started fabrication on the museum projects. Once the parts were prepped and glued, it took us eight months of sanding 40 balloons multiple times to get them to the standard I wanted them at before painting began. As it turns out, Heather had a natural gift for sanding a continuous surface – something I wouldn’t have thought I could let someone else help me with. A friend, John DeFosse, jumped in to help sand, too.  I did not see this project assembled until it was in the museum. It transformed when I added the strings and looked as though the concept drawing had come to life.

Brian McCutcheon, "Alien Landscape Series," 2011. Commissioned by the Indianapolis Museum of Art Courtesy of the Artist.

Landscapes: Every one of these was pretty comic – we were quite a spectacle out in the world in our suits – but all in a normal day for Angus and I. Gabe Mass took the photos. He stood in the passenger seat of a Miata, top down, at 65 MPH to take the Cruise photo out on 74W.  Angus hit him several times when he made contact with the wiffle ball in Play.  And it is still a mystery to us all what Angus was doing at the La-Z-Boy store. Maybe the best story is this – after we wrapped shooting the Shop photo, Angus and I were not far from Lisa Freiman‘s home. Angus is close to Lisa’s daughters so we decided to surprise them in our suits. It was humorous to see the flummoxed look on the neighbors’ faces as Lisa, Ed and I chatted on the front porch, me and Angus fully suited up, with Angus and the girls running around the yard as if nothing unusual was going on.

I hope that this might give you some insight into the work, and stories that you might not know unless you were there.

Many of the courses I taught were part of the universities’ core curricula, which means that my students came from various academic backgrounds and typically enrolled in the class to fulfill a degree requirement. Some of my students had never even visited an art museum! An exciting challenge was to deliver the course material in new, engaging ways. My lectures quickly became multimedia presentations that employed devices like film clips, music, and the internet to introduce key art historical concepts and to illustrate techniques. The opening sequence of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining (1980) provides a nice entrée into a discussion of Edmund Burke’s Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and the Beautiful (1757), the fifth movement of Hector Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique (1830) exemplifies certain characteristics of Romanticism, a short scene from The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965) demonstrates Michelangelo’s transfer of cartoons onto the Sistine Chapel ceiling, and so on. Similarly, one of my assignments at the IMA will be to expand understanding of the scholarly information offered in our digitized publications by conceiving of complementary text, interactive demonstrations, and audio-visual material. This online content will be accessible to a broader audience.

Xia Gui, "Fishing Village in Twilight Glow," mid-1200s.

Teaching also allowed me to move beyond my primary area of study – nineteenth-century Danish portraiture – and become a generalist. Conversance in other periods and regions of art historical research will serve me well at the IMA, since the museum’s collection is comprehensive in scope. For another project, I will develop thematic connections between pieces in different galleries. Viewers will recognize that shared artistic impulses yield different results depending on the historical and cultural milieus that informed the works’ production. For example, Xia Gui’s Fishing Village in Twilight Glow (mid-1200s) and John Constable’s The Cornfield (ca. 1816) reflect the artists’ attachment to their home regions. Xia Gui, a Chinese painter of the Southern Song Academy, probably drew inspiration from the landscape of Hangzhou (then capital of China). Local scenery interested the British painter Constable, too. The Cornfield depicts a spot situated between East Bergholt and Deadham in his native county of Suffolk.  In Constable’s choice of subject matter, he exhibited the nationalistic sentiments shared by many artists following the Napoleonic Wars. However, in its plein air execution, this preparatory oil sketch signals the emergence of an international artistic method, inspired by the studies of Pierre-Henri de Valenciennes (1750-1819) and Thomas Jones (1742-1803), and practiced by contemporaries like C. W. Eckersberg (1783-1853) and Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (1796-1875). In contrast, Xia Gui’s approach evokes Chinese artistic tradition in order to convey his allegiance.

John Constable, "The Cornfield," 1816.

Over the course of the next year, I look forward to exploring these two works further, along with many others in the museum’s rich collection, and to developing pedagogical strategies that will best captivate visitors to the IMA’s website.

Let’s begin with a tour of the functionality. When you start the app, it loads some resources while displaying the title screen, and then you have the chance to view an introduction or skip ahead to the map screen.

