![Acquisitions Editor: Charles Harmon
Editorial Assistant: Erinn Slanina
Sales and Marketing Inquiries: textbooks@rowman.com
Credits and acknowledgments for material borrowed from other sources, and
reproduced with permission, appear on the appropriate pages within the text.
Published by Rowman & Littlefield
An imprint of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.
4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706
www.rowman.com
86-90 Paul Street, London EC2A 4NE
Copyright © 2022 by The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.
Cover image courtesy of Smithsonian National Museum of African American
History and Culture
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or
by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and
retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a
reviewer who may quote passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Piacente, Maria, author.
Title: Manual of museum exhibitions / Maria Piacente.
Description: Third edition. | Lanham : Rowman & Littlefield, [2022] | “A
Lord cultural resources book.” | Includes bibliographical references and
index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2021034056 (print) | LCCN 2021034057 (ebook) | ISBN
9781538152805 (cloth) | ISBN 9781538152812 (paperback) | ISBN
9781538152829 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Museum exhibits—Handbooks, manuals, etc. | Museum
exhibits—Planning—Handbooks, manuals, etc.
Classification: LCC AM151 .M34 2022 (print) | LCC AM151 (ebook) | DDC
069/.5—dc23
LC record available at https:/
/lccn.loc.gov/2021034056
LC ebook record available at https:/
/lccn.loc.gov/2021034057
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper
for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
21_0657-Piacente.indb 2
21_0657-Piacente.indb 2 12/7/21 9:56 AM
12/7/21 9:56 AM](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/74570-250325153333-7fc49b3f/85/Manual-of-Museum-Exhibitions-Maria-Piacente-7-320.jpg)
!['Nature'?" The reply was, of course, "God and Ralph Waldo
Emerson." The Old Manse was built about 1766 for Mr. Emerson's
grandfather, then minister of the parish, and into it he brought his
bride, Miss Phebe Bliss (daughter of Rev. Daniel Bliss, of Concord,
and Phebe Walker, of Connecticut). Miss Mary Emerson, youngest
child of this marriage, used to say "she was in arms at the battle of
Concord," because her mother held her up, then two years old, to
see the soldiers from her window; and from his study window her
father saw the fight at the bridge. It was the scene of many of the
anecdotes, told of Dr. Ripley, some of which, gathered from various
sources, may here be given; it was also, after his death, one of the
resorts of Thoreau, of Margaret Fuller, of Ellery Channing, of Dr.
Hedge, and of the Transcendentalists in general. His parishioners to
this day associate Dr. Ripley's form "with whatever was grave and
droll in the old, cold, unpainted, uncarpeted, square-pewed meeting-
house, with its four iron-gray deacons in their little box under the
pulpit; with Watts's hymns; with long prayers, rich with the diction of
ages; and, not less, with the report like musketry from the movable
seats."[1] One of these "iron-gray deacons," Francis Jarvis, used to
visit the Old Manse with his children on Sunday evenings, and his
son, Dr. Edward Jarvis, thus describes another side of Dr. Ripley's
pastoral character:—
"Among the very pleasant things connected with the
Sabbaths in the Jarvis family were the visits to Dr. Ripley
in the evening. The doctor had usually a small levee of
such friends as were disposed to call. Deacon Jarvis was
fond of going there, and generally took with him one of
the children and his wife, when she was able. There were
at these levees many of the most intelligent and agreeable
men of the town,—Mr. Samuel Hoar, Mr. Nathan Brooks,
Mr. John Keyes, Deacon Brown, Mr. Pritchard, Major Burr,
etc. These were extremely pleasant gatherings. The little
boys sat and listened, and remembered the cheerful and
instructive conversation. There were discussions of
religion and morals, of politics and philosophy, the affairs](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/74570-250325153333-7fc49b3f/85/Manual-of-Museum-Exhibitions-Maria-Piacente-48-320.jpg)
![of the town, the news of the day, the religious and social
gossip, pleasant anecdotes and witty tales. All were in
their best humor. Deacon Jarvis [adds his son], did not go
to these levees every Sunday night, though he would have
been glad to do so, had he been less distrustful. When his
children, who had no such scruples, asked him to go and
take them with him, he said he feared that Dr. Ripley
would not like to see him so frequently."
According to Mr. Emerson, Dr. Ripley was "a natural gentleman; no
dandy, but courtly, hospitable, and public spirited; his house open to
all men." An old farmer who used to travel thitherward from Maine,
where Dr. Ripley had a brother settled in the ministry, used to say
that "no horse from the Eastern country would go by the doctor's
gate." It was one of the listeners at his Sunday evening levees, no
doubt, who said (at the time when Dr. Ripley was preparing for his
first and last journey to Baltimore and Washington, in the presidency
of the younger Adams) "that a man who could tell a story so well
was company for kings and for John Quincy Adams."
When P. M., after his release from the State Prison, had the
effrontery to call on Dr. Ripley, as an old acquaintance, as they were
talking together on general matters, his young colleague, Rev. Mr.
Frost, came in. The doctor presently said, "Mr. M., my brother and
colleague, Mr. Frost, has come to take tea with me. I regret very
much the causes (very well known to you), which make it impossible
for me to ask you to stay and break bread with us." Mr. Emerson, his
grandson (by Dr. Ripley's marriage with the widow of Rev. William
Emerson) relates that he once went to a funeral with Dr. Ripley, and
heard him address the mourners. As they approached the farm-
house the old minister said that the eldest son, who was now to
succeed the deceased father of a family in his place as a Concord
yeoman, was in some danger of becoming intemperate. In his
remarks to this son, he presently said,—
"Sir, I condole with you. I knew your great-grandfather;
when I came to this town, in 1778, he was a substantial](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/74570-250325153333-7fc49b3f/85/Manual-of-Museum-Exhibitions-Maria-Piacente-49-320.jpg)
!["Broken down with the infirmities of age, and subject to
fits that deprive me of reason and the use of my limbs, I
feel it a duty to be patient and submissive to the will of
God, who is too wise to err, and too good to injure. My
mind labors and is oppressed, viewing the present state of
Christianity, and the various speculations, opinions, and
practices of the passing period. Extremes appear to be
sought and loved, and their novelty gains attention. You,
sir, appear to retain and act upon the sentiment of the
Latin phrase,—
"'Est modus in rebus, sunt certi denique fines.'
"The learned and estimable Norton appears to me to have
weakened his hold on public opinion and confidence by his
petulance or pride, his want of candor and charity."
Six years earlier, Dr. Channing had written to Dr. Ripley almost as if
replying to some compliment like this, and expressed himself thus, in
a letter dated January 22, 1833,—
"I thank God for the testimony which you have borne to
the usefulness of my writings. Such approbation from one
whom I so much venerate, and who understands so well
the wants and signs of the times, is very encouraging to
me. If I have done anything towards manifesting
Christianity in its simple majesty and mild glory I rejoice,
and I am happy to have contributed anything towards the
satisfaction of your last years. It would gratify many, and
would do good, if, in the quiet of your advanced age, you
would look back on the eventful period through which you
have passed, and would leave behind you, or give now, a
record of the changes you have witnessed, and especially
of the progress of liberal inquiry and rational views in
religion."[2]](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/74570-250325153333-7fc49b3f/85/Manual-of-Museum-Exhibitions-Maria-Piacente-51-320.jpg)
![that a parcel of men and teams have broke into our wood-
lot, and are making terrible destruction of the very best
trees, and unless we do something immediately I shall be
ruined.' Mr. Barrett had no heart to resist this appeal of
Cæsar's; he told him not to be alarmed, for he would see
that he was not hurt, and would put the matter right. He
then wrote an order to his men to cut no more wood, but
to come directly home with their teams, and sent the
order by Cæsar."[3]
The biographer of Mr. Barrett, who was also his attorney and legal
adviser, goes on to say:—
"A favorite nephew who bore his name, and whose
guardian he was, died under age in 1818, leaving a large
estate, and no relatives nearer than uncle and aunt and
the children of deceased aunts. Mr. Barrett believed that
the estate in equity ought to be distributed equally
between the uncle and aunt and the children of deceased
aunts by right of representation.[4] And although advised
that such was not the law, he still insisted upon having the
question carried before the Supreme Court for decision;
and when the court decided against his opinion, he carried
out his own views of equity by distributing the portion that
fell to him according to his opinion of what the law ought
to be. After he had been fully advised that the estate
would be distributed in a manner he thought neither
equitable nor just, he applied to the writer to make out his
account as guardian; furnishing the evidence, as he
believed, of the original amount of all his receipts as such
guardian. I made the account, charging him with interest
at six per cent. on all sums from the time of receipt till the
time of making the account. Mr. Barrett took the account
for examination, and soon returned it with directions to
charge him with compound interest, saying that he
believed he had realized as much as that. I accordingly](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/74570-250325153333-7fc49b3f/85/Manual-of-Museum-Exhibitions-Maria-Piacente-65-320.jpg)
![made the account conform to his directions. He then
wished me to present this account to the party who
claimed half the estate, and ask him to examine it with
care and see if anything was omitted. This was done, and
no material omission discovered, and no objection made.
Mr. Barrett then said that he had always kept all the
property of his ward in a drawer appropriated for the
purpose; that he made the amount of property in the
drawer greater than the balance of the account; and
(handing to me the contents of the drawer) he wished me
to ascertain the precise sum to which it amounted. I found
that it exceeded the balance of the account by $3,221.59.
He then told me, in substance, that he was quite unwilling
to have so large an amount of property go where it was in
danger of being distributed inequitably, and particularly as
he was confident he had disclosed every source from
which he had realized any property of his ward, and also
the actual amount received; but, as he knew not how it
got into the drawer, and had intended all the property
there to go to his nephew, he should not feel right to
retain it, and therefore directed me to add it to the
amount of the estate,—which was done."[5]
Conceive a community in which such characters were common, and
imagine whether the claim of King George and the fine gentlemen
about him, to tax the Americans without their own consent would be
likely to succeed! I find in obscure anecdotes like this sufficient
evidence that if John Hampden had emigrated to Massachusetts
when he had it in mind, he would have found men like himself tilling
their own acres in Concord. The Barretts, from their name, may have
been Normans, but, like Hampden, the Hosmers were Saxons, and
held land in England before William the Conqueror. When Major
Hosmer, who was adjutant, and formed the line of the regiment that
returned the British fire at Concord Bridge, had an estate to settle
about 1785, the heir to which was supposed to be in England, he
employed an agent, who was then visiting London, to notify the heir,](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/74570-250325153333-7fc49b3f/85/Manual-of-Museum-Exhibitions-Maria-Piacente-66-320.jpg)
![farms in Marlborough, with a good house on it, and Lucy
can match his land acre for acre."
Joseph returned from that land of Egypt, and like a wise youth took
the hint, and built a house of his own, planting the elm trees that
now overshadow it, after a hundred and twenty years. After the due
interval he went again to Marlborough, and found Lucy Barnes in the
September sunshine, gathering St. Michael's pears in her father's
garden. Cousin John was married, by this time, to another damsel.
