kudos affiliates! march 2011

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As winter thaws into spring (hopefully!), it’s great to see these accomplishments in Affiliateland.

The Walmart Foundation has donated $38,838 to the Las Vegas Natural History Museum. The funds will be used to improve its live animal and marine life departments.

The Paul G. Allen Family Foundation has awarded the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture $30,000 in funding for an upcoming series at the museum titled “Visions and Voices.” This grant is for the exhibit, “Ric Gendron: A Good Journey,” which will pair Gendron, one of the region’s top local artists, with Oregon writer Elizabeth Woody.

The Massachusetts Cultural Council announced Plimoth Plantation as a winner in the Creative Learning category of the 2011 Commonwealth Awards, honoring exceptional achievement in the arts, humanities, and sciences. The museum will bring a love of Shakespeare to the town of Plymouth and surrounding area with the innovative program: “One Play, One Community: Romeo and Juliet.”

where will the pavilion go next?

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The Smithsonian’s magnificent Ten Thousand Springs Pavilion will end its visit to Flushing Town Hall in New York City in September 2011.  Would your Affiliate like to be the next stop on its tour through America?

The Ten Thousand Springs Pavilion is a 1:5 scale replica of the Wan Chun Ting pavilion that stands in the Imperial Garden of the Forbidden City in Beijing.  An example of classical Chinese architecture, the Pavilion was carved in China in 2007 by artisans of the China Red Sandalwood Museum, who then donated it to the Museum Conservation Institute at the Smithsonian.  Demonstrating traditional Chinese techniques of carving, the richly-detailed Pavilion is made of 3,000 hand-carved pieces of red sandalwood, one of the hardest woods in the world, and is constructed using mortise-and-tenon joinery.  There are no nails holding this magnificent model together.

Students learn from the Pavilion in Peoria, IL

The Ten Thousand Springs Pavilion has already made three stops in Affiliateland.  After its exhibition at the Smithsonian in 2007, it traveled to the Lakeview Museum in Peoria, Illinois.  Accompanied by Chinese-specific programs including calligraphy classes, tai chi and tea ceremony demonstrations, and exhibits of Chinese art, the Pavilion drew a truly international audience, including the Chinese Ambassador to the United States.  (Read more about its Peoria life in The Affiliate newsletter article.)

It then traveled to the Irving Art Center in Irving, Texas, where it was stunningly displayed in the museum’s lobby.  In October, the Pavilion traveled to Flushing Town Hall in Queens, located in one of New York City’s largest Asian communities.  Complemented by a wide range of Asian-specific performances and art exhibitions, the orchestrated construction of the Pavilion by Smithsonian conservator Don Williams and his team of volunteers is a show unto itself.  This spectacular artifact will be ready to travel to a new location in September 2011.

an overhead view in Irving, TX

If you are interested in pursuing a loan of the Ten Thousand Springs Pavilion, here’s what you should know:

– The Pavilion is approximately 10’ wide x 10’ deep  x 10’ high.
– The Pavilion weighs 1.5 tons when assembled.
– The Pavilion comes in 14 large, specially-designed cases which must be stored during its installation.
– Text panels in English and Chinese accompany the Pavilion.
– The Pavilion must sit on a simple platform (12-18” high) which is usually built on-site.

– Contact your National Outreach Manager as soon as possible to discuss logistics!  affiliates@si.edu

Complete information about the Pavilion, including text from the panels and images, can be found at https://www.si.edu/MCI/pavilion/pavilion.html.

its current home in Flushing, NY

affiliates help smithsonian and MIT solve mysteries

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Helping the Smithsonian solve a mystery about a fictitious environmental disaster – doesn’t that sound like fun? 

