About
Hello! Welcome to The Museum Review.
My name is Madison. I just recently graduated from James Madison University with a double bachelor's degree in Art History and Studio Art. For my Art History degree, I concentrated in Museum Studies and took numerous classes that studied the museum as an entity; what it does, why it exists, its history both public and private, how it is runs, and what could make it better in the near future. Museums are complicated institutions now and they're only getting more so. We think of museums as places that focus on the past, but they must also be able to see into the future. For example, any given museum exhibit you visit was likely planned several years before it was ever installed in the museum. How did the museum staff know that you'd like what you were seeing two years after they first decided it was a good idea? They probably didn't. But that doesn't mean it was a complete guess either. As the public's opinions about museums and what they should be continue to change, museum must remain flexible and open to new ideas (something they're never been particularly great at). Hopefully, this blog will operate as a two way street, a mediator between the public and the people working deep inside its walls, to facilitate discussion about what goes on in a museum besides just the art.
This blog has a two part goal: The first is to provide museum visitors with a little more background about all the little things that go into creating the bigger picture of museums. I'll look at guest services, signage, wall labels, exhibition design, curation, and museum events. I'll fill you in on who does what to make exhibits happen, why things work, and why they don't. I'll also look at which type of visitors the museum caters towards and which it misses out on.
The second goal is to give museums a resource for possible improvement ideas. I'm not a museum professional (yet), but I have studied what it's like to be one. This training allows me to see or understand deeper meaning behind small things the everyday visitor might not notice or worry about but that really contribute to the museum experience overall. On the other hand, I'm still a 20-something college student. I want to be entertained while I walk around a museum, to "ooh!" and "aah!" and to be surprised as well as educated. From this unique perspective I hope I give museums a different type of feedback than they receive from the general public in surveys or from museum professional who have been operating in the museum field for their entire careers.
My name is Madison. I just recently graduated from James Madison University with a double bachelor's degree in Art History and Studio Art. For my Art History degree, I concentrated in Museum Studies and took numerous classes that studied the museum as an entity; what it does, why it exists, its history both public and private, how it is runs, and what could make it better in the near future. Museums are complicated institutions now and they're only getting more so. We think of museums as places that focus on the past, but they must also be able to see into the future. For example, any given museum exhibit you visit was likely planned several years before it was ever installed in the museum. How did the museum staff know that you'd like what you were seeing two years after they first decided it was a good idea? They probably didn't. But that doesn't mean it was a complete guess either. As the public's opinions about museums and what they should be continue to change, museum must remain flexible and open to new ideas (something they're never been particularly great at). Hopefully, this blog will operate as a two way street, a mediator between the public and the people working deep inside its walls, to facilitate discussion about what goes on in a museum besides just the art.
This blog has a two part goal: The first is to provide museum visitors with a little more background about all the little things that go into creating the bigger picture of museums. I'll look at guest services, signage, wall labels, exhibition design, curation, and museum events. I'll fill you in on who does what to make exhibits happen, why things work, and why they don't. I'll also look at which type of visitors the museum caters towards and which it misses out on.
The second goal is to give museums a resource for possible improvement ideas. I'm not a museum professional (yet), but I have studied what it's like to be one. This training allows me to see or understand deeper meaning behind small things the everyday visitor might not notice or worry about but that really contribute to the museum experience overall. On the other hand, I'm still a 20-something college student. I want to be entertained while I walk around a museum, to "ooh!" and "aah!" and to be surprised as well as educated. From this unique perspective I hope I give museums a different type of feedback than they receive from the general public in surveys or from museum professional who have been operating in the museum field for their entire careers.
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