Because the project centers around the White River near Indianapolis, we only assembled hydrological data for the area around Marion County for the application (I’ll go into more detail later). On the map screen, a prompt appears to inform you that tapping on the map will simulate a rain event. When the map is tapped, the app displays the series of streams, storm drains, and/or sanitary lines that would carry a raindrop from that location to the White River. It also displays the area (known as a drainage basin or watershed) from which other raindrops would follow the same path. Another prompt then appears to let you know that tapping on the raincloud icon allows for selection of storm intensity. As little as a quarter inch of rain can cause sewers to overflow into streams in this area, so when this option is selected, the path displayed will change to reflect this so you can see where you don’t want to go fishing. You can also toggle the display of the 100-year floodplain, which shows you where you can keep your feet dry during a big flood event. In addition to selecting a location on the map, pressing the compass icon locates your device via GPS, and typing in the address bar uses the Google Maps address look-up feature. Tapping on a question mark icon provides some information about pollutants that threaten the path upstream, as reported by the Indiana Department of Environmental Management.

Pressing the “i” icon at the top opens the informational menu. From here, you can learn more about the app, check current weather alerts and conditions, find out how weather differs from climate, get some tips on how to improve water quality, and visit the project website.

Now we can get into some behind the scenes stuff. We wanted to try to reach a broad audience with Raindrop, so we decided to put the time that we had into developing a cross-platform mobile application. These are known as web apps, in contrast to native apps. If we only had an iPhone native app in the App Store, people using Android phones wouldn’t be able to use it, and vice-versa. To handle cross-platform compatibility, we decided to build Raindrop using a framework called jqMobile, which was in a very early stage when we started. It hasn’t quite had an official release yet (it’s in its third beta release at the moment), but has become increasingly robust with each version.

As for the map, you might wonder how we figured out the path that raindrops take to get to the river. Our collaborator at Williams Creek combined information based on digital elevation models, which can be used to derive the boundaries of natural watersheds, with data from the city that indicates where all of the storm drains and sanitary systems are and which areas drain into them.

We then wrote Python scripts to read the scientific data and generate KML geometry files and look-up tables. The application uses a spatial grid look-up to figure out which basin is tapped (so it’s not perfectly accurate, but not too slow either), and then loads the appropriate file with the graphics to display for the path and the basin. It also reads information from another table that has all the details about pollutants.

Along the way, we’ve combined this technology with graphical elements and design guidance provided by Mary’s team, and scientific guidance and content from Butler. The multi-disciplinary process has really embodied the nature of Mary’s City as A Living Laboratory concept. And just as the aim is to lead curious folks from Mary’s eye-catching mirrors and markers along the river to the website and the web app to learn more, hopefully those who discover the project online will follow the raindrop and find their way down to experience the river as well.

As one of the two photographers here at the IMA, I am responsible for capturing the IMA galleries in a similar fashion.  At times I capture galleries alive with its patrons.  At other times I document for posterity the space free of human distraction.  I, as those participating in my questionnaire, enjoy seeing the galleries in various degrees of these states – the sole visitor reflecting on a work of art, the mass of humanity flowing between its walls, the gallery alone asking us to reflect on the images presented, or the gallery free of any artwork or person and completely desolate.

Below are a few of those images and the responses from the photographers.  If you are interested in the photographs presented, please follow the gallery series on Flickr.

 Witold Riedel:
Witold Riedel is a creative director at one of the largest advertising networks in the world. He is responsible for a worldwide campaign, which “involves a good amount of travel.”

This image was included in the “Trapped In The White Cube” series. An excerpt from Witold’s responses to the questionnaire is below:

(via Flickr)

 What made you capture and share the image you created?

Are we talking about the picture of the nun and the dinosaur? Oh, it was just a very sweet moment at the Museum Mensch und Natur in Nymphenburg, in Munich. I had missed my flight to Moscow on that day and after visiting the BMW Welt, Nymphenburg felt like the perfect contrast. The room was very small, I had to be close to the nun to take the picture. I only had one chance to expose the photograph without disturbing the composition. I was lucky. I had set the exposure and aperture and the focus on my Leica correctly. I like that there are some parallels in the expression of the dinosaur and the nun. The picture is certainly not intended as cultural criticism. I have nothing against dinosaurs or the Catholic Church.

What type of museum objects do you enjoy the most?

I like to return to some not very loved paintings, just to discover that I have changed more than they have. And I also like to see that they are still there, in their own place. Or maybe in a new place.

I  used to stand next to the Mona Lisa at the Louvre sometimes and just look at the people coming to visit. I actually have two photo series about this on my old website. It was interesting how many visitors were not actually interested in the work, they were more interested in having a picture taken with the work. It really is about that connection sometimes. The Mona Lisa is now in a different place within the Louvre. It is now easier to take pictures with her. But it is much more difficult to see her. That might be one of the reasons why I prefer the not so loved paintings sometimes. Though they obviously must be incredibly special already, just to make it to the galleries. What percentage of the work never makes it out of storage? Some museums have created galleries that feel almost like open storage. I like that idea quite a bit.