A preview look at the Vanished site, a curated alternate-reality game

Smithsonian scientists have teamed up with MIT’s Education Arcade to engage middle-school students to do just that, in an online alternate-reality game.   Vanished will kick off on April 4 at vanished.mit.edu.  In the course of 8 weeks, students ages 11-14 from all over the country will collect clues on- and off-line, and form a scientific community to help Smithsonian scientists test hypotheses and solve this mystery.  Thanks to the Smithsonian Center for Education and Museum Studies, a range of scientists from entomologists to paleontologists will host videoconference sessions with players, mentoring them through their scientific discoveries.  (Read more in this USA Today article.)

Where will students collect the real data from their hometowns, to share with Smithsonian scientists?  Many will look to their local Affiliate for clues.  According to MIT game designer Caitlin Feeley, “a kid in Kansas could go to the Kansas Cosmosphere in Hutchinson and bring back information on space exploration, and a kid in North Carolina could go to the Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh, walk through their incredible diorama, and bring back information on how a lost species massively affected an entire ecosystem.”  In fact, 17 Affiliate museums are partnering with the Smithsonian and MIT to offer clue-gathering opportunities for gamers.  “The Aerospace Museum of California is excited to partner with the Smithsonian and MIT in this unique educational opportunity,” says Linda Payne, the Museum’s Education Director.  “We are certain that Vanished will stimulate students’ interest in scientific exploration and problem solving.”

The game, made possible by a grant from the National Science Foundation, hopes to capitalize on the popularity of shows such as CSI to offer a specific kind of scientific problem-solving for students.  “The kids are actually doing science,” says Elizabeth Cottrell, Smithsonian geologist and director of the Smithsonian’s global volcanism program.  “They are going to have the ‘Ah, I get it,”. moment for themselves.”

Thanks to the Smithsonian Affiliates who will help students find those “Ah hah” moments… right in their own neighborhoods.

Affiliate partners for Vanished:
Mid-America Science Museum, Hot Springs, AR
Mary Brogan Museum of Art and Science, Tallahassee, FL
Buffalo Bill Historical Center, Cody, WY
Kansas Cosmosphere, Hutchinson, KS
The Museum of Flight, Seattle, WA
Schiele Museum of Natural History, Gastonia, NC
Aerospace Museum of California, McClellan, CA
Putnam Museum, Davenport, IA
Heinz History Center, Pittsburgh, PA
South Florida Museum, Bradenton, FL
Virginia Museum of Natural History, Martinsville, VA
Kenosha Public Museum, Kenosha, WI
Museum of the Rockies, Bozeman, MT
Museum of Dentistry, Baltimore, MD
South Carolina State Museum, Columbia, SC

“Vanished” in the news:
USA Today: Interactive game ‘Vanished’ doubles as an educational tool

ArtDaily.org: Smithsonian and MIT Partner to Turn Kids into Scientific Investigators

from airmail to email

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Centennial Celebration of the Wiseman Cook Flight with Smithsonian Curators

Wiseman Cooke Plane on display at the National Postal Museum.

Centennial celebrations don’t happen every day.  When the Sonoma County Museum, an Affiliate in Santa Rosa, California, set out to host an event to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the first airmail flight, they turned to the Smithsonian curators who care for the event’s primary artifact, the plane that made that journey a century ago.  Together, they’ve organized a program that will connect online viewers and live audiences at the Sonoma County Museum and the National Air and Space Museum to celebrate this event.

The flight was piloted on February 17 and 18, 1911 by Fred Wiseman.  Wiseman took off from Petaluma, California and flew 25 miles to Santa Rosa with three letters.  Wiseman’s plane is part of the collections of the National Air and Space Museum and is currently on display at the National Postal Museum.  The event carries even more significance to the local community because the Sonoma County Museum is located in a building that was the Santa Rosa post office in 1911. 

During the program, Tom Crouch, senior curator, aeronautics, National Air and Space Museum and Nancy Pope, curator and historian at the National Postal Museum will share their knowledge about the flight.  Tom will discuss the historical context of the plane and Nancy will talk about its significance to postal history. 

Please join us on Saturday, February 19th at 2pm Eastern Standard Time at the Smithsonian’s Ustream channel, where online viewers can watch the lecture and email questions to both curators.   If you would like to organize a similar distance learning program, contact your national outreach manager.

it’s not too early to plan for jazz appreciation month!