Miss Lucy was bent on having her own way and her own Joseph;
and so Mr. Barnes gave his consent. They were married at
Christmas, 1761; and Lucy came home behind him on his horse,
through the same Concord woods. She afterwards told her youngest
son, with some pique:—
"When my brother Jonathan was married, and went to
New Hampshire, twenty couples on horseback followed
them to Haverhill, on the Merrimac, but when your father
and I were married, we came home alone through these
dark Concord woods."[6]
The son of this lively Lucy Hosmer, Rufus Hosmer, of Stow, was a
classmate, at Cambridge, of Washington Allston, the late Chief
Justice Shaw, and Dr. Charles Lowell, father of Lowell the poet. They
graduated in 1798, and Dr. Lowell afterwards wrote:—
"I can recall with peculiar pleasure a vacation passed in
Concord in my senior year, which Loammi Baldwin, Lemuel
Shaw, Washington Allston, and myself spent with Rufus
Hosmer at his father's house. I recall the benign face of
Major Hosmer, as he stood in the door to receive us, with
his handsome daughter-in-law (the wife of Capt. Cyrus
Hosmer) on his arm. There was a charming circle of young
people then living in Concord, and we boys enjoyed this
very much; but we liked best of all to stay at home and
listen to the Major's stories. It was very pleasant to have a](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/74570-250325153333-7fc49b3f/85/Manual-of-Museum-Exhibitions-Maria-Piacente-68-320.jpg)
Manual of Museum Exhibitions Maria Piacente
- 1. Read Anytime Anywhere Easy Ebook Downloads at ebookmeta.com Manual of Museum Exhibitions Maria Piacente https://ebookmeta.com/product/manual-of-museum-exhibitions- maria-piacente/ OR CLICK HERE DOWLOAD EBOOK Visit and Get More Ebook Downloads Instantly at https://ebookmeta.com
- 2. Recommended digital products (PDF, EPUB, MOBI) that you can download immediately if you are interested. The Museum as a Cinematic Space The Display of Moving Images in Exhibitions 1st Edition Elisa Mandelli https://ebookmeta.com/product/the-museum-as-a-cinematic-space-the- display-of-moving-images-in-exhibitions-1st-edition-elisa-mandelli/ ebookmeta.com Images of the Art Museum Connecting Gaze and Discourse in the History of Museology 1st Edition Eva-Maria Troelenberg https://ebookmeta.com/product/images-of-the-art-museum-connecting- gaze-and-discourse-in-the-history-of-museology-1st-edition-eva-maria- troelenberg/ ebookmeta.com Exhibitions for Social Justice 1st Edition Elena Gonzales https://ebookmeta.com/product/exhibitions-for-social-justice-1st- edition-elena-gonzales/ ebookmeta.com Pedagogies of Punishment. The Ethics of Discipline in Education 1st Edition Winston C. Thompson https://ebookmeta.com/product/pedagogies-of-punishment-the-ethics-of- discipline-in-education-1st-edition-winston-c-thompson/ ebookmeta.com
- 3. Charged With Forever (After the Law #5) 1st Edition May Gordon [Gordon https://ebookmeta.com/product/charged-with-forever-after-the- law-5-1st-edition-may-gordon-gordon/ ebookmeta.com Pro Data Visualization Using R and JavaScript: Analyze and Visualize Key Data on the Web 2nd Edition Tom Barker https://ebookmeta.com/product/pro-data-visualization-using-r-and- javascript-analyze-and-visualize-key-data-on-the-web-2nd-edition-tom- barker/ ebookmeta.com Black Women Taught Us An Intimate History of Black Feminism 1st Edition Jackson Jenn M https://ebookmeta.com/product/black-women-taught-us-an-intimate- history-of-black-feminism-1st-edition-jackson-jenn-m/ ebookmeta.com Bite Me Shadow Guild Vampire Bride 1 1st Edition Linsey Hall https://ebookmeta.com/product/bite-me-shadow-guild-vampire- bride-1-1st-edition-linsey-hall/ ebookmeta.com Motivating and Inspiring Students Strategies to Awaken the Learner Helping Students Connect to Something Greater Than Themselves 1st Edition Robert J Marzano Darrell Scott https://ebookmeta.com/product/motivating-and-inspiring-students- strategies-to-awaken-the-learner-helping-students-connect-to- something-greater-than-themselves-1st-edition-robert-j-marzano- darrell-scott/ ebookmeta.com
- 4. Hucow Before Christmas 1st Edition Jodie Brighton https://ebookmeta.com/product/hucow-before-christmas-1st-edition- jodie-brighton/ ebookmeta.com
- 6. MANUAL OF MUSEUM EXHIBITIONS MARIA PIACENTE THIRD EDITION A Lord Cultural Resources Book ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD Lanham • Boulder • New York • London 21_0657-Piacente.indb 1 21_0657-Piacente.indb 1 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 7. Acquisitions Editor: Charles Harmon Editorial Assistant: Erinn Slanina Sales and Marketing Inquiries: [email protected] Credits and acknowledgments for material borrowed from other sources, and reproduced with permission, appear on the appropriate pages within the text. Published by Rowman & Littlefield An imprint of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 www.rowman.com 86-90 Paul Street, London EC2A 4NE Copyright © 2022 by The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. Cover image courtesy of Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Piacente, Maria, author. Title: Manual of museum exhibitions / Maria Piacente. Description: Third edition. | Lanham : Rowman & Littlefield, [2022] | “A Lord cultural resources book.” | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2021034056 (print) | LCCN 2021034057 (ebook) | ISBN 9781538152805 (cloth) | ISBN 9781538152812 (paperback) | ISBN 9781538152829 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Museum exhibits—Handbooks, manuals, etc. | Museum exhibits—Planning—Handbooks, manuals, etc. Classification: LCC AM151 .M34 2022 (print) | LCC AM151 (ebook) | DDC 069/.5—dc23 LC record available at https:/ /lccn.loc.gov/2021034056 LC ebook record available at https:/ /lccn.loc.gov/2021034057 The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 2 21_0657-Piacente.indb 2 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 8. iii Contents Foreword ix Gail Dexter Lord Preface xi Maria Piacente Acknowledgments xiii Chapter 1 Introduction: The Exhibition Development Process 1 Maria Piacente PART I: WHY? Chapter 2 Museums and Their Exhibitions 7 Brad King 2.1. The Trust Factor 8 2.2. Exhibitions as Agents of Transformation 8 2.3. Museums as Activist Institutions 10 2.4. Corporate Sponsorship: How Close is Too Close? 12 2.5. The Way Forward 13 Chapter 3 Where Do Exhibition Ideas Come From? 17 Barry Lord (updated by Maria Piacente) 3.1. Research-Based and Market-Driven Exhibitions 18 3.2. Planning for Exhibition Research 18 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 3 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 3 12/7/21 1:14 PM 12/7/21 1:14 PM
- 9. iv Contents PART II: WHERE? Chapter 4 Exhibition Facilities 25 Sean Stanwick and Heather Maximea 4.1. A World of Exhibition Spaces 26 4.2. Developing Design Criteria for Exhibition Spaces 27 4.3. Exhibition Space Characteristics 37 4.4. Exhibition Gallery Security 51 4.5. Accessibility, Adjacency, and Circulation 55 PART III: WHAT? Chapter 5 Permanent Collection Exhibitions 61 Katherine Molineux 5.1. Planning for Permanent Collection Exhibitions 61 5.2. Changing Permanent Collection Displays 63 5.3. Interpreting Collections 64 5.4. Modes of Display 66 Chapter 6 It’s Not Always about Collections 73 Katherine Molineux 6.1. Idea Exhibitions 73 6.2. Children’s Exhibitions 76 6.3. Living History Exhibitions 79 6.4. Science Exhibitions 81 6.5. Digital Immersive Exhibitions 83 Case Study: Weston Family Innovation Learning Centre, Terms of Engagement at the Ontario Science Centre, by Lesley Lewis and Kevin von Apen 85 Chapter 7 Virtual Exhibitions 89 Sarah Hill 7.1. What is a Virtual Exhibition? 89 7.2. Why Develop a Virtual Exhibition? 90 7.3. Thinking About Digital Audiences 95 7.4. Virtual Exhibition Considerations 99 7.5. Virtual Exhibition Development Process 111 7.6. Tips for Smaller Museums that Want to go Digital 112 Case Study: Extending the Life of a Traveling Exhibition, Museum of International Folk Art, Santa Fe, United States 113 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 4 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 4 12/7/21 1:14 PM 12/7/21 1:14 PM
- 10. Contents v Chapter 8 Temporary Exhibitions 119 Maria Piacente and Katherine Molineux 8.1 Types of Exhibitions in a Temporary Exhibition Program 120 8.2 Managing a Temporary Exhibition Program 125 8.3 Making Space for Temporary Exhibitions 127 8.4 Public and Educational Programming 129 8.5 Marketing and Public Relations 129 8.6 Funding and Resourcing a Temporary Exhibition Program 130 8.7 Generating Revenue 131 Chapter 9 Traveling Exhibitions 133 Maria Piacente 9.1 Why Create a Traveling Exhibition Program? 134 9.2 Strategize for Success 135 9.3 Staff and Professional Resources 137 9.4 Loan Agreements 138 9.5 Designing and Preparing an Exhibition for Travel 139 9.6 Managing the Tour 141 9.7 Borrowers and Organizers 144 Case Study: Natural History Museum London’s Touring Exhibition Program, An Interview with Jan English, Head of Touring Exhibitions 145 Interview: Traveling Exhibitions in a Changing World, with Antonio Rodriguez, Chairman of the Board, International Committee for Exhibition Exchange (ICOM, ICEE) 148 PART IV: WHO? Chapter 10 Exhibitions and Diversity, Equality, Accessibility, and Inclusion 153 Maria Piacente and Karen Carter 10.1 Implications for Exhibitions 154 10.2 Reflections: Fulfillment of Our Promise 157 Case Study: Activating Change: DEAI, Community, and Evaluation, An Interview with Cheryl Blackman, Director of Museums and Heritage Services for the City of Toronto, Canada 160 Chapter 11 Curiosity and Motivation 165 Shiralee Hudson Hill and Barbara Soren 11.1 Cultivating Curiosity 165 11.2 Learning and Exhibitions 169 11.3 Understanding Audience Experiences, Motivations, and Preferences in Exhibitions 171 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 5 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 5 12/7/21 1:14 PM 12/7/21 1:14 PM
- 11. vi Contents Chapter 12 Evaluation 177 Gail Lord, Duncan Grewcock, Barbara Soren, and Jackie Armstrong 12.1 Measuring Success by Gail Lord 177 12.2 Before, During, and After: Front-End, Formative, Remedial, and Summative Evaluation by Duncan Grewcock 179 12.3 Qualitative and Quantitative Audience by Barbara Soren and Jackie Armstrong 187 Case Study: University of Michigan Museum of Natural History Front-End and Formative Visitor Study Using Multiple Methods by Barbara Soren 201 PART V: HOW? Chapter 13 Roles and Responsibilities 211 Maria Piacente 13.1 Who’s Involved in the Exhibition Process? 211 13.2 Teams and Committees 215 13.3 Contracting Expertise 217 13.4 Making Decisions 217 Case Study: Oakland Museum of California Exhibition Process with Valerie Huaco, Deputy Director and Chief Content Officer 218 Case Study: Roles and Responsibilities in a Small Museum: The Central Bank Museum of Trinidad and Tobago 221 Chapter 14 Preparing the Exhibition Brief 223 Maria Piacente and John Nicks 14.1 Formulating the Exhibition Concept 223 14.2 Exhibition Brief 226 Case Study: Canada Day 1 Traveling Exhibition 231 Chapter 15 Interpretive Planning 233 Maria Piacente 15.1 Preplanning, Research, and Visioning 236 15.2 Interpretive Strategy 237 15.3 Organizational and Thematic Frameworks 239 15.4 Organizational and Thematic Frameworks from around the World 241 15.5 Communication Objectives/Visitor Outcomes 248 15.6 Interpretive Plan 249 Case Study: University of Michigan Museum of Natural History, Exploring Michigan 250 Case Study: Capitol Visitor Center Exhibition Hall, Washington, DC: Excerpts from the Interpretive Plan 253 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 6 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 6 12/7/21 1:14 PM 12/7/21 1:14 PM
- 12. Contents vii Chapter 16 Content Development 257 Lisa Wright 16.1 Research Planning 258 16.2 Collections Research and Selection 260 16.3 Exhibition Text by Patchen Barss 263 16.4 Image Research and Procurement 268 16.5 Hands-On Exhibits, Models, and Dioramas 273 16.6 Multimedia Exhibits 274 16.7 Subject Matter Experts 278 Case Study: Working with Subject Matter Experts: Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21, Halifax, Canada 279 16.8 Communities and Content 282 Case Study: Creating with Community The First Peoples Exhibition at Bunjilaka Aboriginal Cultural Centre at Melbourne Museum, a Shared Endeavor of Museums Victoria and the Victorian Aboriginal Community 283 Case Study: Indigenous-Led Design and Content Development: Indigenous Peoples Garden, Assiniboine Park, Winnipeg, Manitoba 287 Chapter 17 Exhibition Design 289 Yvonne Tang and James Bruer 17.1 The Design Process 290 17.2 Exhibition Display Cases by Mike Chaplin 301 17.3 Lighting Design by Kevin Shaw 308 17.4 Green Design 314 Case Study: Exhibitions and Museums in India: Challenges and Opportunities by Uttiyo Bhattacharya 317 Chapter 18 Graphic Design 319 Mary Yacob and Jacqueline Tang 18.1 Semiotics in Design 319 18.2 Graphic Design Phases 321 18.3 Graphic Design Elements 323 18.4 Color 330 18.5 Imagery 333 18.6 Design Essentials 333 Chapter 19 Multimedia 335 Cory Timpson 19.1 Strategic Role 336 19.2 Types of Multimedia 337 19.3 Operationalizing Multimedia 351 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 7 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 7 12/7/21 1:14 PM 12/7/21 1:14 PM
- 13. viii Contents Case Study: Rights of Passage Exhibition at Canadian Museum for Human Rights 356 Case Study: Mandela: Struggle for Freedom Traveling Exhibition 360 Chapter 20 Fabrication and Installation 363 Erich Zuern 20.1 Who Will Produce the Exhibition? 363 20.2 Design-Bid-Build or Design-Build: What’s the Difference? 364 20.3 Contracting 366 20.4 The Production Process 368 20.5 Tracking and Scheduling 375 20.6 Warranty 376 Case Study: Creative Contracting by the North Dakota Heritage Center & State Museum by Erich Zuern and Genia Hesser 377 Chapter 21 Financial Planning 379 Erich Zuern 21.1 Creating an Exhibition Budget 379 21.2 Direct Exhibition Costs 384 21.3 Related Exhibition Costs 386 21.4 Managing the Budget 387 Case Study: Budget Stretching with In-Kind Contributions 389 Chapter 22. Effective Exhibition Project Management 391 Robert LaMarre 22.1 The Role of Project Management and Why it is Needed 392 22.2 A Team Effort 392 22.3 Applying Project Management Methodology 394 22.4 Certifications and Continuous Learning 403 22.5 Completing the Tasks 403 Chapter 23 Conclusion: The Future of Exhibition-Making 405 Gail Dexter Lord Glossary 411 Select Bibliography 425 Index 437 About the Editor 457 About the Contributors 459 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 8 21_0657_00a_TOC.indd 8 12/7/21 1:14 PM 12/7/21 1:14 PM