XAM+ANNA:
XAM+ANNA are actually Massimiliano Matera and Annalisa Pilati, two aspiring architects, and a couple in life and work.  They live in Rome, which is its own “open-air museum.”

This image was included in the “Trapped In The White Cube” series and here’s an excerpt from XAM+ANNA’s responses to the questionnaire below:

(via Flickr)

What made you capture and share the image you created?

The photo creates a relation between the space and the visitors, with specific references from the art world (see works of contemporary artist such as Vito Acconci and Michelangelo Pistoletto, for example). For us, the link between spectator and artwork is fundamental and our research tends to show the reactions of the spectator, making him an integral part (then actor) of a new form of art, in which he’s the protagonist.

Vileinist:
Vileinist, a.k.a. Jonathan O’Reilly is a Faculty Researcher at University of Maryland lives in Washington D.C.

(via Flickr)

What made you capture and share the image you created?

It was an interesting piece of work. You can expect avant-garde art at the Hirshhorn Museum, but this was something quite unique. When I turned the corner into the room, I was taken aback by the visual display – swirling curves of light were dancing across the wall to a soundtrack of pure silence. There were no distractions in the room, just the projector and the wall. There was a lone person looking at the piece in a state of wonder. Her placement in the frame helped me create an image that helped to reflect my own feeling of awe. An image of the piece by itself would not have been as surreal. In general, I like to photograph humans not as primary subjects, but rather as accessories to accentuate proportions or my own feelings in a given setting.

Most painted sketches were never intended to be displayed publicly, but rather were made as tools in the creative process. They were used to experiment with ideas for a composition, to propose a composition to a patron, or to record a finished painting for future reference. Preliminary painted sketches could be very rough in appearance, mapping out the artist’s first thoughts about a composition, or more finished exercises that laid out not only elements of the composition, but also served as studies of color and light.

Sebastiano Conca (Italian, 1680–1764), "The Madonna Appearing to St. Philip Neri," 1740, James E. Roberts Fund, 71.6

This lively, loosely painted sketch is a preliminary study for a large altarpiece in the Pilo e Calvello Chapel, Sant’Ignazio Martire all’Olivella (formerly San Filippo Neri), Palermo, commissioned from Conca at the height of his fame in 1739-40. In these years, Conca led a large and busy workshop in Rome and served as the director of the Roman academy. Unwilling to relocate to complete such commissions, Conca would have sent small preliminary sketches like this to his patron in Sicily for approval before undertaking the final full-scale altarpiece. Two additional painted sketches and one drawing related to the altarpiece also survive, with slight variations between them that indicate Conca’s exacting approach to composition.

Giacinto Diana (Italian, 1730–1803), "The Martyrdom of St. Sebastian," about 1780, James E. Roberts Fund, 71.5

Diana’s sketch is a preparatory study for the main altarpiece of the church of San Sebastiano (now San Giovanni Battista), Gragnano, part of a series of five paintings dedicated to the life of the saint. This painting is relatively large in scale, indicating that it might have served as a presentation model for the patrons, even though it displays the unfinished quality of a preparatory sketch. Diana omits fine details such the bows and arrows held by the executioners, which he may have judged to be extraneous to the overall effect of the composition. The graceful, refined figures and warm tonality are hallmarks of Diana’s style, which was widely disseminated thanks to his role as an instructor at the academy in Naples.

Carlo Innocenzo Carlone (Italian, 1686–1775), "Glorification of the Cross," about 1718, Martha Delzell Memorial Fund, 56.106

Carlone’s brilliantly colored, fluid sketch is a study for the cupola fresco in the chapel of Schloss Ludwigsburg, the residence of Eberhard Ludwig, Duke of Württemburg. Large-scale ceiling decorations required especially careful planning because of their complexity. As in this composition, they often featured a multitude of figures in extreme foreshortening arranged in highly complex interwoven groups. Here, heaven expands upwards, presided over by the Trinity and swirling masses of angels and saints. Carlone’s dependence on painted sketches to work out the elaborate commissions he undertook for palaces and churches in Germany and Austria is attested to by the presence of some 300 sketches that remained in his studio at his death.

With their fluid brushwork, abbreviated handling, and intimate scale, painted sketches are often more vibrant than finished full-scale paintings. As a glimpse of the artist’s creative process and because of their aesthetic value, these studies appealed to sophisticated connoisseurs and collectors in the eighteenth century, who conceded them to painted sketches the status of works of art in their own right.

