The IMA Lab is a team of diverse and creative minds—programmers, developers, designers, producers, videographers and communicators— with deep experience developing significant and cutting-edge projects. We’ve seen the benefits that vibrant collaborations can bring to bear on shared problems, and we’ve also had our share of frustrations with the resources available to the cultural sector. We believe that our community can do better… together. Team members of the IMA Lab are employed by the Indianapolis Museum of Art, an organization dedicated to transparency and innovative modes of engaging communities through art, design and the natural world.

Robert Stein - Chief Information Officer, Director IMA Lab

Favorite Part of Working at the Museum

Making a Difference. It’s so gratifying to know that real people use and appreciate what you work so hard on. Life’s too short to waste time, I really want to make my work count while I can.

Best Way to Unwind After a Hard Day

No better way to beat the stress of a hard day than to drop the top on my Jeep and turn the music up loud! Followed by collapsing on the couch with the family for some serious chill time.

Robert Stein is the Chief Information Officer and Director of Museum Information Systems at the Indianapolis Museum of Art. In this role, Rob leads the museum’s IT, Web, and New Media teams and has played a significant role in helping the IMA become a leader in the use of technology among museums. Rob and his colleagues write and speak frequently at conferences and professional gatherings about technology projects, strategy and the impact of the web on cultural institutions.

A long time advocate of technology and innovation, Rob joined the museum in 2006 from Indiana University where he served as Assistant Director of the Visualization and Interactive Spaces Lab. At the lab, Rob led research efforts combining scientific visualization techniques with novel human computer interface research. Rob also served as Senior Visualization Specialist at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois. During his tenure at Illinois, Rob developed custom visualization software for domain specialists and developed innovative solutions using virtual reality and building large advanced display systems.

Rob was elected by his peers to the board of the Museum Computer Network in 2008 and has been actively involved in serving the museum community and his local community for many years. In 2007, Rob received the Indy’s Best and Brightest award by Junior Achievement. Also in 2007, Stein was picked by Indianapolis Business Journal as one of their 2007 Forty under 40, an award which recognizes professionals who have made their mark in the Indianapolis business community prior to their 40^th birthday. He is happily married to his wife of 12 years and is proud to be the father of two fine sons.

Charles Moad - Assistant Director IMA Lab

Favorite Part of Working at the Museum

The people. It's rare to find a work environment filled with such a large majority of motivated and passionate people.

Best Way to Unwind After a Hard Day

Nothing eases the soul like cooking and enjoying a nice dinner to wrap up a hard day's work.

Charlie leads the application development team towards providing open-source and reusable solutions for the IMA and the cultural community as a whole. His diverse programming background has helped the IMA provide internal solutions and bypass the communications barrier often experienced with museum consultants. He has been deeply involved in the integration of the museum's collection and digital asset management systems with other frameworks, including the IMA's main website.

Before coming to the IMA, Charlie was an Associate Developer for the Scientific Data Analysis Lab, a Pervasive Technology Lab of Indiana University. There he worked on visualization and web service applications in the bioinformatics and life sciences realm. Charlie holds a M.S in Computer Science from Indiana University.

Meg Liffick - Assistant Director, Public Affairs

Favorite Part of Working at the Museum

I grew up loving art and museums. It’s important for me to be able to communicate my passion for art with others. I feel lucky to be able to do exactly what I love. I’m also very grateful to be working with such wonderfully brilliant and fun colleagues.

Best Way to Unwind After a Hard Day

I love going for long runs. I put on my ipod, turn up the hip hop and go. It’s meditation for me. Running calms me down, clears my mind, and helps me to stay focused on the moment.

Meg Liffick is the Assistant Director of Public Affairs and is responsible for developing integrated approaches to marketing that leverage a wide range of traditional, online and emerging techniques aimed at promoting the IMA. Meg recently returned to the Indianapolis Museum of Art after serving as the Marketing Manager at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum where she led the museum's social networking and digital marketing efforts as well as oversaw more traditional advertising initiatives. Prior to New York, Meg served as the communications manager at the IMA and spearheaded member communications, eCommunications, and digital marketing efforts.

During her initial tenure at the IMA, Meg served on a team that oversaw the development, launch, and maintenance of imamuseum.org,theromansarecoming.org, and the IMA’s dashboard. She also served as co-producer for the award-winning webisode series created for the Roman Art From the Louvre exhibition. Meg attended Indiana University where she earned her B.A. in History and Art History and her M.A. in Arts Administration. She has published and presented on the subjects of marketing, technology, and integrated communications.

Ed Bachta - Applications Developer

Favorite Part of Working at the Museum

I feel fortunate to have the opportunity to be a part of an organization dedicated to educating the public about cultures from around the world and the value of differing perspectives. It is increasingly important for us all to respect one another and find a way to live harmoniously on this planet.

Best Way to Unwind After a Hard Day

I like to take a break from the glowing screen and play a little guitar, read a book, get outdoors to walk, ride my bike, play tennis, or play board games with my wife. On the weekend we add in video games, movies, and visiting with family

Ed Bachta is a software developer who enjoys designing and implementing effective and engaging interactive online experiences that empower website visitors to explore and learn about the world around them. At the IMA he has developed exhibition websites (e.g. To Live Forever), interactive features (e.g. Virtual Rome for Roman Art from the Louvre, mummy CT-scan interactives, the ArtBabble video player), and tools (e.g. project management tools, Term Review for the Steve tagging project) as part of the IMA’s in-house development team. In graduate school he specialized in computer graphics and virtual reality, and then worked in the field of scientific and information visualization before entering the museum community.

