Update 2018 2#

Since my last post I have been gathering more resources to use in my final thesis as well as gathering physical copies of the books I'm already using. What's more, I have also added more details on the companies, schools, and people from Rochester into my paper in order to gain both a longer paper and inform more people on what the city's role was during the war and how it was effective.

I have also sent several rewrites of my paper to my two advisors both of whom are giving me advice on what I should add to my paper and how I need to expand on certain subject so readers may learn more about the topic if they are not familiar with either WWI or Rochester's role in the war.

Some of these selective pieces of knowledge that many would not know about include RIT's role in training the Red Cross, making materials for the war such as dehydrated food, or training soldiers in technical skills that would serve them in Europe. Whats more the University of Rochester trained students in combat by starting one of the original ROTC programs in an attempt to give students who wanted to fight in the war a chance to lead men into battle after going trough basic training.

I also discovered that Eastman Kodak created an Aerial Reconnaissance School for pilots so they might gather information more accurately as they learned from the English and French that reconnaissance was the most important thing for the modern military in the 20th century.

I hope to find out more as I keep writing and I plan on having at the very least thirty pages at the end of the year with charts and tables to show off even more detailed information in my final draft of the paper.

"That's not it!!??"

Last Tuesday I made my first visit of the semester to the Burchfield Penney Archives in order to study documents from the 1976-1978 seasons at Artpark. The documents of particular interest were editions of the Artpark magazine, called Current, and drafts of press releases. One of the most amusing Artpark pieces I've come across in the documents is Phillip Simkin's Human Puzzle, a participatory piece which had 75 visitors each wear a giant foam puzzle piece and attempt to put together a "puzzle" containing their bodies (I know the art itself isn't a particular focus of my paper but it's still interesting to learn about). The information I received from this visit should be sufficient for me to finish putting in all of the available initial data into the database by the end of the month. Then, I can spend the next month focusing on visualization and analysis.

I also need to consider my poster design and the nature of the figures I want to include. Contrary to what was believed today, there were previous posters available online for reference. I look forward to the workshop next week.   

Participant Observation and More

I have gotten into the groove of my participant observation, with a set template and plan of attack in regards to navigating the space of the RPM. As my knowledge has grown, I have integrated myself into the community found at the Rochester Public Market. A vendor who sells honey is also interested in what progress and observations I have made in my research, and I am always happy to fill him in when I go to buy honey from him. I’ve also become friends with the musicians, who are always eager to play something, say something-- to be heard in different mediums. Many vendors have come to expect my presence at the market, and I have come to expect going.

(Above: RPM's vending Shed A in February)

My visitor observations have led me to discover connections between John H. Falk’s Museum Visitor Identity types and the types of market visitors. I’m happy to observe overlap between the way museum visitors and the RPM’s patrons engage within the space, and I have found that some other aspects of visitor participation have come into focus for me. I also attended a seminar given by Evan Lowenstein, the communication/project coordinator for the market, to understand the RPM from the urban planner’s perspective. I’ve also discovered that the Rochester Museum and Science Center has toured travelling exhibits at the RPM in years past, which I was very excited to hear about.

 

(Above Left: Vendor selling chickens. Above Right: Vegetables and fish that I bought from the market and started to prepare at home).

Going forward, I will continue to homogenize the data I have collected over the last few months, and conduct my last one or two interviews with representatives from the Memorial Art Gallery and other local cultural institutions.

(Above: A meal containing food grown/produced in Rochester, NY by people who live in Rochester, NY. Yes, even the cider).

More Progress...

I have completed my case studies! In my last update I had only completed inspecting one title but since then I have inspected three others. I decided on doing four case studies instead of five for the sake of time and I was seeing the same pattern where doing a fifth inspection would not have made a difference. I have truly enjoyed my time working at the Louis B. Mayer Conservation Center and will miss it dearly. Handling nitrate has been a great experience. Deborah Stoiber has been a great resource for all my questions, mainly asking what type of decomposition is this and if there is a name for it.

As of now, I am working through feedback from both advisors and tackling the big issues. I will be adding in my inspection on my last three case studies and everything that follows including lots and lots of photographs for the appendix.

