50 Pieces

by Ashley Rand

This week was quite eventful. On Monday alone, we managed to document 50 pieces of unframed work. I know it sounds like a lot, but that's because it is. We managed to photograph the entire series by Larry Clark titled Tulsa. The series includes 50 images that are approximately the same size. So one might think the process for documenting these works would be easy. Actually, although it was simple, it did require a lot of prep work to get the series completed. Since we have moved onto documenting flat works, the entire working area has changed, as we now have the lights set up in a way that faces down towards the floor. We have our working area set close to the ground, with the camera mounted on a tripod above the work. It takes a few test shots for us to get the day started.  Once Peter is comfortable and satisfied with the lighting, the assembly line begins to form. With unframed prints, you need to be extra sensitive as to not crease, bend, or mark up the paper. In this case, I was mainly helping out setting up the gray and color scales alongside the prints and making sure that the photograph was set up backwards due to the way the camera was arranged. Being that this series is incredibly delicate, Peter and Shannon were the only ones to handle the actual art work that day, while the interns recorded and helped when needed. This was by far one of my favorite days. Not because I didn't have a lot to do, but for having the opportunity to see this series in person. It was by far amazing. It made me realize why I loved black and white photography and everyday life with normal people. This series was simply beautiful, even though some prints weren't pleasant to look at, it still told a story about how one survived in Tulsa. I never would have imagined. After seeing this series, I now feel it's necessary to have the book in my collection and will be purchasing it within the week. I can't wait to see what works we will photograph next week. My excitement keeps growing each week. 

Simply Amazing

by Ashley Rand

Another week with the Museum at Work and still learning something new each day. This week was quite eventful as we managed to finish all the framed pieces of art work, however, in the process I was able to learn how to store the works. This was by far one of my most stressful weeks because the art varied so much in size. Any normal person would just store the art back to back, front to front, but in a museum there are precautions in which one needs to follow in order to store the work properly. In fact, you do place artwork back to back or front to front depending on which way it is needed, although on top of that the work needs to span the other piece. "What exactly does that mean?" you might ask; it means that the when storing art you can't have a piece smaller than the one in front, behind because it will dig into the back of the work. The same goes for placing the pieces facing each other; you can't have a piece that the frame sets on the Plexiglas; it needs to be wider or taller than the original piece. "Why?" you ask; simply because you want to avoid the possibility of scratches getting onto the work. This was news to me and in fact took me an entire day to get the hang of it. Although it makes complete sense, I never would have known how to place art back in the vault.

While working at CAM, I often check local museums for exhibits going on and was beyond excited when I saw the Museum of Fine Arts in St. Pete having an exhibit on Andy Warhol. I was able to go see the show on Wednesday, and was absolutely amazed. However, while I enjoyed the show and the museum, I realized how much effort went into hanging each piece onto the wall. I know the dedication and hard work each individual went through to make sure every piece was hung at the exact place on the wall. I feel for the first time that I not only appreciated the exhibit, but indeed everything that went along with the art work. After working with the Museum at Work staff at CAM this summer, I know the dedication it takes to make a show successful. I would advise people to go look at this exhibit, for it was simply amazing.

Talking Heads of the Museum

by Barbara Cardinale

As I walked into CAM during week seven, I was taken back by the changes in the gallery. The black cloak that had once masked half of the set was now pulled back from side to side to reveal a contraption that holds a camera and unframed works of art. Peter was engaged in testing the camera to print ratio. While he was doing this, he appeared more so as an actor than a photographer, as he had to leap back and forth from the camera to a spot on the "stage" that wouldn't distort the lighting. We interns and volunteers all agreed that the exhibition project is not only an exercise in viewing and touching art works, but physically a performance art in how we are constantly moving and displaying ourselves. As a lover of performance arts (I've been in a few on-stage productions), I find myself feeling like David Byrne of the Talking Heads-- a man that combined visual art with performance art. How awesome is it that I get to work in this environment?

Also this week, I was interviewed by a member of the Oracle newspaper staff. Check out what I had to say, as well as others here:

http://www.usforacle.com/documenting-art-1.1771290

The Art of the 1970's

by Jasmine Rippy

6-9-09

Photographed the Documenta series from 1970 – finding out how much I like work from the1960’s-late 70’s….There is a quality to early contemporary work that resonates just as strong today as it must have then. I find that many modern day contemporary artists are regurgitating that which our predecessors had been doing years before and it is not exactly any better. Something very bad happened to art in the 80’s and I’d very much like to see it shaken off already.

