Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Hot time . . .

MMCD Library is moved!
On Monday, August 9, the library at MMCD was moved into the Delhom-Gambrell Library at Mint Museum Randolph. Many thanks to the folks at Charlotte Public Library for the shelving swap and for assembling shelving in the D-G Library; to the great crew from Armstrong Relocations who were careful and considerate maneuvering large metal pieces and unwieldy book carts through MMR and who successfully moved everything in one day; to volunteers Kelley Grogan and Martha McPhail who cleaned all the new shelving once it was in place in the D-G Library; (and another thanks to Martha who came back the next day to shelf-read and arrange); and last but not least, thank you to Brian Gallagher and Martha Mayberry for preping the galleries in the right of way and helping keep watch as all the stuff went through the building. Woo-hoo!


From the (online) newstand:
Let's Have a Discussion: Sustainability in the Ceramics Studio : From Ceramics Arts Daily, a timely article about how glaze waste, rinse water, etc - the by-products of the ceramic studio - can be handled in environmentally-sound ways.
The Internet: Everything You Need to Know : A lengthy, spot-on article about the internet from The Guardian (UK) and our dependence upon it combined with our general lack of knowledge about how it operates and where it is going. We use it every day constantly, so really, what is it? A GREAT read.

New titles!
- Why Design Now? National Design Triennial from Cooper Hewitt, National Design Museum - THE coolest stuff on the planet - everything from radios to architecture, from lamps to water purifiers, from bicycles to textiles, and from typefaces to tableware - with an emphasis on sustainability and "design for good." Presented by the Friends of the Mint in honor of outgoing president Helen Katz. Thank you Friends!
- Grayson Perry by Jacky Klein - a great big monograph on the ceramic artist who accepted the prestigious Turner Prize wearing "a lilac babydoll dress and red pumps." Don't let the cute outfits fool you - his work can be hard-hitting social commentary; witty and profound. His work is represented in the upcoming Contemporary British Studio Ceramics show.
- Tanguy, Calder: Between Surrealism and Abstraction - stunning exhibition catalog - fascinating exhibition and beautifully designed publication. Check it out (if you can pry it out of Jon's hands).
- The Walter O. Evans Collection of African American Art - documents a "significant cross section" of an impressive collection of over two hundred works created from 1848 to 1997.

Asian Library Visit
What an amazing place! Over 130,000 Asian language publications - the largest in the country (YES - the country!) and its right across the street from Trader Joe's! And its founder, Dr. Ki-Hyun Chun, is remarkable. This was his dream, funded himself, as a tribute to his father and to fill a real need. He told us that when he realized that most Asians coming to this country could not bring books with them, ("How terrible! To have no books!") he decided to create the library. Dr. Chun and his wife and the staff of his business (housed in the same building) could not have been more gracious. Our donation of books was just one part of the experience. It was a present to us as well.

Now a little something for you cubeworlders uptown! (best DJ voice when reading)
Some of you have already taken advantage of online radio - direct ear bud to computer link-up - such as Pandora and LastFm where you can create your own "radio" station of artists and/or styles. Now you can listen based on your mood! Check out StereoMood! It provides music based on how you are feeling or on your activities. Personal fave so far: It's raining .
And for all of us: check out Songza! and give a listen to WMMU - the tunes that will take us to the next level station :o) Then, join for free and add songs to the mix, vote others up or down, but most of all, have fun!

Wednesday, June 02, 2010

And there's more . . .


Great gift
Many thanks to Elizabeth Apple for her promised gift to the library of the 1983 limited edition book Hiroshima (885/1500)with silkscreens by Jacob Lawrence; signed by Lawrence, John Hersey and Robert Penn Warren. Brilliant. Just one of the silkscreen images is to the left. Select the image for a larger view.


Great news!
designinform.co.uk and MintWiki: The folks at designinform - a UK based subscription database of information on design and crafts - got in touch about using our wiki (yep, good ole MintWiki) as a source of information. SWEET! We will likely be included in this link: The Research Guides as they are free resources of information. Isn't that fantastic? Also, the Research Guides themselves are wonderful. Suggestion: Add it to your favorites!


New titles!
- Albert Paley: In the 21st Century - an oversized catalogue for monumental sculpture! Created to accompany the exhibition running this year at Memorial Art Gallery in Rochester.
- Also from the Memorial Art Gallery: Breaking Ground: a Century of Craft Art in Western New York featuring Paley along with Wendell Castle, Wayne Higby and Michael Taylor among others.
- Thorough and well-illustrated - Textile Conservation: Advances in Practice by Frances Lennard and Patricia Ewer.
- From the exhibition of the same name at the Hermitage Rooms at Somerset House, London, The Triumph of Eros: Art and Seduction in 18th-century France. (Ooh la la!) Many thanks to Peter and Mary White and Helen Espir for this lovely gift!
- And thank you to the Friends for three excellent titles in honor of Annie Carlano: Glenn Adamson's The Craft Reader, Contemporary Ceramics by Emmanuel Cooper, and Contemporary Design: 1900 to Today by Catherine McDermott. Fabulous!


On the road!
Thanks to book sale money, a set of rare books from the Delhom Library is now at the conservator for restoration and custom boxes! DuHalde's 4 volume The History of China (1736) contains the first explanation of the porcelain-making process to a European audience. Pretty special!!