- 14. ix Foreword Gail Dexter Lord The foreword to the third edition of the Manual of Museum Exhibitions was written during Lord Cultural Resources’ fortieth anniversary. While writing Planning our Museums,1 which turned out to be the first book on museum planning, Barry Lord and I founded Lord Cultural Resources. The premise of that book was simple but new: “Museums are for people.” This idea quickly found support around the world because a new generation of museum workers, managers, leaders, and supporters had already decided that museums were for people and wanted to find systematic ways of implementing the idea through planning. And so, the idea grew into a series of museum manuals2 on planning, management, exhibitions, learning, and strategic planning. It gives me great pleasure to introduce this third edition of the Manual of Museum Exhibitions, which ushers in a new generation of museum leaders through the visionary and capable edito- rial direction of Maria Piacente, who has directed exhibitions and event projects for more than a quarter century. Maria has realized exhibitions in museums around the world, bringing an exceptional experience to this volume as reflected in the breadth of its contributors, range of topics, and level of practical detail. Above all, Maria brings a respect for cultural diversity, which is essential to the success of the museum exhibition as a communication medium. Thank you to Maria Piacente and the contributors to this new edition of the Manual of Museum Exhibitions, which is destined to be a classic. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 9 21_0657-Piacente.indb 9 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 15. x Foreword NOTES 1. Barry Lord and Gail Dextor Lord, eds. Planning Our Museums / National Museums of Canada (Ottawa, Canada: Museums Assistance Programme, National Museums of Canada, 1983). 2. Gail Dextor Lord, The Manual of Museum Planning (London: Stationary Office Books, 1999, 1st Edition; 2003, 2nd Edition; 2012; 3rd Edition); Gail Dextor Lord, The Manual of Museum Management (London: Stationary Office Books, 1997, 1st Edition, reprinted 1998; 2009, 2nd Edition); Gail Dextor Lord, Man- ual of Museum Exhibitions (Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press, 2001, 1st Edition; 2014, 2nd Edition; 2021 3rd Edition); Gail Dextor Lord, The Manual of Strategic Planning for Museums (Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press, 2007); Barry Lord, The Manual of Museum Learning (Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press, 2007, 1st Edition; 2015, 2nd Edition); Ali Houssani and Ngaire Blakenberg, Manual of Digital Museum Planning (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2017); Gail Dextor Lord and Kate Market, The Manual of Strategic Planning for Cultural Organizations (Lanham, MD: Roman & Littlefield, 2017). 21_0657-Piacente.indb 10 21_0657-Piacente.indb 10 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 16. xi Preface Maria Piacente When I began contemplating a third edition to the Manual of Museum Exhibitions, I thought my biggest challenge was going to be addressing the mounting complexity and cost of technology and the growing desire for digital and immersive experiences in addition to exploring trends in visitor centered approaches to exhibition development. Then the COVID-19 pandemic struck in early 2020 and the world changed. What did this mean for the role of exhibitions? Would the “blockbuster” as we know it ever make its return, and if so in what form? How would design address the new reality of physical distancing and what would it mean to “interact” in a gallery in the short and long term? Massive protests also marked societal change as people rightly demanded equality, inclusion, and justice in the antiracism movements that began in the United States and sparked a movement worldwide. In Hong Kong, young leaders protested for democracy and freedom, reminding us of the ongoing changes triggered by the Arab Spring and #MeToo movements. It’s not enough just to present the information—museums are taking a stand—entering the realm of advocacy and reinforcing that “truth” must be sought in facts, science, and public discourse. As museums shine a critical light on their practice and the way in which they engage with diverse communities, how will the relationship between the visitor, the object, and the story change? Despite these seismic changes and pressures, I still believe that all museum activities, from research and conservation to education and outreach, converge in the very public forum of the 21_0657-Piacente.indb 11 21_0657-Piacente.indb 11 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 17. xii Preface exhibition. Since the previous manual was published in 2014, new types of experience-driven venues have surfaced, drawing on the core of what makes museum experiences unique— authenticity—while building on the public’s desire for storytelling, full-body immersive, and singular cross-disciplinary collaborations. From the very first version of the publication, visitors have always been at the core of the Manual of Museum Exhibitions. What has become clear is that visitor-centricity has become even more prevalent as museums and art galleries are committed to creating exhibitions that appeal to their audiences. Many of the examples and case studies peppered throughout the manual are excel- lent models of this approach which, considering the growing and justifiable focus on diversity and inclusion, is more important than ever. Our definition of exhibitions is constantly changing as they can now be virtual; nontraditional mi- gratory and pop-up spaces play host to temporary displays; engaging visits must be story-based, participatory, and experience-driven; social media has shifted authority away from experts to the public; and as time-constrained audiences demand more dynamic, interactive, and mobile applications, museum leadership, managers, staff, and designers are rising to these challenges in innovative ways. This new edition of the Manual of Museum Exhibitions aspires to address these cultural and technological changes in the context of professional museum practice. The third edition of Manual of Museum Exhibitions, while addressing new challenges, continues to be, at its heart, a sensible guide to the exhibition development process. New and experienced museum and design professionals will find the technical and detailed methodologies practical and adaptable to any project—big or small, physical, or digital. It will still be your favorite “go-to” guide for “How do I . . .” The manual includes more examples of cool exhibitions from around the world that will inspire you. The manual is organized in five parts: • Part I: Why? We explore the “why” of museum exhibitions. A new treatise on the purpose of exhibitions provides context, as museums are on the cusp of responding to a changing world and greater community engagement. • Part II: Where? The physical requirements to mount permanent and temporary exhibitions safely and effectively are described. • Part III: What? The many different types of exhibitions from science to art to virtual are defined. • Part IV: Who? This new and expanded section focuses on the importance of understanding visitors, what motivates them, and the evaluation techniques to address their needs. In addi- tion, we explore the impact of Diversity, Equality, Accessibility, and Inclusion (DEAI) on the exhibition development process. • Part V: How? From concept to opening day, the exhibition development process is analyzed and described in detail. This is the heart of this new edition. New examples and case studies are featured. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 12 21_0657-Piacente.indb 12 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 18. xiii Acknowledgments Firstly, I would like to thank the contributors who have provided all of us with the benefit of their experience and expertise in the field of museum exhibitions. Some are experience experts at Lord Cultural Resources, others are valued collaborators on previous projects, and still others are included simply because I know and admire the work they have done and are doing. Together, their contributions tell as comprehensive a story about this complex subject as we aim to tell in each exhibition. I would also like to thank the cultural institutions that have allowed us to use photographs, dia- grams, tables, documents, or data from their exhibition projects as illustrations or case studies in this manual. These examples demonstrate the exhibition process in action and provide new and experienced professionals with tangible ways of connecting theory and practice to real life solutions. The Manual of Museum Exhibitions, 3rd edition, has benefitted greatly from the professional at- tention of my editors at Rowman & Littlefield. I know that everyone in the museum profession appreciates their dedication and support of publications in the cultural sector. Finally, this manual is dedicated to the late Barry Lord, cofounder of Lord Cultural Resources. He was my coeditor for the 2014 version of this book, and his wisdom and guidance continued to inspire me as I prepared this new volume. Barry loved exhibitions, their transformative power, and the way they revealed the world of science, culture, and art in ways like no other medium. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 13 21_0657-Piacente.indb 13 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 19. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 14 21_0657-Piacente.indb 14 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 20. 1 Introduction The Exhibition Development Process Maria Piacente As opportunities and demand for exhibitions have increased, so too has the need for a broader understanding of where exhibition ideas come from; how they’re developed; what the choices are with regard to approach; who makes those choices; what exhibitions cost; how to incorporate complex and expensive new technologies; what impact they will have on museum finances; and what benefits can reasonably be expected from exhibitions in terms of engaging the public and creating new knowledge. Often, decision makers are aware of neither the high cost of exhibitions nor how these costs can be controlled. Exhibitions may be initiated in the hopes of achieving high attendance levels, yet no market research is conducted. Alternatively, market research and front-end evaluation is con- ducted, but ignored in the design. Sometimes, the design is completed with minimal involvement of curators and educators, with the result that neither artifacts nor learning objectives fit quite the way they should. With the growing imperative for community consultation and co-curation, exhibition processes need to be further adapted to ensure a responsible and meaningful dialogue that is reflected in the final product. Chapter 1 21_0657-Piacente.indb 1 21_0657-Piacente.indb 1 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 21. Figure 1.1. Exhibition Development Process. LORD CULTURAL RESOURCES 21_0657-Piacente.indb 2 21_0657-Piacente.indb 2 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 22. Introduction 3 Figure 1.1 presents a template for the exhibition development process from initial concept to opening day. This flexible and adaptable process holds true for all project types whether a small temporary exhibition on a tight timeframe or a multimillion-dollar renovation of a national mu- seum’s permanent collection gallery. If your museum is committed to visitor centricity, the role of interpretive planning in your exhibition development process is essential. As the figure illustrates, the process can be understood in three phases: development, design, and implementation. 1. In the development phase the exhibition idea or concept is created, tested, and refined. The principal outcome of this phase is a deep institutional understanding of what the exhibition is about and why the museum is doing it at this time, in this way, and at this scale. This understanding is recorded in the exhibition brief. The heart of the development phase is the interpretive plan, which is explored in chapter 15. Many museums fail to develop a robust plan for an exhibition, with potentially disastrous results that are laid at the feet of designers (not enough engagement), or marketing (not enough advertising), or development (not enough money). In fact, the problems are more likely to be rooted in a divided museum staff; lack of clarity of purpose; lack of appropriate funding to match expectations; and insufficient research into the subject, the audience, or both. 2. The design and content coordination phase takes place when the interpretive plan and all the research conducted to date is transformed into three-dimensional reality through the creativity and insight of designers working collaboratively with curators, interpretive planners, and evaluators. With the growing use of technology in exhibitions, multimedia specialists should be engaged in the design phase in order to maximize the creative power of digital while keeping an eye on costs. Parallel to the design process is content develop- ment and coordination. This is to ensure the content leads design and not vice versa. Object, specimen, and artwork lists are refined, and curatorial research is turned into specific stories, interactive experiences, gallery text, and scripts for multimedia. 3. The implementation phase is the production and installation of the exhibition. Project and financial management throughout the development and design phases are crucial to ensure an on-time and on-budget culmination of the exhibition process. Budget oversight, cost control, and financial evaluation are ongoing throughout the process. As well, curators, designers, and interpretive planners will be quick to point out that their work does not end until opening day or later. Exhibition development is a recurrent and iterative process, adapting and adjusting to exhibitions of varying sizes and budgets, level of complexity, purpose, and the expert teams drawn together to complete them. Ongoing evaluation of exhibitions throughout the planning, design, and installation phase, including a period for adjustments during a “soft opening” is important enough, but a long-range program of evaluating exhibitions over the months or years that they are on view is of even greater value. The exhibition process and strategies outlined in these pages can be adapted to a project of any type, size, or budget, and can be effectively applied to museums with a staff of five people or five hundred. The key is committing to a process—once agreed upon—and a management approach that will lead you to success. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 3 21_0657-Piacente.indb 3 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 23. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 4 21_0657-Piacente.indb 4 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 24. PART I WHY? North Dakota Heritage Center & State Museum/Herb Byers 21_0657-Piacente.indb 5 21_0657-Piacente.indb 5 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 25. 6 Part I Today, human beings are highly aware of the connectivity among us all. We are acutely in- formed of how subjects as diverse as our choice and use of energy sources, our tolerance for each other’s beliefs and practices, our extreme disparities of income, our understanding of each other’s cultures, and many other features of the natural world or what we have fashioned from it are all interrelated. And we question the presuppositions underlying each of these sub- jects, especially because we can see how one set of assumptions affects all the others. As trusted sources of information, museums can be of great value as we explore deep, powerful, and sometimes traumatic subjects. The arts evoke the essential meanings of our lives sensually and imaginatively. Understanding human history is necessary for an incisive awareness of the present, and museums of archaeology or historic sites can present and interpret the past more vividly than a textbook or a lecture. Keeping abreast of contemporary science and technology is a bracing challenge that science centers, natural history museums, zoos, botanical gardens, or industrial museums can help us meet. Children’s museums and specialized institutions on all subjects can speak to more focused interests. Museums of ideas can directly address such fundamental questions related to human rights, tolerance, and identity. Exhibitions are the principal means by which museums can be of service to us. They can confirm, question, or shake our beliefs. They may arouse a new interest or deepen our understanding of ourselves or the world we live in. Exhibitions entertain, delight, and amuse us. They transport us to faraway places and tell stories. They have the ability—if done well and responsibly—to present complex and traumatic content and histories from multiple perspectives to ensure we are getting the whole story. We expect authenticity from exhibitions—original works of art, genuine artifacts, and the most advanced and best informed research on their subjects. Are exhibitions really necessary? Will they make a difference, and if so to whom? Are they the best way to communicate content? Can we use other types of media to make them more effec- tive? Why are they worth the dedication of the museum’s collections, space, time, and money— and most especially—the human resources needed to make them happen?