Observations on... Visitor Observations

In my previous post, I identified a few goals I had for moving forwards with my thesis project.
One of these goals was to complete one last round of visitor observations, preferably by
visiting the Rochester Museum and Science Center (RMSC) on a weekend, as I had yet
to do so and I was curious as to whether the museum would attract more/different visitors
on the weekend than during the rest of the week.  I am pleased to report that not only was
I able to visit the RMSC on a Sunday, but there were indeed more visitors than on my 
previous two visits (the Wednesday before Thanksgiving 2017 and a Friday morning
in mid-January 2018), which gave me the opportunity to make a number of important
observations about how people interact with the Native Peoples of the Americas exhibit and its content, as well as to better understand observations
I’d made on my previous visits.

My observations across all three visits led me to a few interesting and valuable conclusions
that I’d like to share here.

• The exhibit appears to attract 3 main visitor groups - parents (aged approximately 25-35)
  with young children (typically between the ages of 3 and 9), young people (late teens
  through early 20s) visiting in pairs or small groups, and older visitors (mid 40s
  through mid 60s) wandering around individually.  Visitors in the first two groups
  tend to vocally and obviously (i.e., point, gesture, or otherwise specifically indicate
  a piece of exhibit content) interact with the exhibit content, while older, individual
  visitors don’t.  However, none of the groups linger (and my site survey completed
  on my first visit clues me in to why).  This diversity in visitor groups and potential
  experiences highlights the importance of the exhibit space being adaptable and
  inclusive for all visitors, so everyone is comfortable and has an equal opportunity
  to explore and learn.  For example, visitors using mobility devices like wheelchairs
  and walkers can have difficulty viewing the dioramas, ironically, because of the
  steps in front of them that are necessary for younger visitors to better view the
  dioramas (this is a design element I have highlighted to be changed in the future).
• The gaps in visitor knowledge and in the information the exhibit provides
  overlap in places.  Parents with young children tend to have to field a lot of
  questions if their child is actively engaging with the exhibit content.  However,
  they are occasionally asked questions which they are unable to answer themselves,
  and when they turn to the (limited) text in some portions of the exhibit, they cannot
  find an answer.  This leads to one of three responses (“I don’t know,” a made-up answer,
  or pointing out another item or idea which they do know something about).
  While the exhibit text cannot possibly account for every question a curious three-year-old
  could ask, there needs to be more text that could potentially do so, or point the
  parents (or any visitor) in a direction for further research, and needs to be written
  in such a way that a parent could use it as a jumping off point to answer their child’s
  inquiry, or an older child could answer their question for themselves.
• And, perhaps most importantly for this project, people largely seem to refer
  to the peoples and cultures they are seeing in the exhibit in the past tense.
  While there is no clear indication from observing visitors as to whether or not
  this is due to the belief that these peoples/cultures no longer exist, or an a
  cknowledgement that they do not necessarily follow any traditional practices anymore.
  Regardless of the cause of this prevalent use of passive voice by the visitors,
  it underlines, at least in my mind, the importance to providing modern contextualization
  for the exhibit content, especially the dioramas, which are some of the only
  representations of actual people (in the sense that they depict persons, rather than
  just an object) in the exhibit, yet are also some of the most static.

These were just a few of the takeaways from the visitor observation portion of my project,
and I will consider all of these and more as I move closer to writing my recommendations
for the redesign of the exhibit.

Mid-Semester Update! Still Listening?

Admittedly, I do not have any sort of grand update on the status of my thesis this time around.
Since receiving feedback from the first draft of my thesis I’ve slowly been chipping away at revisions,
and it seems like a more complete version of my thesis is beginning to take form.

Since my last update, I have near completed writing about my podcast case studies and am
working to create visuals and tables to make the comparative nature of my paper more easily
understandable. I am also currently working on the more arduous task of bringing together my
specific case study analysis and my larger examination of public history common practices.

At this point I’d honestly just like to thank my advisors for all of their help and support so far,
and ask that they continue to believe in my research as much as I do. In process, I write in a
very fragmented manner, so the fact that they are able to glean anything from my research so
far is encouraging for when I can finally put it all together. Going forward I plan to really
clean up and finalize a lot of the ideas and writing I have, making a more well rounded and
complete thesis.

Round Two

Today I submitted the first draft of my thesis proper, and I am excited to see my paper beginning to take shape! Last semester it seemed like the final thesis deadline was impossibly far away, so it is crazy to think that the paper will basically be all written in a few weeks.

I was able to visit the Kodak Archives with my secondary advisor, Jody Sidlauskas, which allowed her to see the space and give me some ideas for framing my recommendations and collections plan. It also allowed me to get updated on the state of the archive since I last saw in June 2017. Kodak has continued to accept materials in the absence of the archive interns, so there is certainly a need for a plan of action. I now feel ready to move forward with my collections plan and complete the final part of my writing.

