Web 2.0 logos from Flickr user stabilo boss

Lucky for me, social media has become an integral part of the way museums create an interactive experience for the museum visitor, especially here at the IMA.

That said, we at the IMA would like to invite all our blog readers and fellow bloggers to peel your eyes from the computer screens for one night, and put a face to the local blogs you love to read. (Don’t worry, we’ll have wi-fi so you can live-blog and tweet to your heart’s content!)

Come one, come all...

And now, just for fun, The top signs you have a Blogging Problem: {Comment below with your own (probably more) witty ‘top signs…’}

• After 5 minutes of meeting someone you ask, “So… do you blog?”
• You make plans and decision based on whether they are ‘blog-worthy’
• You get more “approve this comment” e-mail messages than spam
• You only stay at hotels with broadband or with a Starbucks within 3 blocks
• People worry about you when you do not post for a day
• You’ve started to resemble this guy:

RSS feed tattoo from Flickr user shizhao

For more absurd blogger tattoos, click here. Obsessed with Facebook? In need of a Twittervention? You’re invited too… See you on Friday!

Interview with artist Dawoud Bey
As published in the fall issue of the IMA’s Previews membership magazine

Q. Can you tell us when you became interested in portraiture?
As I began to figure out what I wanted to do as an artist, I was spending a lot of time going to museums and galleries looking at work by other photographers. The pictures that resonated for me most strongly were those that were of human subjects. There seemed to me something quite powerful about a person confronting the camera, returning the attention of the photographer. Early on I was most struck by the photographs by Mike Disfarmer that I saw at the Museum of Modern Art in the mid-70s. I also was struck by Richard Avedon’s show of portraits at Marlboro Gallery around that same time. James Van Der Zee’s photographs had impressed me in the Harlem On My Mind exhibition. I wanted to make photographs that resonated for me the way those photographs had.

Q. How did you begin to focus on photographing teenage students?
Young people became the primary subject of my work in 1992, when I was invited to do a residency at the Addison Gallery of American Art at Phillips Andover. During the eight weeks I was there, I photographed both students at Phillips and students from Lawrence High School, a town a few minutes away. I also worked with the teachers to extend the idea of the portrait into the classroom in other forms, including writings produced by the students. I began to realize how much young people were excluded from the fabric of “the art world” as I knew it and how much their images had been stereotyped in the larger culture over the years. I decided then that I wanted to construct a more complex representation of these young people while also engaging in my own ideas about the photographic object.

Q. Can you talk about how you develop your relationship with the students you work with?
My relationship with the students actually begins while photographing them. I make photographs as a way to find out something about someone. I don’t attempt to develop a relationship and then translate that relationship into a picture; I do my finding out through the camera. All of the pictures in Class Pictures were made by spending two or three weeks in each school. Usually I have only 45 minutes in which to take a student’s photograph, since the student has been released from class in order for me to photograph them. Before making the photograph I ask the student to sit quietly for a few minutes and write something about themselves. Once they are done I make the pictures without reading what they have written. I think if a portrait is well done the viewer is left with a feeling that they have connected to the life of another human being, even though they may be a stranger. The photographs are posed and highly staged, but with an eye towards creating an appearance of informality.

Q. What advice would you give to a young Indianapolis student looking to discover his or her own voice through art?
I would say look at as much art as you can, and make as much art as you can. Never stop looking, and never stop learning. The whole history of art is available to you; it is up to you to know that history and to figure out what you want to contribute to it. Then seek out the training and education that will allow you to accomplish that. And have fun too!

Class Picture Day on Flickr!
In celebration of Bey’s exhibition, we’re inviting you to share your own high school pictures. Artist Dawoud Bey displays statements written by the students alongside the portraits he captures. Be sure to include your own caption.

Submit your class photos, past or present, and we’ll post our favorites here on the IMA Blog!

Good news, right? Until the day when scientific advancements make living forever possible, everyday blogger-types like myself can pursue other life-extending options gleaned from those who do it best.

The Danish people seem to have figured something out. Ranked (once again) as the “happiest people in the world” in a recent international survey, one would expect the Danes to also have a longer life expectancy. Some suspect it’s low expectations that keep them content, while others say it’s the city’s way of life, with nearly one-third of Danes biking to work and another one-third taking public transit. Others suggest it’s the laid-back, carefree lifestyle they lead with free healthcare and top-notch education systems. I am not sure how Americans can avoid worry, but Hoosiers can certainly benefit from a better public transit system. The sooner it is on track, the sooner we’ll be whistling our way to work.

Next up, Japan boasts the healthiest population in the world, with a woman’s life expectancy averaging 86 years. A diet rich in fish, rice and seaweed helps keep heart disease and cancer under control, while government-sponsored fitness programs help the Japanese stay trim. My advice — spin class and sushi for dinner tonight. I hear the Wii Fit is also to die for.

Leading the world in smarts, the Finnish students come out on top. They attribute a good education system to student-teacher relationships, pupils’ enthusiasm to learn and an environment conducive to learning mathematics, with strict rules minus the high anxiety. Determining the smartest population is impossible because there is no standardized global exam. Staying mentally fit has been a proven factor in reducing the onset of disease. So it’s back to reading Middlemarch and playing Settlers of Catan next Friday for me.

To state the obvious, I think we can agree that happiness, health and intelligence all contribute to longevity. So my plug for an instant fix — RSVP for tomorrow’s exhibition preview and party for To Live Forever: Egyptian Treasures from the Brooklyn Museum at the IMA. Bring a friend, have a drink and learn a little about the ancient Egyptians’ quest to live forever.

• Get your tickets here

  

Last night was FIERCE! Between the drag show, the giant disco balls, the larger-than-life runway projection and the hundreds of guests, the party was a hit. Folks polished their stilettos, broke out their finest threads and didn’t disappoint. The fashion both inside and outside the galleries was stunning. I’ve posted some of the party pics on the IMA’s Flickr account. Check out who was there and what they wore by clicking here.

If you didn’t make it to the party, there’s still plenty of time to see the show. Breaking the Mode, Contemporary Fashion from the Permanent Collection, Los Angeles County Museum of Art is open to the public from March 16-June 1, 2008. Preview it online by clicking here.