In addition to being fascinated with earth science, Ed is also interested in Edo-period and modern Japanese culture and studied abroad in Japan for one year as an undergraduate, acquiring a functional level of proficiency in Japanese. He is also concerned about environmental sustainability, and collaborates with the museum's sustainability team on projects covering topics from power monitoring and conservation in the machine room to environmental awareness in the Art and Nature Park.

Matt Gipson - Web Designer

Favorite Part of Working at the Museum

Being able to work with such a diverse team of talent with access to many resources.

Best Way to Unwind After a Hard Day

Listening to dusty grooves and enjoying his at home petting zoo and being a Nintendo nerd.

Matt is a Web Designer with a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Graphics Technology from Purdue University. He discovered his love for pixels as a kid playing video games and combined that with his love for drawing to end up where he is today. As the Web / Interactive Designer at the IMA, Matt is responsible for the visual artwork and design across a variety of websites and interactives. Matt has designed a slew of IMA related websites including ArtBabble, Breaking the Mode, Adrian Schiess, Sacred Spain, IMA Blog, IMA Dashboard, Power and Glory, and To Live Forever just to name a few. Matt’s weapons of choice are Photoshop, Fireworks, Dreamweaver, Flash, Wordpress, Drupal, and a steaming hot mug of coffee with extra sugar and cream. Since working at the IMA Matt has designed a variety of web interfaces by taking them from the conceptual phase, to full creative mockups, and then into themes. Matt loves the process of building out websites using the latest front-end design techniques with HTML and CSS. Matt wouldn’t be caught dead designing a website using tables.

Kate Franzman - New Media Manager

Favorite Part of Working at the Museum

My favorite part about working at the museum happens every morning upon my arrival. In every season, the gardens and grounds of the IMA are always breath-taking.

Best Way to Unwind After a Hard Day

Nothing helps me unwind after a hard day's work like strapping on my roller skates and going to roller derby practice.

Kate is a New Media Manager at the IMA. She coordinates filming and manages projects like the IMA’s new handheld multimedia tour, TAP. She also manages web content for the museum’s main website and social media outlets such as ArtBabble.org, Facebook, iTunes U, Flickr, and YouTube. Kate has a Journalism degree from Penn State University, and joined the IMA from a local alternative paper, NUVO Newsweekly. In her spare time, she likes to watch her boyfriend DJ, and play roller derby.

Kyle Jaebker - Application Developer, Steve in Action Grant

Favorite Part of Working at the Museum

My favorite part of working for an Art Museum has been the openness to new ideas. Many places I have worked in the past were set in the way things were done and did not allow for the freedom to try new ideas and technologies. I have found the IMA enjoys exploring new areas in technology to provide unique solutions to problems.

Best Way to Unwind After a Hard Day

After a good day of work I like to get home to relax with my wife and play with my two sons. They both have more energy than they know what to do with and it is infectious. Whether we are at the pool or just playing in the yard; it is great to be with family and to be outside.

Kyle is a new member of the IMA team but has been involved in professional software development efforts for the past seven years. He has worked on many different projects during that time including web survey tools and satellite ground systems. Kyle is also proficient with many different technologies including PHP, Javascript, MySql, Oracle, Java, ColdFusion, and others. Early in his career Kyle found that working on the web was where his passion was. To continue to grow that passion Kyle became involved as a developer with the PHP content management system MODx where he has been a core contributor for the past five years. Over that period Kyle has developed many add-on components for building menus, searching, and generating tag clouds.

This passion for the web led Kyle to his current position at the IMA. At the IMA, Kyle works as a developer on the Steve.museum social tagging project. With this project Kyle is developing software tools to provide museums a way to allow online tagging of their collections.

Outside of work Kyle enjoys running, biking, and just about anything outdoors. He is a huge Indianapolis sports fan and when time allows he likes to play some video games. Kyle has a wife and two boys who make coming home from work a joy.

Kris Arnold - Web Developer

Favorite Part of Working at the Museum

Working in an environment that is mentally challenging and furthering my knowledge of development.

Best Way to Unwind After a Hard Day

99% of the time it is sitting down putting on some music or heading into my basement to make some music.

Kris’ interest in computer programming began around the age of 9 in his home town of Greencastle, IN. When the college let out for the summer Kris and his mother would go around the campus to go dumpster diving. One year someone left a Tandy 1000 next to the dumpster, which Kris immediately snatched up. Without money for computer games, Kris taught himself BASIC and started writing very simple text based games for something to play.

For many years, computers were only a hobby for Kris until a good friend suggested he take a job with him at IQuest internet doing technical support. In his time there Kris was promoted into the operations department and handled network infrastructure duties as well as building and maintaining internal websites until the company purchased a webhosting company.

After leaving IQuest, Kris took a year off to pursue his interests in photography. This eventually led him to the local alt-weekly newspaper, where he began working as a photographer. A few months later Kris applied for and was offered a position as IT Manager. Kris joined the IMA as a web developer in 2009 and spends his time writing software for the IMA’s online efforts.