- 26. 7 Chapter 2 Museums and Their Exhibitions Brad King Exhibitions are a museum’s primary public function. Small wonder: exhibitions, particularly tem- porary and traveling shows, are often high-profile events involving advertising, media coverage, social media campaigns, and direct marketing. Exhibitions are more prominent than major ac- quisitions, publications, research, and educational programs and other important but less visible activities. The public knows museums through their exhibitions, which makes them powerful tools of communication. Be they traditional gallery installations or online experiences, exhibitions have a unique power not only to capture the public’s imagination, but to transform how people view the world. In an earlier edition of this book, Barry Lord wrote that “transformation takes place because the visitor is moved by the perceived authenticity of the exhibit to discover meaning in the objects on display . . . the apprehension of that content is itself a transformative experience that the exhibits uniquely make possible.”1 No other public communication medium can accomplish this feat in quite the same way. The long history of museum exhibitions—from the “cabinet of curiosities” in the eighteenth century, to the edification of the working classes in the nineteenth century, to more recent advances in informal learning—have proven the constancy of their transformative power. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 7 21_0657-Piacente.indb 7 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 27. 8 Chapter 2 This ability to transform is augmented by trust. Public trust in museums is known to be high. This chapter argues that the former is most effective when combined with the latter—that exhibitions’ power to capture hearts and minds is directly proportional to the level of trust in which museums are held. Preservation of that trust is one of the keys for maximum effectiveness, but it can never be taken for granted. The goal of this chapter is to provide guidance for exhibition-making during a period of political instability, declining trust, and transformational change in the museum world and in society as a whole. 2.1 THE TRUST FACTOR Trust is a crucially important factor in society. High-trust societies are more successful econom- ically, more stable politically, and more successful overall. Overall, trust levels have been declining across Western societies. Tribal media, political parties, race, class, age, geography, and many other forces often divide society and produce declines in trust, whether that be in institutions, individuals, or governments. Unifying, trusted influences are less common, but this is where museums have an advantage: they have unmatched reserves of “trust capital,” which puts them in a unique position to create exhibitions that can help heal social and political fractures. Why is trust so important? Former US secretary of state George Schultz called it “the coin of the realm.” Trust, he said, is at the very heart of diplomacy, a necessary precondition to make things happen.2 Museum leaders who want to “make things happen” need to maintain their trust advantage in their exhibitions. Studies released over the past twenty years (the most recent cited here is from 2019) document museums’ remarkably consistent levels of public trust,3 even as other public institutions have been diminished. The 2017 National Awareness, Attitudes and Usage Study of Visitor-Serving Organizations highlights how museums are perceived as free from political agendas, which correlates with greater perceived trustworthiness. Data analyst and museum consultant Colleen Dilenschneider calls it museums’ “superpower.”4 But this trust cannot be taken for granted. The vast majority of museums are scholarly, fact-based, and scientifically sound. In less polarized times, these virtues made trust something of a given. Today, though, science and scholarship themselves are often under attack. Museums must work to not only maintain trust but to build it. This is important because, as is widely agreed, museums and their exhibitions can make a posi- tive contribution to society and can be a driving force in solving society’s “wicked problems,” as coined by designer Jon Kolko. He describes “a social or cultural problem that is difficult or impos- sible to solve for as many as four reasons: incomplete or contradictory knowledge, the number of people and opinions involved, the large economic burden, and the interconnected nature of these problems with other problems.”5 Climate change, social inequality, racial injustice, and a host of other contemporary issues clearly meet these criteria. But preserving their trust capital is vital if museums are to achieve their potential as agents of positive change. 2.2 EXHIBITIONS AS AGENTS OF TRANSFORMATION The way in which museum exhibitions communicate with the public can benefit society by providing a platform to discuss solutions to wicked problems. As Rebecca Carlsson says in a recent MuseumNext post, museums (via, in large part, their exhibitions) can play a major role in 21_0657-Piacente.indb 8 21_0657-Piacente.indb 8 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 28. Museums and Their Exhibitions 9 reestablishing common ground and a shared sense of purpose around society’s issues.6 They can be mediators and facilitators, not just between curators and audiences, but also between different audiences themselves. The gallery and its digital extensions serve as connection points, places of discussion and debate. This role reflects recent fundamental changes in exhibition philosophy. Many authors, including those writing in earlier editions of this manual, suggest communication was the primary purpose of exhibitions, in the sense that the effectiveness of an exhibition’s abil- ity to communicate is a measure of its ability to transform.7 In decades past, the nature of com- munication in exhibitions tended to be one-way: from authoritative museum professionals to the receiving public. This is no longer so. Today, museum exhibitions are more likely to be avenues for two-way or multidirectional communication—from museum professionals and content experts to the museum’s audiences, but also from the museum’s audiences back to the professionals, and from one visitor to another. Indeed, the very term “visitor” is no longer as accurate as it once was; in many ways, visitors have become participants, actively engaging in the content. That shift puts the building blocks in place to build consensus, or at least meaningful and respectful discussions of opposing viewpoints, making the way in which exhibitions communicate an important building block in problem-solving and social unification. The origins of this trend stem from a refocus on “visitor centricity,” which resulted from a com- bination of scholarship and a drive for increased relevance. In visitor-centric museums, formal and informal communication between audiences and museum professionals happens all the time—before, during, and after exhibition experiences. Museums stay connected to their audi- ences and vice versa. Thanks to the work of scholars like John Falk, Lynn Dierking, and others, we now understand far more about how people interact and learn in museums. Didactic, behaviorist approaches where knowledge transmission is authoritative and top-down have been superseded by more participatory approaches. Museums have become places where visitors can “create, share, and connect with one another around content,” according to museologist Nina Simon.8 This change of emphasis has altered the nature of what people learn in museum exhibitions. A “shared authority” model based on dialogue, participation, and co-curation is a model that moves away from one-way transmittal of facts and conclusions that few visitors absorb and makes it possible to think about learning in a different way. Subject matter content becomes a vehicle for developing soft skills such as critical thinking and active citizenship. Visitors still learn about the subject matter, but they also learn how to critically engage more generally in other aspects of their lives. Two-way or multidirectional communication also signals the end of single or universal narratives. Exhibitions now need to approach subject matter from multiple perspectives. This means victors no longer write (or interpret history)—at least not in museum exhibitions. Museumgoers have greater power to make their own history, identity, and cultural belonging part of the narrative. According to the Swedish academic Kersten Smeds, Visitors create their own meanings. The museum will become a stage for action, a meeting place, a “switchboard” for information, and a showroom for a pluralistic reality. . . . This mode of organizing exhibitions fits well into the new pedagogy of self-formation . . . thus new narratives of history and social development can be created. . . . The situation has created a “connecting people” kind of experience which opens possibilities to collectively sharing information and resources with others, with people you choose yourself, locally, regionally, nationally, or internationally. In my opinion we 21_0657-Piacente.indb 9 21_0657-Piacente.indb 9 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 29. 10 Chapter 2 are witnessing new kinds of collectivism which, in my view, may, in a fascinating way, restore the creativity of memory, the unpredictability of History that was lost at the time of the introduction of national narratives, of the one-way things are.9 These principles support the role of museum exhibitions as a unifying force by making room for dissent and debate. They are more democratic than unidirectional communication media. They also benefit museums, making exhibitions welcoming to people with differing mindsets and preferences who would otherwise be alienated by authoritative narratives that dismiss their perspective. New ideas about exhibition content bolster the multiple-perspective approach. Museums in- creasingly work to connect content to audience members’ lived experiences. Visitor-centered relevance has never been more crucial for museums. Engaging with real-world problems con- tributes to the idea of the museum as modern-day athenaeums, through which scholars and the public discuss current issues and everyday life. More than ever, museums are civic society insti- tutions supporting both informal learning and also a kind of “school for living” and citizenship. All these trends and techniques make the exhibition’s power to transform all the more potent. 2.3 MUSEUMS AS ACTIVIST INSTITUTIONS As the drive to be more relevant and constructive in society becomes more urgent, some muse- ums have become more strident in how they advocate through their exhibitions. Even pop culture subject matter now explore serious questions about contemporary issues, and increasingly call for real-world action from their audiences. We have seen how the transformative power of exhi- bitions as communication platforms can inspire such action. The question is how far can they go in this direction before their precious reserves of trust capital—and their overall effectiveness in achieving their goals—begins to diminish. How can museums grapple with divisive current issues without falling into traps of false equivalency (presenting two sides of an issue as if each had an equal claim on the evidence) or the pitfalls of political advocacy? To what extent can museums take a stand on controversial issues? How do museums ensure they heal social divisions rather than exacerbate them? One way to answer these questions is to consider the likely impact of an activist exhibition on trust levels. There is no doubt that museums exert influence, no matter how much they might try to be neu- tral. They are, in fact, “soft power” institutions, a concept developed by the scholar Joseph Nye and explored in the museum context by Gail Lord and Ngaire Blankenberg and others.10 These thought leaders have noted museums’ ability to project soft power, a form of diplomacy, in the service of this or that point of view. Museum soft power can be exerted at various levels: at the level of the individual, at the municipal or city level, or even an international level (e.g., the use of museums to advance national pride or status). Persuasion is its stock in trade. Soft power has a wide spectrum of applications. At one end, it can involve a more-or-less objec- tive presentation of hard facts and their resulting conclusions. As noted, a museum deploying even this mild version of soft power is not neutral. As Marcie M. Muscat says, the museum is “a subtle peddler of influence, promoting an agenda of its own devising” with exhibition narratives “dictated by the objects shown and their means of display, and the prescriptiveness of the story is made less perceptible through careful curation.”11 But the unavoidable fact of curation in and of itself eliminates any possibility of neutrality. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 10 21_0657-Piacente.indb 10 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 30. Museums and Their Exhibitions 11 At the other end of the spectrum is more overt activism. Most museums continue to shy away from this “harder” form of soft power, but there are growing pressures for that to change. Some pressures come from within; for museum staff who make morally powerful arguments regarding funding ethics or hiring inequities, a step in the direction of political activism in ex- hibitions is not a large one. The pressure for change can also extend to museums’ relationships with the outside world. External stakeholders can also influence senior administrators and board members toward more activist or even militant directions in exhibition development. For them, morality, ethics, and global existential threats mean unequivocally that if you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem. This trend has put museum leaders in a very difficult position, since they must now tread carefully between the demands of activist staff, the expectations of their audiences, and their board members and donors, many of whom are wary of wading into politics and other controversial issues. Some thought leaders believe it is time for museums to become more vocal in their defense of facts and reason and on issues of political and social justice. As Richard Sandell and Robert R. Janes say in the very first lines of their preface to their 2019 book Museum Activism, “Only a decade ago, the notion that museums, galleries and heritage organisations might engage in activist practice—marshalling and directing their unique resources with explicit intent to act upon inequalities, injustices, and environmental crises—was met with widespread skepticism and often derision.”12 This is no longer the case. For Sandell and Janes, museums are a “sleeping giant” and a po- tentially powerful “force for good.”13 As social and political divides grow broader, as existential planetary crises become deeper, and as society at large and the museums in particular become more diverse, institutions consider the question of activism more and more seriously. In their volume, Sandell and Janes say that museums can communicate an alternative to the corporatist narrative of early twenty-first-century history. For them, activism is a moral duty, necessitated by the failure of political leadership and business elites to confront the emergencies of the times. Museums are not isolated from the volatility of contemporary society (and never were). But how should they exercise their power in this context? How far can museums go while remaining effective agents of change? Should they “harden” their soft power? Obviously, some areas are noncontroversial: a museum that did not take an unequivocal stand against racism or some other clear-cut moral question would lose all credibility. But for more contentious issues, “hardening” its soft power influence has risks, especially in some societies where basic acts of good citizenship and common decency—such as wearing masks during the COVID-19 pandemic—are politicized. The main risk is that activist museums will become “tribal signifiers,” especially in low-trust societies, with the practice of museum-going becoming a badge of membership in a specific sociopolitical group. Given the progressive political leanings of most museum staff members, this tribal signifier would likely be characterized as “left wing,” “liberal,” or “elite” but of course this can vary. The implications must be carefully considered. How will activism affect the value of its well-deserved reserves of trust capital, its ability to build up social trust overall, and, therefore, its ability to effect positive change? The answer will vary from society to society, but the main point is that museums should consider implications for staff and funding as well as reputation in exhibition planning. There are many instructive examples. One controversy that took place at the Museum of Art and Design at Miami Dade College in Florida in 2020–2021, underscores the potential for damage. The museum had 21_0657-Piacente.indb 11 21_0657-Piacente.indb 11 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 31. 12 Chapter 2 undertaken an exhibition in partnership with a London-based group called Forensic Architecture, which investigates human rights violations. The exhibition, Forensic Architecture: True to Scale, was intended to be a vehicle for investigating a nearby detention center for immigrant children funded by the US government through a private operator. This exhibition was seen to have entered the realm of investigative journalism, in essence a three-dimensional version of the press (and it is worth remembering that the press is not nearly as well-trusted as museums, according to the surveys cited above). The exhibition’s political overtones likely cost its curator her job while rais- ing alarm among many of the museum’s trustees.14 Museums must also consider their potential visitors. Some survey results show lower income and younger segments of society much less trusting of institutions and authority.15 If their goal is inclusivity and effectiveness, museums must understand the psychology of those who are not as open to new experiences, the questioning of formerly accepted narratives, or embracing multiple perspectives. In commenting on the 2020 film Hillbilly Elegy, one conservative writer noted how the rural people depicted in the film reject new experiences as a defensive measure against so- called urban elites in order to preserve their established values, and also to avoid the “reverse snobbery” to which they might be subject from their peers.16 Museums already struggle to attract this demographic; an activist approach is likely to make that struggle all the more difficult, further isolating museums from a large percentage of the population and compromising their ability to maximize unity in the fight against common problems. It is therefore necessary for museums to do the work that will allow them to better understand the questions, concerns, and lived experi- ence of less trusting segments of society in order to properly communicate with them. Finally, and most importantly, there is the question of how effective activist exhibitions can be at effecting the transformations needed to achieve consensus on wicked problems. If an exhibition reaches only the people who already agree with its position, it is merely preaching to the con- verted. Can a museum exhibition be a vehicle of inclusivity and reconciliation when a large and influential proportion of the population are neither open nor interested in engaging with it? Is it enough merely to mobilize audiences who are already sympathetic to the cause? All of this is to say that museums should ponder the likely impact on trust levels—both in main- taining their existing levels of public trust, and in their potential to build it more generally—when considering exhibition projects. It is also important that they try to understand the concerns of a broad swath of the potential audience in order to be most effective in change-making. 2.4 CORPORATE SPONSORSHIP: HOW CLOSE IS TOO CLOSE? In considering the need to preserve trust capital, the always-present need to generate revenue can also produce problems. With the long-term decline in government subsidies, museums have focused on increased revenues from earned and contributed sources to fill the gap. But there are dangers for museums’ credibility as trusted sources of information here as well. The need to generate increased revenue is real, and while financial pressures long predated the COVID-19 pandemic, that world-historical event was catastrophic for museums’ balance sheets. One report stated that the average American museum had lost some US$850,000 in revenue in the first several months of the pandemic, and that many were in danger of permanent closure.17 As with so many other things, the pandemic accelerated preexisting trends toward innovation in revenue generation, leading museums to think more expansively about increasing nongovern- ment revenue streams for some time. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 12 21_0657-Piacente.indb 12 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 32. Museums and Their Exhibitions 13 The phenomenon of “exhibits for hire” is one manifestation of that thinking. Exhibitions that some have called “sponsored content” skate perilously close to ethical lines, mirroring similar trends in journalism.18 Just as traditional media, such as newspapers, have tried to reverse losses from declining ad revenue by publishing such content, so too have some museums done the same via exhibitions. And there are other instances of trust-threatening proximity to corpo- rate concerns: for example, the ethical conflicts of for-profit art galleries sponsoring museum exhibitions of artists they represent, since such exposure might increase auction prices or a gallery’s future business prospects.19 Corporate partnerships have long been a feature of museum business strategies, and these will continue to be important in the future. To maintain appropriate distance, a key issue is curatorial independence where sponsors influence curatorial choices, however questions around credibility thus emerge. The other safeguard is clarity wherein complete transparency around a company’s role in exhibit-making is needed. Awareness of these two principles in exhibition development can help museums maintain trust. 2.5 THE WAY FORWARD This is a time when many formerly unquestioned tenets of museum ethics and operations are being tested. From debates around the use of monies, from collection deaccessioning to questions around ethically correct funding sources, to the proper role of museums in solving our large-scale “wicked problems,” what was once taken for granted is now up for revision, and it will be some time before a consensus is reestablished. While this chapter has focused on the latter issue, its topic is of a piece with many contemporary issues in the field. Assessing an exhibition project’s impact on trust and effectiveness is one tool to help museums navigate such a fraught landscape. Due to their prominence, exhibitions are at the center of many of these debates. At their best, they can be effective tools to rally majorities around solutions to serious societal problems. Due to the trust they enjoy, museums can be a force for unification, using the transformative power of exhibitions as a kind of antidote to the division fostered by so many other public platforms. Current trends in exhibitions reinforce this potential, since the “public town hall” nature of many exhibitions fosters debate and discussion, affective learning, and changed perspectives. Multi- perspective exhibitions have all but erased the idea of a universal narrative, which leaves room for competing opinions and, hopefully, some consideration of opposite viewpoints. The ultimate goal is consensus and action. For this mediation role to work, trust is the single most important factor. We know that museums are trusted, amplifying their ability to influence. George Schultz sums it up: Trust is fundamental, reciprocal, and, ideally, pervasive. If it is present, anything is possible. If it is absent, nothing is possible. The best leaders trust their followers with the truth, and you know what happens as a result? Their followers trust them back. With that bond, they can do big, hard things together, changing the world for the better.20 Trust is the linchpin: with it, things can happen. Without it, effectiveness is diminished. It is important to be clear: the need for museums to maintain public trust does not imply they should avoid taking a stand on obvious injustices, nor should they shy away from controversial topics. A major source of museums’ trust capital springs from truth-telling: we must go where the 21_0657-Piacente.indb 13 21_0657-Piacente.indb 13 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 33. 14 Chapter 2 facts take us, and not succumb to false equivalency or “alternative facts.” Museums actually do have “a duty to be political” as one writer states, not only to help solve existential problems, but also to be on the front lines in the fight against racism, for example, or in the defense of scientific integrity.21 But they also have a duty to be effective, which means that the preservation of trust capital must be a consideration in exhibition-making. The process of exhibition development discussed in subsequent chapters of this book lays out all the considerations for creating excellent experiences. This chapter has hopefully provided broad parameters for the approach to those experiences to empower many new exhibitions to generate positive social change in a world that desperately needs it. Museums can provide a venue for dis- cussions that generate the unity to tackle society’s wicked problems—even as polarization itself has become a wicked problem. The answers are complex, but a reconceptualization of exhibition development processes is an important component. Staff will likely need to acquire and cultivate new kinds of skills. Evaluation of exhibition proposals is another angle: Does a proposal preserve and build trust as it tries to advance a social good? Do we truly understand the questions and concerns of the seg- ments of society we are trying to reach, especially those with lower levels of trust? How far can we push boundaries and maintain trust? These types of questions can help build understanding and guide exhibition development, or at the very least help museums approach their exhibitions with their eyes wide open to the potential implications. To solve our wicked problems, we need to talk to one another. The multidirectional communica- tion in modern-day museum exhibitions can be an effective platform. When founded on public trust, exhibitions have the power to leverage their transformative power as never before by using their trusted status to not only help achieve consensus, but also to build trust in society gener- ally, using this advantage to contribute to a successful, higher-trust society. As the purpose of museum exhibitions continues to evolve, so too must the process of creating them, if we are to fully realize opportunities for positive change. NOTES 1. Barry Lord, “The Purpose of Museum Exhibitions,” in Barry Lord and Maria Piacente, eds., The Manual of Museum Exhibitions, second edition (Lanham, MD and Plymouth, UK: Rowman & Littlefield 2014), 12. 2. George P. Schultz, “The ten most important things I’ve learned about trust over my 100 years, Wash- ington Post, December 11, 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/12/11/10-most -important-things-ive-learned-about-trust-over-my-100-years/?arc404=true. 3. There are several such studies. From the United Kingdom, see the Museums Association, “Public perceptions of—and attitudes to—the purpose of museums in society” (2013), https://www.muse umsassociation.org/app/uploads/2020/06/03042013-britain-thinks.pdf, a British companion to the oft-cited Lake, Snell, and Perry survey released in 2001 and commissioned by the American Al- liance of Museums. For the 2017 study, see Colleen Dilenschneider, “People Trust Museums More than Newspapers. Here’s Why That Matters Right Now,” April 26, 2017, at https://www.colleendilen .com/2017/04/26/people-trust-museums-more-than-newspapers-here-is-why-that-matters-right -now-data/. A 2019 update appears at https://www.colleendilen.com/2019/03/06/in-museums-we -trust-heres-how-much-data-update/. 4. Dilenschneider, “People Trust Museums More Than Newspapers.” 5. Jon Kolko, “Wicked Problems: Problems Worth Solving,” March 6, 2012, https://ssir.org/books /excerpts/entry/wicked_problems_problems_worth_solving#:~:text=A%20wicked%20problem%20 is%20a,these%20problems%20with%20other%20problems. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 14 21_0657-Piacente.indb 14 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 34. Museums and Their Exhibitions 15 6. Rebecca Carlsson, “Why We Need Museums Now More Than Ever,” MuseumNext, Oct. 8, 2020, https://www.museumnext.com/article/why-we-need-museums-now-more-than-ever/. 7. Lord, “The Purpose of Museum Exhibitions,” 12. 8. Nina Simon, The Participatory Museum (Santa Cruz, CA: Museum 2.0, 2010), ii. 9. Kersten Smeds, “On the Meaning of Exhibitions—Exhibition Epistèmes in a Historical Perspective,” Designs for Learning 5, nos. 1–2 (2012): 69, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/285980155 _On_the_Meaning_of_Exhibitions_-_Exhibition_Epistemes_in_a_Historical_Perspective. 10. Gail Lord and Ngaire Blankenberg, eds., Museums, Cities and Soft Power. (Washington, DC: The AAM Press, 2015). 11. Marcie M. Muscat, “The Art of Diplomacy: Museums and Soft Power,” November 9, 2020, https:// www.e-ir.info/2020/11/09/the-art-of-diplomacy-museums-and-soft-power/. 12. Richard Sandell and Robert R. Janes, “Preface” in Richard Sandell and Robert R. Janes, eds., Museum Activism (London and New York: Routledge, 2019), xxvii. 13. Richard Sandell and Robert R. Janes, “Introduction” in Richard Sandell and Robert R. Janes, eds., Mu- seum Activism (London and New York: Routledge, 2019) 1. 14. See Colin Moynihan, “What did the museum sign up for: exhibition or investigation?”, New York Times, January 11, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/11/arts/design/forensic-architecture-miami -dade-college.html?action=click&module=Well&pgtype=Homepage§ion=Art%20%20Design. 15. While this will vary from country to country, a recent Canadian example can be found at www.cantrust index.ca. 16. Rod Dreher, “Hillbilly Elegy, Class Conflict and Mercy,” The American Conservative, November 25, 2020, https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/hillbilly-elegy-class-conflict-mercy/. 17. “Museums losing millions, job losses mount as COVID-19 cases surge,” American Alliance of Muse- ums, November 17, 2020, https://www.aam-us.org/2020/11/17/museums-losing-millions-job-loss es-mount-as-covid-19-cases-surge/. 18. Eileen Kinsella, “‘We’d love to work with Netflix again’: cash-strapped museums looking for new au- diences are increasingly doing exhibits-for-hire,” ArtNet, January 4, 2021, https://news.artnet.com /art-world/its-a-deal-is-the-rise-in-museum-sponcon-linked-to-lockdown-1933514. 19. Anny Shaw, “How serious are the dangers of market sponsorship of museum exhibitions?,” The Art Newspaper, January 27, 2020, https://www.theartnewspaper.com/analysis/public-spaces-pri vate-money. 20. Schultz, “The ten things I learned about trust.” 21. Jillian Steinhauer, “Museums have a duty to be political,” The Art Newspaper, March 20, 2018, https:// www.theartnewspaper.com/comment/museums-have-a-duty-to-be-political. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 15 21_0657-Piacente.indb 15 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 35. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 16 21_0657-Piacente.indb 16 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 36. 17 Chapter 3 Where Do Exhibition Ideas Come From? Barry Lord (updated by Maria Piacente)1 If museum exhibitions at their best offer a transformative experience expanding or altering vis- itors’ awareness of, interest in, and valuation of many aspects of themselves and their world, it might be thought that ideas for such exhibitions could originate only with museum professionals who are experts in their respective fields. A few decades ago, this assumption would have been taken for granted, and this chapter would not have been considered necessary in a book on mu- seum exhibitions. Indeed, it is still often true, and the role of the informed connoisseur in sparking museum exhibition ideas remains critical, often crucial, to the genesis of a great exhibition. Nevertheless, such an approach to the museum exhibition also points to other possibilities. Should the museum exhibition arise from a problem in that discipline’s research on the topic? Or should the subject matter respond to public interest, or public demand? What is the role of the community for whom the exhibition is intended, some of whom may not previously have been museum visitors at all? How can they participate in the creation of museum exhibition ideas that are relevant to them? This chapter explores these issues as they affect the planning and devel- opment of museum exhibitions and suggests a visitor-centered approach. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 17 21_0657-Piacente.indb 17 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 37. 18 Chapter 3 3.1 RESEARCH-BASED AND MARKET-DRIVEN EXHIBITIONS The questions posed above are often presented as an irreconcilable alternative based on the widely held belief that museum exhibitions must either be research-based or market-driven: 1. A research-based exhibition program is one that arises from the discipline itself, from an analysis of the museum collection, or from the interests of the museum’s curators. It is pro- posed as worth doing because it will advance our knowledge of the field—our appreciation of the importance of a hitherto undervalued artist, the discovery or interpretation of an archaeological site, or the ecology of an endangered species, for example. 2. By contrast, a market-driven exhibition program arises from public interest or demand, as interpreted by the museum. Political events may suggest the need for an exhibition on the culture of a foreign country. The popularity of an artist may prompt a retrospective. Growing concerns with climate might generate a widespread interest in environmental education and climate change. Or health concerns might suggest an exhibition on wellness and mental health. Although these alternatives have often been presented in professional discussions of the subject as if they were opposed, their opposition is in practice a false dichotomy. This may be expressed in the following statement of principle: On the one hand, research, even in the most rarified of disciplines, does not take place in a so- cial vacuum, and on the other hand public interest is always relevant to the direction of socially responsible research. It is precisely the challenge of museum professionals to forge these links. Thus, a successful museum exhibition program should be both research-based and market-driven. The exhibition policy should articulate this objective in terms relevant to the specific discipline(s) of the museum and should indicate how the museum proposes to be responsive to its community and its audience. Turner, Whistler, Monet: Impressionist Visions was a major traveling exhibition organized by the Art Gallery of Ontario (Toronto, Canada), the Tate Britain (London, United Kingdom), and the Réunion des Musées Nationaux and Musée d’Orsay (Paris, France). It is a true example of a re- search-driven exhibition that interprets how each artist changed the course of landscape painting and how a pattern of themes and variations begun by Turner appears to have been developed in the artistic interchange between the younger artists Whistler and Monet. In extreme contrast, Game of Thrones: The Touring Exhibition was created by HBO in partnership with GES Events, featuring actual props and costumes used in the popular series, themed re- constructed immersive environments of the North, Westeros, and Meereen, as well as special effects, interactive multimedia, and of course, the iconic Iron Throne. This market-driven exhibi- tion took advantage of the worldwide appeal of the books and television series. While it can be argued that the Game of Thrones exhibition does not have the curatorial and perhaps perceived gravitas of a Turner, Whistler, Monet exhibition, both have a place in a museum’s responsibility to serve it audiences and meet institutional needs that include the creation of new knowledge, revenue generation, and increased attendance. 3.2 PLANNING FOR EXHIBITION RESEARCH Desirable as such practices may be, many museum professionals may view the principle of merg- ing research-based with market-driven considerations in an exhibition program as merely a pious wish—a laudable objective, but one that defies achievement in the day-to-day deployment of 21_0657-Piacente.indb 18 21_0657-Piacente.indb 18 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 38. Figure 3.1. Banners promoting the Turner, Whistler, Monet: Impressionist Visions exhibition, June 12 to September 12, 2004, at the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada. © ART GALLERY OF ONTARIO. A-17661 Figure 3.2. The Game of Thrones Touring Exhibition at the Titanic Exhibition Centre in Belfast, Northern Ireland. PA IMAGES/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO 21_0657-Piacente.indb 19 21_0657-Piacente.indb 19 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 39. 20 Chapter 3 time, money, resources, and personnel to operate a museum exhibition program. Indeed, curators responsible for exhibition programs but also trying to conduct research are often encountered in one or the other of two scenarios, neither of which is desirable: • Some curators may attempt to oblige the research requirements of a constantly chang- ing exhibition program that is responsive to public interest. In this position they are able to accomplish only a series of brief forays into an unrelated sequence of research topics, developing each subject only as far as the limited time allowed in a demanding schedule. Exhibition catalogs and storylines may get written, and shows are installed on time, but the curator remains a generalist unable to pursue any one topic, while the permanent collection and even new acquisitions may remain indefinitely without the research that is needed in order to realize their full value. • The other alternative, equally unsatisfactory for both the museum and its staff, is for the cu- rator to withdraw from the exhibition program, delegating their responsibility to an assistant, a designer, or an exhibition officer, freeing the curator to pursue research that may be only tangentially related to the collection, and is often expressed only in the form of scholarly arti- cles in the learned journals of that profession. In this scenario, the curator aspires to become a research professor who does not teach. Although many museum professionals may not be faced with these dire alternatives, they are likely to recognize them as the opposite poles of a spectrum of options, none of which are entirely satisfactory to the museum or to its staff. The solution is for the museum to develop a research policy, and for the curators, conservators, designers, educators, and exhibition offi- cers to develop research plans: • A museum’s research policy should establish the museum’s commitment to research, con- firming that time, money, personnel, and facilities will be dedicated to and in keeping with the museum’s mission. This may vary from a commitment to keep abreast of the latest develop- ments at a kunsthalle exhibiting contemporary art, to a long-term commitment to undertake studies of environmental changes on regional flora or fauna based on the study of specimens at a university’s natural history museum. The research policy should articulate the museum’s position on supporting grant applications for its staff to pursue research interests, and the museum’s approach to intellectual property issues, distinguishing publications or other results of research that are based on work done at the museum from the fruits of research done on the staff members’ own time. The policy should describe the range of research to be undertaken at the museum, hopefully including research on the museum’s market, its communications, and education programs, as well as curatorial and conservation studies. Above all, the research policy should require all museum personnel who wish to undertake research to prepare an annual personal research plan, which after approval the museum can integrate into a general research plan for the whole institution. • Each museum staff member who wishes to do research—and this might include docents, volunteers, educators, marketing or development officers, membership clerks, or building managers as well as curators, curatorial assistants, and conservators—should be asked to prepare an annual personal research plan. This plan should set out objectives for that individual’s research and relate those objectives to the permanent collection and the mu- seum’s public programs, which may include exhibitions, but may also extend to education, market development, or other programs. The research plan should describe the researcher’s particular qualifications and propose a methodology that addresses both the academic and practical implications, such as financial or travel needs. The research plan should also proj- ect a schedule, over many years, if necessary, for completion of the research. Each annual 21_0657-Piacente.indb 20 21_0657-Piacente.indb 20 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 40. Where Do Exhibition Ideas Come From? 21 research plan should be an update of the last, reporting progress or obstacles encountered, and recommending changes if necessary. Each individual’s research plan should be subject to review and approval by the level to which each staff member reports, culminating in a general review and approval by the director, who should undertake integrating all the personal research plans into a general research plan for the entire museum. In this process meetings to discuss each personal research plan may be necessary in order to adjust personal priorities to the mission or corporate plan of the institution, or vice versa. Many curators and some museum directors are anxious about the introduction of research plans, fearing that they may limit academic freedom of inquiry. With curators especially affected by change on all sides and fighting to retain the role of research within museums, these concerns are understandable. But in fact, research plans as described here can be instrumental in resolving the dilemma implied by the alternative outlined above: of curators being dragged from one exhi- bition to another versus the equally unsatisfactory option of the curator who withdraws from the exhibition program in order to pursue other research interests. A museum is neither a university nor a research institution, but it can be a vital center of research in all disciplines, both in relation to the permanent collection and in serving the institution’s public programs. An annually updated general research plan for the entire museum that is based on the personal research plans of all the interested staff can be a dynamic way of keeping research at the heart of the museum. For example, the general research plan for a natural history museum might include the ornithology curator’s personal research plan to investigate the species relationships within a particular genus of birds based on DNA analysis, song analysis, and field research. The schedule for this work may be projected over several years. The director, advised by the marketing and education departments, may decide that the museum’s exhibition program really needs a Birds in Backyards exhibition, which will meet a school curriculum need related to climate change and pollution, and will also be fun for family visitors. The decision as to whether to shift the direction of the ornithology curator’s research work over the next year in order to plan and develop this exhibition may now be considered in the light of the long-term research plan that has already been integrated into the museum’s general research plan. One alternative might be to engage a guest curator for the special exhibition, and to prepare a marketing and retail program that will increase attendance, revenue, private donations, sponsorships, or government grants to justify the additional expense. An important consideration in resolving this example is that the ornithological species research project should be included in the museum’s general research plan only if it is itself related to the museum’s public program objectives: a major new display of the permanent collection of birds, together with an associated education program, scheduled to be launched three years from now, for instance. The decision then becomes one of weighing one longer-range museum public pro- gramming objective against another, shorter-range one. Whatever decision is made, with the aid of the research plan and a research policy, curatorial research can be integrated with the muse- um’s public programs, the curator is no longer being dragged from one topic to another without regard for continuity or for the museum’s long-term needs, and the decision about the exhibition program is now perceived as integrally related to decisions about priorities for the museum’s re- search activity. Museum research can be transformed from its frequent status as a desirable but too often impractical pursuit into the light of museum policy, planning, and prioritizing procedures. NOTE 1. Maria Piacente has updated the chapter on behalf of Barry Lord, who died March 9, 2017, and who inspired their collaboration on the second edition of this Manual, 2014. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 21 21_0657-Piacente.indb 21 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 41. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 22 21_0657-Piacente.indb 22 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 42. PART II WHERE? © Tate Britain 21_0657-Piacente.indb 23 21_0657-Piacente.indb 23 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 43. 24 Part II Museum exhibitions are installed in purpose-built galleries, designed to meet the specific needs of the specimens, artifacts, and works of art that will be displayed within them. While exhibitions may be hosted in nonconventional venues and public spaces for pop-up displays as well as contemporary art and multimedia installations, this section focuses on traditional exhibition galleries. The exhibition gallery provides the space within which objects on display are placed. Yet the gallery itself is conditioned by the museum building as a whole, and that in turn is affected by the building’s site. A white cube in a modern building in the heart of the city may be considered appropriate for a contemporary art exhibition or an interactive science center, whereas an exhi- bition in a historic structure that is itself part of the cultural heritage on display will inform a very different kind of exhibition. Exhibition galleries used to be predictable boxes, but in recent years their architecture has been far more diverse. Consider the vast swathe of space that accommodates Richard Serra’s enor- mous steel sculpture, which is placed under high ceilings in Frank Gehry’s Museo Guggenheim Bilbao, Spain, complete with a mezzanine at one end that allows visitors to appreciate the heft and swoop of the massive sculpture from above. At the other extreme are low-ceilinged spaces of modest size and proportions that provide a comfortable setting for a few visitors at a time to enjoy some rare etchings or drawings at a level of lighting kept deliberately low to reduce the lux-hours of exposure of the precious works on paper. Understanding the nuts and bolts of what makes galleries work not only ensures that an exhibi- tion will be fully accommodated, but that visitors will enjoy experiencing the gallery space. This section provides an overview of design criteria for exhibition spaces and reviews the vast range of factors that have to be considered when planning to build or renovate a gallery. The differ- ences between permanent collection displays and temporary exhibition galleries are examined, as are the functional requirements for security, environmental control, and set-up or striking of exhibition furnishings. You might be wondering, “Why do I need to know this? I’m not an architect!” Even though you may not be an architect or facility manager, understanding how exhibition spaces function within the museum building envelope will make you a better exhibition planner. 21_0657-Piacente.indb 24 21_0657-Piacente.indb 24 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 44. 25 Chapter 4 Exhibition Facilities Sean Stanwick and Heather Maximea A museum’s exhibition galleries are its main public areas. They should be splendid spaces that inspire and engage visitors as they move from one experience to another. Planning and designing galleries as part of a museum facility is exhilarating but challenging because it requires planners to envision the completed exhibition product that will someday be housed there, whether it is a long-term permanent collection display or a series of short-term temporary or traveling exhibi- tions. This visioning must consider the total experience for visitors and the superlative settings for the art, artifacts, specimens, and new media that will be part of the overall story. The design and layout of the gallery spaces, and the sequence of movement through them, is critical to the experience. Akin to a movie or well-crafted story, the gallery experience should facilitate ease of movement and clarity of wayfinding. Permanent exhibitions must keep the attention of visitors as items are often displayed for long periods of time. Changing galleries, on the other hand, must be flexible enough to accommodate a wide range of works and exhibition styles and sizes. Unfortunately, many galleries fall short of the ideal. Lack of consideration for exhibit support spaces will have significant downstream effects such as repeated delays in getting exhibitions fully installed in time for openings; insurance claims for damage to art works; and reluctance or refusal of prestigious lenders to become involved in new projects. Why do these problems occur? If staff is asked for a candid analysis, they may well identify inconvenient, inefficient, and 21_0657-Piacente.indb 25 21_0657-Piacente.indb 25 12/7/21 9:56 AM 12/7/21 9:56 AM
- 45. Another Random Scribd Document with Unrelated Content
- 46. There was in the village, too, a consular man, for many years the first citizen of Concord,—Samuel Hoar,—who made himself known abroad by sheer force of character and "plain heroic magnitude of mind." It was of him that Emerson said, at his death in November, 1856,— "He was a man in whom so rare a spirit of justice visibly dwelt that if one had met him in a cabin or in a forest he must still seem a public man, answering as sovereign state to sovereign state; and might easily suggest Milton's picture of John Bradshaw, that he 'was a consul from whom the fasces did not depart with the year, but in private seemed ever sitting in judgment on kings.' He returned from courts or congresses to sit down with unaltered humility, in the church or in the town-house, on the plain wooden bench, where Honor came and sat down beside him." In his house and in a few others along the elm-planted street, you might meet at any time other persons of distinction, beauty, or wit, —such as now and then glance through the shining halls of cities, and, in great centres of the world's civilization, like London or Paris, muster "In solemn troops and sweet societies," which are the ideal of poets and fair women, and the envy of all who aspire to social eminence. Thoreau knew the worth of this luxury, too, though, as a friend said of him, "a story from a fisher or hunter was better to him than an evening of triviality in shining parlors, where he was misunderstood." There were not many such parlors in Concord, but there was and had constantly been in the town a learned and social element, such as gathers in an old New England village of some wealth and inherited culture. At the head of this circle—which fell off on one side into something like fashion and mere amusement, on another
- 47. into the activity of trade or politics, and rose, among the women especially, into art and literature and religion—stood, in Thoreau's boyhood and youth, a grave figure, yet with something droll about him,—the parish minister and county Nestor, Dr. Ezra Ripley, who lived and died in the "Old Manse." Dr. Ripley was born in 1751, in Woodstock, Conn., the same town in which Dr. Abiel Holmes, the father of the poet Holmes, was born. He entered Harvard College in 1772, came with the students to Concord in 1775, when the college buildings at Cambridge were occupied by Washington and his army, besieging Boston, and graduated in 1776. Among his classmates were Governor Gore, Samuel Sewall, the second chief-justice of Massachusetts of that name, and Royal Tyler, the witty chief-justice of Vermont. Governor Gore used to say that in college he was called "Holy Ripley," from his devout character. He settled in Concord in 1778, and at the age of twenty-nine married the widow of his last predecessor, Rev. William Emerson (and the daughter of his next predecessor, Rev. Daniel Bliss), who was at their marriage ten years older than her husband, and had a family of five children. Dr. Ripley's own children were three in number: the Reverend Samuel Ripley, born May 11, 1783; Daniel Bliss Ripley, born August 1, 1784; and Miss Sarah Ripley, born August 8, 1789. When this daughter died, not long after her mother, in 1826, breaking, says Mr. Emerson, "the last tie of blood which bound me and my brothers to his house," Dr. Ripley said to Mr. Emerson, "I wish you and your brothers to come to this house as you have always done. You will not like to be excluded; I shall not like to be neglected." He died himself in September, 1841. Of Dr. Ripley countless anecdotes are told in his parish, and he was the best remembered person, except Thoreau himself, who had died in Concord, till Emerson; just as his house, described so finely by Hawthorne in his "Mosses," is still the best known house in Concord. It was for a time the home of Mr. Emerson, and there, it is said, he wrote his first book, "Nature," concerning which, when it came out anonymously, the question was asked, "Who is the author of
- 48. 'Nature'?" The reply was, of course, "God and Ralph Waldo Emerson." The Old Manse was built about 1766 for Mr. Emerson's grandfather, then minister of the parish, and into it he brought his bride, Miss Phebe Bliss (daughter of Rev. Daniel Bliss, of Concord, and Phebe Walker, of Connecticut). Miss Mary Emerson, youngest child of this marriage, used to say "she was in arms at the battle of Concord," because her mother held her up, then two years old, to see the soldiers from her window; and from his study window her father saw the fight at the bridge. It was the scene of many of the anecdotes, told of Dr. Ripley, some of which, gathered from various sources, may here be given; it was also, after his death, one of the resorts of Thoreau, of Margaret Fuller, of Ellery Channing, of Dr. Hedge, and of the Transcendentalists in general. His parishioners to this day associate Dr. Ripley's form "with whatever was grave and droll in the old, cold, unpainted, uncarpeted, square-pewed meeting- house, with its four iron-gray deacons in their little box under the pulpit; with Watts's hymns; with long prayers, rich with the diction of ages; and, not less, with the report like musketry from the movable seats."[1] One of these "iron-gray deacons," Francis Jarvis, used to visit the Old Manse with his children on Sunday evenings, and his son, Dr. Edward Jarvis, thus describes another side of Dr. Ripley's pastoral character:— "Among the very pleasant things connected with the Sabbaths in the Jarvis family were the visits to Dr. Ripley in the evening. The doctor had usually a small levee of such friends as were disposed to call. Deacon Jarvis was fond of going there, and generally took with him one of the children and his wife, when she was able. There were at these levees many of the most intelligent and agreeable men of the town,—Mr. Samuel Hoar, Mr. Nathan Brooks, Mr. John Keyes, Deacon Brown, Mr. Pritchard, Major Burr, etc. These were extremely pleasant gatherings. The little boys sat and listened, and remembered the cheerful and instructive conversation. There were discussions of religion and morals, of politics and philosophy, the affairs
- 49. of the town, the news of the day, the religious and social gossip, pleasant anecdotes and witty tales. All were in their best humor. Deacon Jarvis [adds his son], did not go to these levees every Sunday night, though he would have been glad to do so, had he been less distrustful. When his children, who had no such scruples, asked him to go and take them with him, he said he feared that Dr. Ripley would not like to see him so frequently." According to Mr. Emerson, Dr. Ripley was "a natural gentleman; no dandy, but courtly, hospitable, and public spirited; his house open to all men." An old farmer who used to travel thitherward from Maine, where Dr. Ripley had a brother settled in the ministry, used to say that "no horse from the Eastern country would go by the doctor's gate." It was one of the listeners at his Sunday evening levees, no doubt, who said (at the time when Dr. Ripley was preparing for his first and last journey to Baltimore and Washington, in the presidency of the younger Adams) "that a man who could tell a story so well was company for kings and for John Quincy Adams." When P. M., after his release from the State Prison, had the effrontery to call on Dr. Ripley, as an old acquaintance, as they were talking together on general matters, his young colleague, Rev. Mr. Frost, came in. The doctor presently said, "Mr. M., my brother and colleague, Mr. Frost, has come to take tea with me. I regret very much the causes (very well known to you), which make it impossible for me to ask you to stay and break bread with us." Mr. Emerson, his grandson (by Dr. Ripley's marriage with the widow of Rev. William Emerson) relates that he once went to a funeral with Dr. Ripley, and heard him address the mourners. As they approached the farm- house the old minister said that the eldest son, who was now to succeed the deceased father of a family in his place as a Concord yeoman, was in some danger of becoming intemperate. In his remarks to this son, he presently said,— "Sir, I condole with you. I knew your great-grandfather; when I came to this town, in 1778, he was a substantial
- 50. farmer in this very place, a member of the church, and an excellent citizen. Your grandfather followed him, and was a virtuous man. Now your father is to be carried to his grave, full of labors and virtues. There is none of that old family left but you, and it rests with you to bear up the good name and usefulness of your ancestors. If you fail— Ichabod!—the glory is departed. Let us pray." He took Mr. Emerson about with him in his chaise when a boy, and in passing each house he would tell the story of its family, dwelling especially on the nine church-members who had made a division in the church in the time of his predecessor; every one of the nine having come to bad fortune or a bad end. "The late Dr. Gardiner," says Mr. Emerson, "in a funeral sermon on some parishioner, whose virtues did not readily come to mind, honestly said, 'He was good at fires.' Dr. Ripley had many virtues, and yet, even in his old age, if the firebell was rung, he was instantly on horseback, with his buckets and bag." He had even some willingness, perhaps not equal to the zeal of the Hindoo saint, to extinguish the Orthodox fires of hell, which had long blazed in New England,—so that men might worship God with less fear. But he had small sympathy with the Transcendentalists when they began to appear in Concord. When Mr. Emerson took his friend Mr. Alcott to see the old doctor, he gave him warning that his brilliant young kinsman was not quite sound in the faith, and bore testimony in particular against a sect of his own naming, called "Egomites" (from ego and mitto), who "sent themselves" on the Lord's errands without any due call thereto. Dr. Channing viewed the "apostles of the newness" with more favor, and could pardon something to the spirit of liberty which was strong in them. The occasional correspondence between the Concord shepherd of his people and the great Unitarian preacher is full of interest. In February, 1839, when he was eighty-eight years old and weighed down with infirmities, he could still lift up his voice in testimony. He then wrote to Dr. Channing:—
- 51. "Broken down with the infirmities of age, and subject to fits that deprive me of reason and the use of my limbs, I feel it a duty to be patient and submissive to the will of God, who is too wise to err, and too good to injure. My mind labors and is oppressed, viewing the present state of Christianity, and the various speculations, opinions, and practices of the passing period. Extremes appear to be sought and loved, and their novelty gains attention. You, sir, appear to retain and act upon the sentiment of the Latin phrase,— "'Est modus in rebus, sunt certi denique fines.' "The learned and estimable Norton appears to me to have weakened his hold on public opinion and confidence by his petulance or pride, his want of candor and charity." Six years earlier, Dr. Channing had written to Dr. Ripley almost as if replying to some compliment like this, and expressed himself thus, in a letter dated January 22, 1833,— "I thank God for the testimony which you have borne to the usefulness of my writings. Such approbation from one whom I so much venerate, and who understands so well the wants and signs of the times, is very encouraging to me. If I have done anything towards manifesting Christianity in its simple majesty and mild glory I rejoice, and I am happy to have contributed anything towards the satisfaction of your last years. It would gratify many, and would do good, if, in the quiet of your advanced age, you would look back on the eventful period through which you have passed, and would leave behind you, or give now, a record of the changes you have witnessed, and especially of the progress of liberal inquiry and rational views in religion."[2]
- 52. Dr. Ripley's prayers were precise and undoubting in their appeal for present providences. He prayed for rain and against the lightning, "that it may not lick up our spirits;" he blessed the Lord for exemption from sickness and insanity,—"that we have not been tossed to and fro until the dawning of the day, that we have not been a terror to ourselves and to others." One memorable occasion, in the later years of his pastorate, when he had consented to take a young colleague, is often remembered in his parish, now fifty years after its date. The town was suffering from drought, and the farmers from Barrett's Mill, Bateman's Pond, and the Nine-Acre Corner had asked the minister to pray for rain. Mr. Goodwin (the father of Professor Goodwin, of Harvard University) had omitted to do this in his morning service, and at the noon intermission Dr. Ripley was reminded of the emergency by the afflicted farmers. He told them courteously that Mr. Goodwin's garden lay on the river, and perhaps he had not noticed how parched the uplands were; but he entered the pulpit that afternoon with an air of resolution and command. Mr. Goodwin, as usual, offered to relieve the doctor of the duty of leading in prayer, but the old shepherd, as Mr. Emerson says, "rejected his offer with some humor, and with an air that said to all the congregation, 'This is no time for you young Cambridge men; the affair, sir, is getting serious; I will pray myself.'" He did so, and with unusual fervor demanded rain for the languishing corn and the dry grass of the field. As the story goes, the afternoon opened fair and hot, but before the dwellers in Nine-Acre Corner and the North Quarter reached their homes a pouring shower rewarded the gray- haired suppliant, and reminded Concord that the righteous are not forsaken. Another of Mr. Emerson's anecdotes bears on this point:— "One August afternoon, when I was in his hayfield, helping him, with his man, to rake up his hay, I well remember his pleading, almost reproachful looks at the sky, when the thunder-gust was coming up to spoil his hay. He raked very fast, then looked at the cloud, and said, 'We are in the Lord's hand,—mind your rake, George!