A new installation featuring 18^th-century painted sketches from the IMA’s permanent collection is now on view in the Charles O. McGaughey Gallery. The paintings by Conca and Diana are being exhibited for the first time since entering the museum’s collection in 1971, following recent conservation treatment. An upcoming post will discuss the treatment of these two paintings.

If you’re a little rusty on your art history, Cézanne was a French painter from the 19^th Century whose artwork was from the Post-Impressionism period. Cézanne’s paintings bridged the gap between late Impressionism and the 20^th century movement, Cubism. His artwork is usually very recognizable because of his repetitive and exploratory brushstrokes. These defining brushstrokes are easily seen in the painting featured on the IndyGo bus, House in Provence, which consist of a single farmhouse set in the landscape of Mont Sainte-Victorie, a mountain in Cézanne’s native Provence in southern France. You can also check out the painting at the IMA, as House in Provence is currently on view!

If you happen to see the bus around town, snap a photo of it! Then upload your photo to the IMA’s Flickr group and send us the link to your  image by emailing it to web@imamuseum.org. We will then send you an email with a coupon code for 50% off to the Hard Truths: The Art of Thornton Dial exhibition or Dynasty and Divinity: Ife Art in Ancient Nigeria. Happy searching!

IndyChannel recently launched their A-list ballot for 2011 – a yearly poll that highlights the best of Indy. The IMA is proud to say that we have been nominated as a contender for best museum. The wide-ranging list below, in the form of a TOP ten, are just a few reasons why you should vote in support of the IMA as Indianapolis’ BEST museum. We know you already agree but we hope to reassure you anyway.

10. First and foremost, the IMA is an ART museum, even though it provides films, talks, events, galas, and workshops that may convince you otherwise, the enormous and comprehensive collection is at the heart of our existence. The IMA strives and achieves in providing an art museum environment that is friendly and non-threatening to those without an artistic background, embracing the community as a whole. Those with a love and passion for the arts can mingle amongst peers and schedule an entire weekend of events solely with IMA activities.

9. The IMA has had a remarkable year which included a recent performance at the Venice Biennale, representing the US on a global venue. As you know, the IMA has been working tirelessly on this event, which has garnered amazing responses to Allora & Calzadilla’s works. The IMA represented Indianapolis and the US in an authentic and innovative way through this artistic duo. Did I mention the IMA represented the ENTIRE UNITED STATES? Just checking.

Photos by Andrew Bordwin.

8. In recent years, the opening of the Randall L. and Marianne W. Tobias Theater, aka The Toby, has drawn some big-named speakers into our Indianapolis sphere. Most recently Stefan Sagmeister came to speak about design and happiness from his personal studio, Sagmeister Inc, which was founded in 1993. Sagmeister has designed for the likes of The Rolling Stones, HBO and the Guggenheim with his maxim’s made of both conventional and unconventional mediums using his words and design as a “tool for social renewal.” The Toby has also hosted, Temple Grandin, a woman living with Autism, who is praised with her humane design for handling livestock facilities. An HBO film biography on her won seven Emmy awards! With an amazing turn out for the Toby’s first year (almost 37,000 visitors) the future only looks brighter. Who will the Toby draw in next?

7. Not only does the IMA host galleries filled with ancient arts and artifacts from cultures around the world, it also hosts its own contemporary art wing from a world-wide net. Do-Ho Suh’s contemporary work, Floor is  a very awe inspiring piece. Viewers are allowed and meant to step upon this expansive platform where hundreds of male and female figurines seemingly hold you up. The hundreds of figures that cover the underside of the 32 individual squares allow each viewer’s weight to be held up by their tired plastic arms. The IMA has a contemporary collection worth noting as well as artist showcases, presently being Mr. Thorton Dial—whose exhibition Hard Truths runs through September 18.

6. Spring has sprung and summer is fully fledged! 100 Acres: The Virginia B. Fairbanks Art and Nature Park is an amazing outdoor experience that is definitely worth its own visit to the IMA. On these beautiful Indianapolis summer days, 100 acres is a perfect getaway from the bustle of the city (even just for a few hours)! With eight sight-specific works commissioned, the park shows how art and nature intertwined in a contemporary style. Joep van Lieshout, with his studio Atelier van Lieshout, created Funky Bones, and interactive large-scale sculpture of a Halloween-esque skeleton to be multifaceted, as both art and as functional benches. Plus, where else can you row out to an artist-inhabited island? Pretty sure we’re the only one.