Ahem. . .

Progress......

To be honest, I didn't do much involving my thesis over Winter Break. Most of my project's progress has occurred over the past two weeks. I finally have an interview Roger Remington set up, and am currently waiting for word back from Jennifer Whitlock. Both interviews I am initially conducting via email as a way to let my interviewees take the time and space they need to provide well rounded answers.

While I wait for my interviewees to respond I am gathering eclimate data for the 4th floor stacks at the Vignelli Center and filling out my thesis sections on the scope of the collections, biographical information on the Vignelli's and my conclusion and recommendation.

I currently feel very overwhelmed, but Dr. Lent says thats normal and I am actually very on track, so I will take her word for it.

Artpark Spring Season

Over the winter break, I focused on gathering the preliminary data for my relational database. I visited the Burchfield Penney archives once again to specifically examine records from 1974 and 1975, the first two years of Artpark's operation. What I learned then was that Artpark actually had a publication that ran during the years of my study. Articles featuring specific artists might be useful in the future for receiving a more complete picture of their careers prior to their residencies.

I am currently developing the database using Airtable. So far, I am finding Airtable very easy to use and it allows me to easily keep track of which artists went through the same institutions in their careers. However, gaps in the data are becoming inevitable, as the archival documents cannot provide complete exhibition history for every artist. Additionally, not all of the artists-in-residence were visual in their medium. Some were performers, some were poets, and some were even educators. I will have to determine how I would want to distinguish between these different mediums in my database.

As for figures, if I had a time machine, I could go back in time and take my own photos of the temporary land art created at Artpark. Unfortunately, I cannot and the ephemeral works no longer exist (although some were recreated recently). So I will likely stick with screenshots of the database and resulting visualization. 

Case Study Progress

Since intersession, I have decided on a film collection to pull films from for case studies, the John Allen Collection. A former student from 2000 inspected a group of films from this collection which I am now using for my case studies.

The films are silent nitrate prints and from the early 20th century. The films I am inspecting are at varying levels of decay. These films are held at the Louis B. Mayer Conservation Center owned by the George Eastman Museum. I have been visiting the conservation center to inspect the films, Collection Manager, Deborah Stoiber, has been there to assist and instruct me.

As of today, I have inspected the film Garden of Allah and found that since the films have been put into the nitrate vaults the amount of decay has slowed considerably since they were last inspected in 2000. I have plans to inspect 5 titles total and compare them to each other. In the end, I hope to be able to conclude the storage conditions have slowed the rate of decomposition for all of the titles.


I am continuing to add information on current preservation practices and am deciding whether or not to add in the costs associated with preservation. 

New Semester Update!

Over the winter break, I took admittedly more of a vacation from my thesis than I was planning on, but now the new semester has started and I've jumped right back into work!

After completing a first draft, I feel much more confident in the direction that my thesis is going, as I've moved on from ideas to more hard data. In writing my proposal I focused a lot on the history and theory of public history and podcasting, and now I have transitioned to focusing on my case studies, BackStory Radio and Dan Carlin's Hardcore History.

In researching and investigating these podcasts, I was fortunate enough to be able to conduct an interview with Dr. Nathan Connolly, one of the four main hosts of backstory radio. Being able to talk directly with someone in the podcasting realm, and even better on one of my case studies, will be an invaluable resource going forward and I am very excited to incorporate it into my work.

Going forward, I will be diving further into my research of these two podcasts and will work to tie together my initial research with the data I am collecting now.

Spring semester updates

Because my project is research-based, I didn't get to do anything too exciting or hands-on over the break. This format allows me to work on my thesis at more of my own pace, and not that of a more rigid project schedule, which I think is helping me a lot. I find myself writing at odd times, like during a quick 20 minute break or really late at night, but every little paragraph is still progress!

As I began writing, I started to notice a few "holes" in my research. I had originally thought some of my sources would have enough material, but I find myself wanting to add a bit more, just to improve the flow. It's difficult to know whether I'm dwelling too much on background context and the history of museum education, but I'm assuming that I'll end up cutting a decent portion of that first section of my paper. The more I write, the better idea I have of what research I still need.

After today's class, I'm now trying to think ahead to what types of images would be appropriate to include. The final "product" of my thesis will be a list of suggested applications of museum education methods to selected Common Core standards, so maybe a table would be an efficient way of listing that information.