- 53. we are in the Lord's hand;' and seemed to say, 'You know me; this field is mine,—Dr. Ripley's, thine own servant.'" In his later years Dr. Ripley was much distressed by a schism in his church, which drew off to a Trinitarian congregation several of his oldest friends and parishioners. Among the younger members who thus seceded, seventy years ago, were the maiden aunts of Thoreau, Jane and Maria,—the last of whom, and the last of the name in America, has died recently, as already mentioned. Thoreau seceded later, but not to the "Orthodox" church,—as much against the wish of Dr. Ripley, however, as if he had. In later years, Thoreau's church (of the Sunday Walkers) was recognized in the village gossip; so that when I first spent Sunday in Concord, and asked my landlord what churches there were, he replied, "The Unitarian, the Orthodox, and the Walden Pond Association." To the latter he professed to belong, and said its services consisted in walking on Sunday in the Walden woods. Dr. Ripley would have viewed such rites with horror, but they have now become common. His Old Manse, which from 1842 to 1846 was occupied by Hawthorne, was for twenty years (1847-1867) the home of Mrs. Sarah Ripley, that sweet and learned lady, and has since been the dwelling-place of her children, the grandchildren of Dr. Ripley. Near by stands now the statue of the Concord Minute-Man of 1775, marking the spot to which the Middlesex farmers came "In sloven dress and broken rank," and where they stood when in unconscious heroism they "Fired the shot heard round the world," and drove back the invading visitor from their doorsteps and cornfields. Dr. Ripley, however, seldom repelled a visitor or an invader, unless he came from too recent an experience in the state prison, or offered to "break out" his path on a Sunday, when he had fancied himself too much snow-bound to go forth to his pulpit. The anecdote is
- 54. characteristic, if not wholly authentic. One Sunday, after a severe snow-storm, his neighbor, the great farmer on Ponkawtassett Hill, half a mile to the northward of the Old Manse, turned out his ox- teams and all his men and neighbors to break a path to the meeting- house and the tavern. Wallowing through the drifts, they had got as far as Dr. Ripley's gate, while the good parson, snugly blocked in by a drift completely filling his avenue of ash-trees, thought of nothing less than of going out to preach that day. The long team of oxen, with much shouting and stammering from the red-faced farmer, was turned out of the road and headed up the avenue, when Dr. Ripley, coming to his parsonage door, and commanding silence, began to berate Captain B. for breaking the Sabbath and the roads at one stroke,—implying, if not asserting, that he did it to save time and oxen for his Monday's work. Angered at the ingratitude of his minister, the stammering farmer turned the ten yoke of cattle round in the doctor's garden, and drove on to the village, leaving the parson to shovel himself out and get to meeting the best way he could. Meanwhile, the teamsters sat in the warm bar-room at the tavern, and cheered themselves with punch, flip, grog, and toddy, instead of going to hear Dr. Ripley hold forth; and when he had returned to his parsonage they paraded their oxen and sleds back again, past his gate, with much more shouting than at first. This led to a long quarrel between minister and parishioner, in course of which, one day, as the doctor halted his chaise in front of the farmer's house on the hill, the stammering captain came forward, a peck measure in his hand, with which he had been giving his oxen their meal, and began to renew the unutterable grievance. Waxing warm, as the doctor admonished him afresh, he smote with his wooden measure on the shafts of the chaise, until his gentle wife, rushing forth, called on the neighbors to stop the fight which she fancied was going on between the charioteer of the Lord and the foot-soldier. Despite these outbursts, and his habitual way of looking at all things "from the parochial point of view," as Emerson said of him, he was also a courteous and liberal-minded man, as the best anecdotes of
- 55. him constantly prove. He was the sovereign of his people, managing the church, the schools, the society meetings, and, for a time, the Lyceum, as he thought fit. The lecturers, as well as the young candidates for school-keeping—Theodore Parker, Edward Everett, and the rest—addressed themselves to him, and when he met Webster, then the great man of Massachusetts, it was on equal terms. Daniel Webster was never a lyceum lecturer in Concord, and he did not often try cases there, but was sometimes consulted in causes of some pecuniary magnitude. When Humphrey Barrett died (whose management of his nephew's estate will be mentioned in the next chapter), his heir by will (a young man without property, until he should inherit the large estate bequeathed him), found it necessary to employ counsel against the heirs-at-law, who sought to break the will. His attorney went to Mr. Webster in Boston and related the facts, adding that his client could not then pay a large fee, but might, if the cause were gained, as Mr. Webster thought it would be. "You may give me one hundred dollars as a retainer," said Webster, "and tell the young man, from me, that when I win his case I shall send him a bill that will make his hair stand on end." It so happened, however, that Webster was sent to the Senate, and the case was won by his partner. In the summer of 1843, while Thoreau was living at Staten Island, Webster visited Concord to try an important case in the county court, which then held sessions there. This was the "Wyman Trial," long famous in local traditions, Webster and Choate being both engaged in the case, and along with them Mr. Franklin Dexter and Mr. Rockwood Hoar, the latter a young lawyer, who had been practicing in the Middlesex courts for a few years, where his father, Mr. Samuel Hoar, was the leader of the bar. Judge Allen (Charles Allen of Worcester) held the court, and the eminent array of counsel just named was for the defense. The occasion was a brilliant one, and made a great and lasting sensation in the village. Mr. Webster and his friends were entertained
- 56. at the houses of the chief men of Concord, and the villagers crowded the court-house to hear the arguments and the colloquies between the counsel and the court. Webster was suffering from his usual summer annoyance, the "hay catarrh," or "rose cold," which he humorously described afterward in a letter to a friend in Concord: — "You know enough of my miserable catarrh. Its history, since I left your hospitable roof, is not worth noting. There would be nothing found in it, either of the sublime or the beautiful; nothing fit for elegant description or a touch of sentiment. Not that it has not been a great thing in its way; for I think the sneezing it has occasioned has been truly transcendental. A fellow-sufferer from the same affliction, who lived in Cohasset, was asked, the other day, what in the world he took for it? His reply was that he 'took eight handkerchiefs a day.' And this, I believe, is the approved mode of treatment; though the doses here mentioned are too few for severe cases. Suffice it to say, my dear lady, that either from a change of air, or the progress of the season, or, what is more probable, from the natural progress of the disease itself, I am much better than when I left Concord, and I propose to return to Boston to-day, feeling, or hoping, that I may now be struck off the list of invalids." Notwithstanding this affliction, Mr. Webster made himself agreeable to the ladies of Concord, old and young, and even the little girls, like Louisa Alcott, went to the courthouse to see and hear him. He was present at a large tea-party given by Mrs. R. W. Emerson in his honor, and he renewed his old acquaintance with the Dunbars and Thoreaus. Mr. Emerson, writing to Thoreau September 8, 1843, said, briefly, "You will have heard of our 'Wyman Trial,' and the stir it made in the village. But the Cliff and Walden, which know something of the railroad, knew nothing of that; not a leaf nodded; not a pebble fell;—why should I speak of it to you?" Thoreau was indeed
- 57. interested in it, and in the striking personality of Webster. To his mother he wrote from Staten Island (August 29, 1843):— "I should have liked to see Daniel Webster walking about Concord; I suppose the town shook, every step he took. But I trust there were some sturdy Concordians who were not tumbled down by the jar, but represented still the upright town. Where was George Minott? he would not have gone far to see him. Uncle Charles should have been there;—he might as well have been catching cat-naps in Concord as anywhere. And, then, what a whetter-up of his memory this event would have been! You'd have had all the classmates again in alphabetical order reversed,—'and Seth Hunt and Bob Smith—and he was a student of my father's—and where's Put now? and I wonder—you—if Henry's been to see George Jones yet? A little account with Stow—Balcolm—Bigelow—poor, miserable t-o-a-d (sound asleep). I vow—you—what noise was that? saving grace—and few there be. That's clear as preaching— Easter Brooks—morally depraved—how charming is divine philosophy—somewise and some otherwise—Heighho! (Sound asleep again.) Webster's a smart fellow—bears his age well. How old should you think he was? you—does he look as if he were two years younger than I?'" This uncle was Charles Dunbar, of course, who was in fact two years older than Webster, and, like him, a New Hampshire man. He and his sisters—the mother and the aunt of Henry Thoreau—had known Webster in his youth, when he was a poor young lawyer in New Hampshire; and the acquaintance was kept up from time to time as the years brought them together. Whenever Webster passed a day in Concord, as he did nearly every year from 1843 to 1850, he would either call on Miss Dunbar, or she would meet him at tea in the house of Mr. Cheney, a college classmate of Mr. Emerson, whom he usually visited; and whose garden was a lovely plot, ornamented with great elm trees, on the bank of the Musketaquid. Mrs. Thoreau
- 58. was often included in these friendly visits; and it was of this family, as well as of the Emersons, Hoars, and Brookses, no doubt, that Webster was thinking when he sadly wrote to Mrs. Cheney his last letter, less than a year before his death in 1852. In this note, dated at Washington, November 1, 1851, when he was Secretary of State under Fillmore, Mr. Webster said:— "I have very much wished to see you all, and in the early part of October seriously contemplated going to Concord for a day. But I was hindered by circumstances, and partly deterred also by changes which have taken place. My valued friend, Mr. Phinney (of Lexington), is not living; and many of those whom I so highly esteemed, in your beautiful and quiet village, have become a good deal estranged, to my great grief, by abolitionism, free-soilism, transcendentalism, and other notions, which I cannot (but) regard as so many vagaries of the imagination. These former warm friends would have no pleasure, of course, in intercourse with one of old-fashioned opinions. Nevertheless, dear Mrs. Cheney, if I live to see another summer, I will make a visit to your house, and talk about former times and former things." He never came; for in June, 1852, the Whig convention at Baltimore rejected his name as a Presidential candidate, and he went home to Marshfield to die. The tone of sadness in this note was due, in part, perhaps, to the eloquent denunciation of Webster by Mr. Emerson in a speech at Cambridge in 1851, and to the unequivocal aversion with which Webster's contemporary, the first citizen of Concord, Samuel Hoar, spoke of his 7th of March speech, and the whole policy with which Webster had identified himself in those dreary last years of his life. Mr. Hoar had been sent by his State in 1846 to protest in South Carolina against the unconstitutional imprisonment at Charleston of colored seamen from Massachusetts; and he had been driven by force from the State to which he went as an envoy. But, although Webster knew the gross indignity of the act, and
- 59. introduced into his written speech in March, 1850, a denunciation of it, he did not speak this out in the Senate, nor did it appear in all the authorized editions of the speech. He could hardly expect Mr. Hoar to welcome him in Concord after he had uttered his willingness to return fugitive slaves, but forgot to claim reparation for so shameful an affront to Massachusetts as the Concord Cato had endured. Mr. Webster was attached to Concord—as most persons are who have ever spent pleasant days there—and used to compliment his friend on his house and garden by the river side. Looking out upon his great trees from the dining-room window, he once said: "I am in the terrestrial paradise, and I will prove it to you by this. America is the finest continent on the globe, the United States the finest country in America, Massachusetts the best State in the Union, Concord the best town in Massachusetts, and my friend Cheney's field the best acre in Concord." This was an opinion so like that often expressed by Henry Thoreau, that one is struck by it. Indeed, the devotion of Thoreau to his native town was so marked as to provoke opposition. "Henry talks about Nature," said Madam Hoar (the mother of Senator Hoar, and daughter of Roger Sherman of Connecticut), "just as if she'd been born and brought up in Concord."