5. In 2008 the IMA was named an Energy Star partner with a pledge to reduce energy consumption. In turn, we reduced natural gas consumption by 48 percent and electricity by 19 percent. In 2010 the IMA was named one of 11 museums to receive recognition by the Environmental Protection Agency which sparked the IMA’s own “greening committee”- displaying art and protecting the environment, one day at a time.

4. We love to collaborate! The Indianapolis International Film Festival has again paired with the IMA’s Toby theatre and DeBoest Lecture hall and will be running from July 14-July 18. This festival will show films from all over the world of varying genre, skill level and lengths. From one minute films (Check out Dinosaur Ballet) to full length feature films, this festival will have a film to suit everyone’s taste. The IMA bringing a small piece of the world to you through this collaboration is sure to be an eye-opening experience. (It also includes a film by one of the IMA’s own staff, be sure to check out Type A!)

3. A certain buzz has been generated from the unveiling of the enigmatic Miller House and Garden in Columbus, Indiana. This acquisition marks an expansion that the IMA knows no bounds and will restore and display art of many forms while also showcasing Indiana’s architectural gem, the city of Columbus itself.

2. Summer Nights is a summer film series that has been widely received by the Indianapolis community. Not only can you sit amongst your friends, and enjoy a great film in the evening, but you can lounge in an amphitheatre setting reminiscent of the ancient Greeks and enjoy food and refreshments. This series is widely popular and lets you escape from the air-conditioned doldrums of the standard blockbuster while enjoying an acclaimed film and a nice summer breeze. Are you convinced yet?

1. In the words of a beloved YELP reviewer: “…an art museum that’s free? Must be a joke or not worth going to. Turns out that I was wrong.” You heard right, to everyone’s utter amazement and enjoyment, admission is FREE! VOTE NOW for the IMA as the BEST Museum in Indianapolis!

Richard B. Gruelle, The Canal-Morning Effect, 1894 (detail).

So far, I’ve tried to be engaging. My blog posts were all a stab at that and I think I’ve done well. Largely, I’ve written on how you don’t need a degree to enjoy art. However, one can’t deny that knowing background information surrounding a piece does enhance its story. When you don’t know anything about the work or the artist the only context you have is the nail it’s hanging on. Personally, I feel this should be enough and museums spend countless hours developing ways to make “you are in a museum” the only context one needs – but it is nice to know more. So. I’ve posted a handful of images from our permanent collection on the IMA’s Flickr account. I cropped the images into detail shots and gave a little background information. One of the best things about my internship is that I get to learn a lot “fun facts” about our works, so I shared a few. My goal was to provide context, be engaged and (as always) have a little fun with art.

Ai Weiwi, "Remembering," installed at the Haus der Kunst, Munich, 2009.

Prominent Chinese artist Ai Weiwei was detained by police in Beijing’s airport on April 3^rd while attempting to board a flight to Hong Kong. He continues to be held in police custody, with little information released about the events surrounding his arrest. (Learn more about the accusations here.) A longtime human rights activist, Ai openly criticizes the Chinese government and risks his personal safety to expose governmental misconduct. Active since the late 70’s and early 80’s, he has become increasingly more outspoken throughout his 30-year artistic career, which has caused him to become the subject of sustained, intense scrutiny by the Chinese government.

Ai WeiWei is one of dozens of activists taken into custody by the Chinese government since February. Fearing an uprising akin to those in the Middle East and North Africa, the government began to preemptively take into custody the most prominent human rights activists in China.

To show support for Ai and hopefully hasten his release, a petition has been created by an international group of art museum directors. Sign the petition here. In London, Tate Modern is currently exhibiting a 2010 installation by the artist entitled Sunflower Seeds, and has become a location for outcry against his arrest.

Ai Weiwei’s activism is tied to his art. In 2008, an earthquake in Sichuan, China, caused poorly built schools to collapse, killing thousands of local school children.  When the government failed to publish the names or amount of deceased students, Ai and other activists began to investigate to uncover the truth—that Sichuan officials allowed for the construction of unsafe schools. Ai was beaten by the police in 2009 while preparing to testify in the trial of Tan Zuoren, a writer and activist who was also conducting research about the events in Sichuan. Despite this act of violence, Ai WeiWei continued to commemorate the students that died.  His installation tiled the façade of the museum with backpacks, which spelled out in Chinese characters “She lived happily for seven years in this world,” a statement by a mother of a victim in the Sichuan earthquake.