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The 2011 JAM poster featuring Mary Lou Williams

This April is the 10th Anniversary of Jazz Appreciation Month (JAM!)   As always, there are many ways to commemorate this unique American art form at your museum. 

Joann Stevens, program director for JAM Initiatives at the National Museum of American History (NMAH), shared information about the programs and resources available to help plan your Jazz Appreciation month event.  “This year JAM celebrates 10 years of advancing appreciation of jazz as America’s original music.  Smithsonian Affiliations has been a great partner in this mission.  Let’s work to strengthen our relationship in 2011 and beyond.  We invite you to order bulk copies of JAM posters for your programs  and send us information to promote your JAM museum and community events on the JAM website, and connect with us via social media.”

 JAM’s 2011 theme honors the history of overlooked musicians, “Women in Jazz: Transforming a Nation.”  The programs at NMAH will tell the story of the International Sweethearts of Rhythm, and their beginnings at Piney Woods School in Mississippi, “the school that music built.”  The Sweethearts gained global recognition as the nation’s first integrated female band, founded in 1937.  Like many other women at the time, the Sweethearts confronted dual biases of gender and race and excelled during a period in history when many Southern blacks lived in slavery without chains and women were second class citizens.  Another female jazz pioneer, Mary Lou Williams, is the face of this year’s celebrations; her portrait by Keith Henry Brown is the centerpiece for JAM’s poster. 

You can learn more about programming on the program’s website, facebook page and follow JAM on twitter.  And keep a lookout for a special webcast of a Latin jazz percussion workshop on April 7th. More details to come!

And don’t forget programming from a Smithsonian Affiliate in New York City, the Jazz Museum in Harlem.  Their executive director, Loren Schoenberg, is once again offering to lead a special program for Affiliates.  Learn more here.  

To get you in a Jazz mood and begin your programming, check out NMAH’s recent tribute blog to Billy Taylor, Jazz’ Elder Statesman.  Enjoy!

Five Smithsonian Affiliates host live webcast for “National Youth Summit: The 50th Anniversary of the Freedom Rides”

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From May until November 1961, more than 400 diverse and committed Americans rode south together on buses and trains, putting their bodies and freedom on the line to challenge the Jim Crow laws that enforced racial injustice and inequality in public transportation. The Freedom Rides changed the Civil Rights Movement and demonstrated the power of individual action to change the nation. 

On Wednesday, February 9, 2011, 12:00-1:15PM EST, middle and high school students across the country will join together electronically for a National Youth Summit on the Freedom Rides and activism at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. Freedom Rides veterans Congressman John Lewis, D-GA, Diane Nash, Jim Zwerg, and Reverend James Lawson will share how they became involved in the Freedom Rides and how their lives were affected by them. They will join filmmaker Stanley Nelson (Freedom Riders) and scholar Raymond Arsenault to discuss the meaning of the Freedom Rides and the role of young people in shaping America’s past and future. 

Image courtesy Library of Congress.

The discussion in Washington will be joined by five audiences at Smithsonian Affiliate museums around the nation as well as by registered viewers of the webcast.  The Affiliates’ programs will be augmented by a discussion guide produced by the National Museum of American History. Each Affiliate will welcome a veteran Freedom Rider to their museums to participate in the discussion and coordinate with local schools to engage students. 

The Affiliate museums and their legendary Freedom Riders are: 

Students will be encouraged to participate in the discussion through the National Museum of American History’s email, Facebook, Twitter, and the conference portal, and will be asked to think about themselves as makers of history. 

Registration is free, and will include access to preparatory classroom materials, film clips, follow-up materials, and technical assistance. Register today! 

 

The National Youth Summit is presented by the National Museum of American History, the National Museum of African American History and Culture, and the National Endowment for the Humanities, in collaboration with Smithsonian Affiliations and American Experience/WGBH.