6-10-09

Got through most of the objects today but hit some bumps with hanging work so will finish up the rest of what we pulled from the vault tomorrow

6-11-09

Nothing spectacular about the day; we are doing the same thing we do everyday. Got to photograph a Robyn Denny piece that was pretty neat. His work is more about the object than it was of the old school institutional idea of that pretty picture on the wall. It consists of multiple shallow plexi cubes and pigment coated metallic panels inside. Each piece has a subtle colour change from panel to panel ranging from orange to green. It will be nice to look at all the images together later on in the term to get an idea of these in their full context.

6-16-09

New week and new works to document – Eduardo Paolozzi Unit I: Secret of Life, The Human Machine and How it Works was my favorite of the day. (Again from 1970) I had to look him up after we were done today to check out some of his other work. I much prefer learning about art / artists this way much more than reading about it in a book or trying to stay awake in a lecture. Educators take note*

6-17-09

Lots of interns here today so we are sharpening our skills of teamwork, communication and sharing. Pulled some amazing photographs to do – Minor White (no, its not Ian MacKaye’s new band.) Again, I had to look him up… apparently one of the greatest American photographers.

6-18-09

Mostly prints today – Had some nice work by Donald Staff from his Sonnets Suit. It has become a lot of: pull, hang, shoot, put back – the repetition becomes monotonous and it makes me feel like I am disrespecting art somehow by failing to take the time to appreciate it.

6-23-09

Wrapping up of photographing framed works today and I can’t help but to have mixed feelings of it. Glad to be moving on to dealing with something new but there are still so many more pieces in the framed collection I would love to see and learn from. I will have to come back after the term....

6-24-09

Reconfigured lighting and camera set up for working with works on paper. Also got a chance to hang about in the fabrications and repairs shop with the cool rats as they tricked out our new transport cart for the flat works. Bam! Whut!?

6-25-09

Finalized new set up for flat paper works: tweaked the lighting, created clean steady surfaces for transporting and prepping artwork, cleaned and tidied up accumulations from past few weeks (putting away tools and the like that we will no longer need etc.) and then started to shoot works on paper! We started out with two portfolios of photographic work. The art handler’s dance has changed rhythm and the work is so much more vulnerable.

CAM is a Stage

by Sarah Crocker

The more I think about it, the more thought-provoking this past Thursday has been. Earlier in the day, I had talked to one of the other volunteers about how the Museum at Work exhibition project may be interpreted as a form of performance art. We (volunteers, interns, and museum employees) are a vital part of the project, whether or not we recognize this fact. If you consider this exhibition project to be performance art, in whatever significant or insignificant way, we are part of the art itself. Maybe this isn't a revelation for anyone else. I don't feel like a painting or a print or a photograph, but if people are visiting the museum to see both the artwork and the workers (or at least the process of moving and photographing the artworks), it's undeniable that we're a vital part of this exhibit.

When we're not in the museum actually working on something, there's little to see. This reminds me of the reporter that came in recently, after many of us had left or were packing up to leave. He stood next to the barrier, in plain sight of the camera and lighting set-up and all of the computer equipment and asked “Where's the exhibit?” I certainly don't think that this was a stupid question; instead I believe it speaks to the importance of our place in this project.

Another interesting thing occurred Thursday. When I first walked into the gallery, I saw Shannon standing in front of what, at the time, looked like an elaborate art installation. There was a large white board, a smaller blue box on top of that, and a strange metal and wood structure bolted to the side of it. Trying to play it cool, even though I had no idea what the piece was about, I mentioned it to Shannon... who told me it was a cart for transporting prints.

Initial embarrassment aside, it really made me think about others possibly faking an appreciation for art. Even more interesting, Shannon mentioned how a lot of people walk into an art museum (especially if it's a contemporary art museum) expecting that everything in the gallery is a work of art. This mild paranoia, combined with my reluctance to seem like a complete blockhead, produced a fairly entertaining result. I wonder if anyone else feels this way.

'Out-of' Space and the Gallery as Galaxy

by Barbara Cardinale

If I had to choose a single word to describe week six, it would be 'space.' As a current student assistant for the USF Tampa Library's Special Collections department, I understand how space complications may arise due to limited room for collections and work. Each week, I dedicate five to seven hours assisting Pat Tuttle, the Special Collections department's book processor and shelf organizer. I have been working with Pat for only a month now, and thus far we have moved three collections in order to create more space for all of the new book acquisitions. Often, Pat says, "we are getting more books in, but I have no idea where we are going to put them!"