- 60. CHAPTER IV. THE EMBATTLED FARMERS. It was not the famous lawyers, the godly ministers, the wealthy citizens, nor even the learned ladies of Concord, who interested Henry Thoreau specially,—but the sturdy farmers, each on his hereditary acres, battling with the elements and enjoying that open- air life which to Thoreau was the only existence worth having. As his best biographer, Ellery Channing, says: "He came to see the inside of every farmer's house and head, his pot of beans, and mug of hard cider. Never in too much hurry for a dish of gossip, he could sit out the oldest frequenter of the bar-room, and was alive from top to toe with curiosity." Concord, in our day, and still more in Thoreau's childhood, was dotted with frequent old farm-houses, of the ample and picturesque kind that bespeaks antiquity and hospitality. In one such he was born, though not one of the oldest or the best. He was present at the downfall of several of these ancient homesteads, in whose date and in the fortunes of their owners for successive generations, he took a deep interest; and still more in their abandoned orchards and door-yards, where the wild apple tree and the vivacious lilac still flourished. To show what sort of men these Concord farmers were in the days when their historical shot was fired, let me give some anecdotes and particulars concerning two of the original family stocks,—the Hosmers, who first settled in Concord in 1635, with Bulkeley and Willard, the founders of the town; and the Barretts, whose first ancestor, Humphrey Barrett, came over in 1639. James Hosmer, a clothier from Hawkhurst in Kent, with his wife Ann (related to Major
- 61. Simon Willard, that stout Kentishman, Indian trader and Indian fighter, who bought of the Squaw Sachem the township of Concord, six miles square), two infant daughters, and two maid-servants, came from London to Boston in the ship "Elizabeth," and the next year built a house on Concord Street, and a mill on the town brook. From him descended James Hosmer, who was killed at Sudbury in 1658, in an Indian fight, Stephen, his great-grandson, a famous surveyor, and Joseph, his great-great-grandson, one of the promoters of the Revolution, who had a share in its first fight at Concord Bridge. Joseph Hosmer was the son of a Concord farmer, who, in 1743, seceded from the parish church, because Rev. Daniel Bliss, the pastor, had said in a sermon (as his opponents averred), "that it was as great a sin for a man to get an estate by honest labor, if he had not a single aim at the glory of God, as to get it by gaming at cards or dice." What this great-grandfather of Emerson did say, a century before the Transcendental epoch, was this, as he declared: "If husbandmen plow and sow that they may be rich, and live in the pleasures of this world, and appear grand before men, they are as far from true religion in their plowing, sowing, etc., as men are that game for the same purpose." Thomas Hosmer, being a prosperous husbandman, perhaps with a turn for display, took offense, and became a worshipper at what was called the "Black Horse Church,"—a seceding conventicle which met at the tavern with the sign of the Black Horse, near where the Concord Library now stands. Joseph Hosmer, his boy, was known at the village school as "the little black colt,"—a lad of adventurous spirit, with dark eyes and light hair, whose mother, Prudence Hosmer, would repeat old English poetry until all her listeners but her son were weary. When he was thirty-nine years old, married and settled, a farmer and cabinet-maker, there was a convention in the parish church to consider the Boston Port Bill, the doings of General Gage in Boston, and the advice of Samuel Adams and John Hancock to resist oppression. Daniel Bliss, the leading lawyer and leading Tory in Concord, eldest son of Parson Bliss, and son-in-law of Colonel Murray, of Rutland, Vt., the chief Tory of that region, made a speech in this convention against the patriotic party. He was a graceful and
- 62. fluent speaker, a handsome man, witty, sarcastic, and popular, but with much scorn for the plain people. He painted in effective colors the power of the mother country and the feebleness of the colonies; he was elegantly dressed, friendly in his manner, but discouraging to the popular heart, and when he sat down, a deep gloom seemed to settle on the assembly. His brother-in-law, Parson Emerson, an ardent patriot, if present, was silent. From a corner of the meeting- house there rose at last a man with sparkling eyes, plainly dressed in butternut brown, who began to speak in reply to the handsome young Tory, at first slowly and with hesitation, but soon taking fire at his own thoughts, he spoke fluently, in a strain of natural eloquence, which gained him the ear and applause of the assembly. A delegate from Worcester, who sat near Mr. Bliss, noticed that the Tory was discomposed, biting his lip, frowning, and pounding with the heel of his silver-buckled shoe. "Who is the speaker?" he asked of Bliss. "Hosmer, a Concord mechanic," was the scornful reply. "Then how does he come by his English?" "Oh, he has an old mother at home, who sits in her chimney-corner and reads and repeats poetry all day long;" adding in a moment, "He is the most dangerous rebel in Concord, for he has all the young men at his back, and where he leads the way they will surely follow." Four months later, in April, 1775, this Concord mechanic made good the words of his Tory townsman, for it was his speech to the minute- men which goaded them on to the fight. After forming the regiment as adjutant, he addressed them, closing with these words: "I have often heard it said that the British boasted they could march through our country, laying waste every village and neighborhood, and that we would not dare oppose them,—and I begin to believe it is true." Then turning to Major Buttrick, who commanded, and looking off from the hill-side to the village, from which a thick smoke was rising, he cried, "Will you let them burn the town down?" whereupon the sturdy major, who had no such intention, ordered his men to march; and when, a few minutes later, the British fired on his column of companies, the Acton men at the head, he sprang from the ground shouting, "Fire, fellow-soldiers, for God's sake fire!" and discharged
- 63. his own piece at the same instant. The story has often been told, but will bear repetition. Thoreau heard it in 1835 from the lips of Emerson, as he pronounced the centennial discourse in honor of the town's settlement and history; but he had read it and heard it a hundred times before, from his earliest childhood. Mr. Emerson added, after describing the fight:—
- 64. "These poor farmers who came up, that day, to defend their native soil, acted from the simplest instincts; they did not know it was a deed of fame they were doing. These men did not babble of glory; they never dreamed their children would contend which had done the most. They supposed they had a right to their corn and their cattle, without paying tribute to any but their own governors. And as they had no fear of man, they yet did have a fear of God. Captain Charles Miles, who was wounded in the pursuit of the enemy, told my venerable friend (Dr. Ripley), who sits by me, 'that he went to the services of that day with the same seriousness and acknowledgment of God, which he carried to church.'" Humphrey Barrett, fifth in descent from the original settler, was born in 1752, on the farm his ancestors had owned ever since 1640, and was no doubt in arms at Concord Fight in 1775. His biographer says: — "Some persons slightly acquainted with him in the latter part of his life, judged him to be unsocial, cold, and indifferent, but those most acquainted with him knew him to be precisely the reverse. The following acts of his life make apparent some traits of his character. A negro, by the name of Cæsar Robbins, had been in the habit of getting all the wood for his family use for many years from Mr. Barrett's wood-lot near by him; this being done with the knowledge and with the implied if not the express consent of the owner. Mr. Barrett usually got the wood for his own use from another part of his farm; but on one occasion he thought he would get it from the lot by Cæsar's. He accordingly sent two men with two teams, with directions to cut only hard wood. The men had been gone but a few hours when Cæsar came to Mr. Barrett's house, his face covered with sweat, and in great agitation, and says, 'Master Barrett, I have come to let you know
- 65. that a parcel of men and teams have broke into our wood- lot, and are making terrible destruction of the very best trees, and unless we do something immediately I shall be ruined.' Mr. Barrett had no heart to resist this appeal of Cæsar's; he told him not to be alarmed, for he would see that he was not hurt, and would put the matter right. He then wrote an order to his men to cut no more wood, but to come directly home with their teams, and sent the order by Cæsar."[3] The biographer of Mr. Barrett, who was also his attorney and legal adviser, goes on to say:— "A favorite nephew who bore his name, and whose guardian he was, died under age in 1818, leaving a large estate, and no relatives nearer than uncle and aunt and the children of deceased aunts. Mr. Barrett believed that the estate in equity ought to be distributed equally between the uncle and aunt and the children of deceased aunts by right of representation.[4] And although advised that such was not the law, he still insisted upon having the question carried before the Supreme Court for decision; and when the court decided against his opinion, he carried out his own views of equity by distributing the portion that fell to him according to his opinion of what the law ought to be. After he had been fully advised that the estate would be distributed in a manner he thought neither equitable nor just, he applied to the writer to make out his account as guardian; furnishing the evidence, as he believed, of the original amount of all his receipts as such guardian. I made the account, charging him with interest at six per cent. on all sums from the time of receipt till the time of making the account. Mr. Barrett took the account for examination, and soon returned it with directions to charge him with compound interest, saying that he believed he had realized as much as that. I accordingly
- 66. made the account conform to his directions. He then wished me to present this account to the party who claimed half the estate, and ask him to examine it with care and see if anything was omitted. This was done, and no material omission discovered, and no objection made. Mr. Barrett then said that he had always kept all the property of his ward in a drawer appropriated for the purpose; that he made the amount of property in the drawer greater than the balance of the account; and (handing to me the contents of the drawer) he wished me to ascertain the precise sum to which it amounted. I found that it exceeded the balance of the account by $3,221.59. He then told me, in substance, that he was quite unwilling to have so large an amount of property go where it was in danger of being distributed inequitably, and particularly as he was confident he had disclosed every source from which he had realized any property of his ward, and also the actual amount received; but, as he knew not how it got into the drawer, and had intended all the property there to go to his nephew, he should not feel right to retain it, and therefore directed me to add it to the amount of the estate,—which was done."[5] Conceive a community in which such characters were common, and imagine whether the claim of King George and the fine gentlemen about him, to tax the Americans without their own consent would be likely to succeed! I find in obscure anecdotes like this sufficient evidence that if John Hampden had emigrated to Massachusetts when he had it in mind, he would have found men like himself tilling their own acres in Concord. The Barretts, from their name, may have been Normans, but, like Hampden, the Hosmers were Saxons, and held land in England before William the Conqueror. When Major Hosmer, who was adjutant, and formed the line of the regiment that returned the British fire at Concord Bridge, had an estate to settle about 1785, the heir to which was supposed to be in England, he employed an agent, who was then visiting London, to notify the heir,
- 67. and also desired him to go to the Heralds' Office and ascertain what coat-of-arms belonged to any branch of the Hosmer family. When the agent (who may have been Mr. Tilly Merrick, of Concord, John Adams's attaché in Holland), returned to America, after reporting his more important business to Major Hosmer, he added,— "I called at the Heralds' Office in London, and the clerk said, 'There was no coat-of-arms for you, and, if you were an Englishman you would not want one; for (he said) there were Hosmers in Kent long before the Conquest; and at the battle of Hastings, the men of Kent were the vanguard of King Harold.'" If Major Hosmer's ancestors failed to drive back the invaders then, their descendants made good the failure in Concord seven centuries later. Thoreau's favorite walk, as he tells us,—the pathway toward Heaven, —was along the old Marlborough road, west and southwest from Concord village, through deep woods in Concord and in Sudbury. To reach this road he passed by the great Hosmer farm-house, built by the old major already mentioned, in 1760 or thereabout, and concerning which there is a pretty legend that Thoreau may have taken with him along the Marlborough road. In 1758, young Jo. Hosmer, "the little black colt," drove to Marlborough one autumn day with a load of furniture he had made for Jonathan Barnes, a rich farmer, and town clerk in thrifty Marlborough. He had received the money for his furniture, and was standing on the doorstep, preparing to go home, when a young girl, Lucy Barnes, the daughter of the house, ran up to him and said, "Concord woods are dark, and a thunderstorm is coming up; you had better stay all night." "Since you ask me, I will," was the reply, and the visit was often repeated in the next few months. But when he asked farmer Jonathan for his daughter, the reply was,— "Concord plains are barren soil. Lucy had better marry her cousin John, whose father will give him one of the best
- 68. farms in Marlborough, with a good house on it, and Lucy can match his land acre for acre." Joseph returned from that land of Egypt, and like a wise youth took the hint, and built a house of his own, planting the elm trees that now overshadow it, after a hundred and twenty years. After the due interval he went again to Marlborough, and found Lucy Barnes in the September sunshine, gathering St. Michael's pears in her father's garden. Cousin John was married, by this time, to another damsel. Miss Lucy was bent on having her own way and her own Joseph; and so Mr. Barnes gave his consent. They were married at Christmas, 1761; and Lucy came home behind him on his horse, through the same Concord woods. She afterwards told her youngest son, with some pique:— "When my brother Jonathan was married, and went to New Hampshire, twenty couples on horseback followed them to Haverhill, on the Merrimac, but when your father and I were married, we came home alone through these dark Concord woods."[6] The son of this lively Lucy Hosmer, Rufus Hosmer, of Stow, was a classmate, at Cambridge, of Washington Allston, the late Chief Justice Shaw, and Dr. Charles Lowell, father of Lowell the poet. They graduated in 1798, and Dr. Lowell afterwards wrote:— "I can recall with peculiar pleasure a vacation passed in Concord in my senior year, which Loammi Baldwin, Lemuel Shaw, Washington Allston, and myself spent with Rufus Hosmer at his father's house. I recall the benign face of Major Hosmer, as he stood in the door to receive us, with his handsome daughter-in-law (the wife of Capt. Cyrus Hosmer) on his arm. There was a charming circle of young people then living in Concord, and we boys enjoyed this very much; but we liked best of all to stay at home and listen to the Major's stories. It was very pleasant to have a