This week at CAM I really felt as though I was working in a Special Collections department. After all, a museum's collection could be considered a "special collection" in library terms. Not to mention the grant funding agency in Washington, D.C. that focuses on museums and libraries called the Institute of Museum and Library Services. For more information about, IMLS, go to: http://www.imls.gov/

I mention IMLS because they afforded me a scholarship and grant called the ALSTARS which stands for Academic Librarians for Tomorrow's Academic Researchers. For more information as to what the ALSTARS is about, please go to: http://reports.research.usf.edu/publications/FY0607/FY0607_section3.pdf

So space is on my mind, as fellow interns, volunteers, Peter, Shannon and I prepared for the auditors' visit on Friday, June 19th. We had to to pull and showcase eight different works from the 2007-2008 fiscal year because the University is interested in whether or not these works are present within CAM's collection. The pieces varied in size and format; the largest of the works, and the most difficult to pull from the collection was Robert Gelinas' Untitled acrylic on canvas (that, interestingly, is date unknown.) It took five people and two ladders to move the piece from its location. Once it was on our level, it took us ten minutes to decide where it should be placed for the time being. We had to move and adjust other art works and a photo-stand on the ground level in order for the required works to be displayed. A table that was already in the room needed to be free of all items so a piece of foam core could be set on it to display five additional works. These included Robert Mangold's Untitled, from Four x Four x Four (1990), two other Untitled pieces, one by Gustavo Rivera (ca. 1990) and the other by Mikhail Ivanov (1990), and two polacolor photographs by Andy Warhol titled Carolina Herrera (1978) and Cabage Patch Doll (1984-1985). Another large print was displayed, Larry Bell's Vapor Drawing (1981), but it was on the ground level so it was easy to get to and didn't need to be moved.

I can't begin to describe how excited I was to browse through The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts gift of 106 photographs and 50 gelatin silver prints from the Andy Warhol Photographic Legacy Program. As a lover of contemporary theory, Andy Warhol's art is the pinnacle of contemporary thought and movements, as Warhol is to me one of the most famous prognosticators of the ever evolving question, "what is art?" For more on CAM's collection of Andy Warhol photographs, go to: http://www.ira.usf.edu/CAM/cam_collection.html

Although CAM's vault is designed to house art works and not display them such as Graphicstudio's vault, it is because CAM's gallery is the space for art-- a roomy space for the artist stars. I feel like I am standing on a blue moon, as I have been fortunate to see CAM's collection rotate like the planets in the sky.

Bringing Art to You

by Enaam Alnaggar 

This week, we moved some medium-sized framed works. These were among the last few framed works to be photographed, as we would be moving on to cataloging other kinds of artwork in the next week. The pieces that interested me the most were those included in the “Art in the News” series. This series contains 12 works, each created by a different artist for the newspaper medium. Each piece was released in The Tampa Tribune once a month from January to December. A year-long exhibit showcasing these pieces was held at CAM throughout 1999. All of the works were very interesting and thought-provoking, but my favorites include those by Mariko Mori (who studied at Bunka Fashion College!), William Wegman, and Allan McCollum. I think that the “Art in the News” series was a great way of bringing art out of the museum and, literally, to the mainstream’s doorstep, coffee table, and office desk, hopefully generating a great deal of interest in contemporary art.

For more information on the “Art in the News” exhibit and to see small images of the works, please visit: http://www.graphicstudio.usf.edu/CAM/exhibitions/1999_01_ArtInTheNews/artinthenews.html

The page includes short bios of each artist and links where you can find even more information.  

Here is a link to a Youtube video of Mori's 2007 exhibit at the Groninger Museum: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acxYOBJ5Y4Q

You can probably very easily find other info and lists of each artist’s works in Wikipedia, as well. Plugging an artist’s name into Google Images will bring up tons of images of their works and often links to articles, interviews, and even blog posts reviewing that artist’s career. I encourage you to explore!

New photos have been uploaded to the Flickr account, so be sure to check them out. In our new layout, our Flickr account can be accessed from the “Photos” link, located in the top navigation bar. Clicking “Press” will take you to a recent article published in a local newspaper about the Museum at Work exhibit.

See you next week and thanks for reading!

Progress!

by Ashley Rand

Museum at Work this week was a little more laid back than usual. On Monday, WUSF news came in and did a brief interview with Peter. During the interview, we had some visitors walking through the exhibit with questions regarding the project; perfect opportunity for us to let the public know what we were up to this summer. While Peter was being interviewed, Shannon and all of us interns were getting the paper work and art work set up for the day's shooting. This entails us taking measurements of the work, getting the line up ready, and placing hangers on the wall. The interview slightly took away from our normal photographing routine in the morning, however, after we took a break for lunch, we managed to come back and get the days work done and put away before 5:00 PM. Starting next week we will begin to photograph unframed prints. It will be interesting to see how we set up for this kind of work. I'm sure the first day will be a little rough with getting the lights situated, but by the second day we should have a routine down. As of last Wednesday, we had more than 300 pieces of work photographed; this means the Museum at Work project is making great progress.