What goes around . . .
The following link was sent to us by a student who enjoyed the Mint Wiki page on Platform Shoes and it's an excellent collection of online resources. Check out The History and Fashion of Shoes

Companion pieces
1) Exhibition at the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art - NASA Art : 50 years of Exploration
2) From NASA, a video explaining one of the mysteries of space that underscores the importance of good design EVERYWHERE!

Still absolutely remarkable after all these years
The Running Fence (1976) - Documentation of the entire project is on display for the first time - Smithsonian American Art Museum - now through September 26. Watch Christo discuss the project.


On the Newstand
Anne Lemanski's Fennec Fox (Dog Star) on the cover of Fiberarts summer issue! A great feature article is in the magazine, which is going to MMCD for a bit and there is more online. (You may remember her work from our Possibilities exhibition)


Online, see the latest issue of ArtSyNC - the free online guide to arts in NC!




Food for thought
Watch "Towards a New Mainstream?" - the lecture by Gregory Rodriguez on "demographic change in the Americas, cultural transformation, and the future of museums." You can also view the webcast and download the discussion guide & resource list.

Treasures from the stacks!
How about this for different? They look like bookmarks - long flat silk ribbons with designs and German text. Thanks to Brian, Terry Prince did the translation and solved the riddle.
They are World War I Commemorative Ribbons, called "vivat-bänder," issued to commemorate significant events of the war and to raise money - in one case, for the Red Cross. In March of last year, the Lilly Library at Indiana University had an exhibition of these! To see them and the information about them, come to the library! Thank you Terry!

Video pick
We know that art can change people - here's how ceramics changed an entire town and how one person with an idea and effort made it happen. Watch this clip from The Mata Ortiza Pottery Phenomenon courtesy of Ceramic Arts Daily.

Friday, May 14, 2010

May May Cray Cray

Grant deadline, moving schedule, weeding, uptown resource centers, wiki updates, summer intern prep, lions and tigers and bears - oh my!

Online newstand
- Latest issue of the
Research and Scholar's Center Newsletter from the Smithsonian American Art Museum!
-
American Craft features among lots of other things, an article on Michael Sherril and an Arline Fisch exhibition review!
-
CharlotteViewpoint article on Richard Saul Wurman - who I posted about last time and who Leslie and I heard speak at the Aunt Stella Center last month. See why he is actually interesting.

Around town dept.
Super! The Fine Art of Comics a new exhibition at Twenty-Two that opened on May 1 is an exhibition of Shelton Drum's collection of comic art. Shelton is the owner of the store Heroes Aren't Hard to Find and the founder of HeroesCon. And of course, former library assistant Shawn Reynolds is the manager of Heroes! Can't wait to check it out!

New titles dept.
- The Participatory Museum by Nina Simon - Answers the question: How can your institution encourage and develop visitor participation and do it well? Thank you Cheryl for donating this timely book.
- Imagination First: Unlocking the Power of Possibility by Eric Liu and Scott Noppe-Brandon - a nice companion (although accidental) piece about creative problem-solving and innovation, and the cultivation of imagination that enables the first two to happen! Brilliant! (Thanks Joel for the request!)
- Inventing Marcel Duchamp: the Dynamics of Portraiture from the exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery. With fore-edge decoration - something you don't run into too often. (No, I'm not going to tell you - look it up!)*
- Claude Raguet Hirst: Transforming the American Still Life by Martha M. Evans - Acclaimed for her mastery of trompe l-oeil, this is the catalog of her first retrospective exhibition. The image at the top of this post is her Book of Letters (1897).

Worth a watch!
Top notch person as well as an incredibly gifted potter - From the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke, Mark Hewitt - Falling into Place Great combination of interviews, action and visuals - like the installation accompanied by music - even though the audio is uneven.

Glad it's there but hope don't have to use dept.
http://www.workinthearts.net/

Cool local news that got little attention dept.
Local students take the top prize! CPCC students won the grand prize in game design in Microsoft's U.S. Imagine Cup Competition beating out Yale, Tufts and the University of California among others for top honors. The competition is for the design of video games which provide solutions to real-world problems. CPCC's winning entry is called "Sixth," a reference to the fact that a sixth of the world's population lives in poverty. The game "involves a series of quest challenges related to ending poverty around the world, including simulating a poor child in India who has to overcome challenges to bring water back to his family." Film director James Cameron who was one of the judges (yes, that film director) said the game "triggers a compassionate response and a call for action." Here's
more! And best of all, this is the second year in a row that they have won! How cool is that.

Favorite new product dept.

Check out
OrangePiel.com where you can upload your favorite photo (summer vacation?) or image (Mae or Helena's latest masterpiece?) or select from their library of graphic images and create custom window treatments or wallpaper. How fun is this!

And last but not least
Treasures from the stacks!
In honor of our visit to the North Carolina Dance Theater's new facility, here are two spreads from a souvenir program dated 1913 for Serge Diaghilev's Ballet Russ
e! (In the special collections of the library of course)















*Ok, well here's a
video but the Duchamp book is not that elaborate! (Isn't this cool though?)

Monday, April 05, 2010

Springing into the future

Best news I've had all day department: TED is coming to Charlotte! Check out Tedx Charlotte and be sure to check out the organizing committee - a familiar cast of characters! (It would be cool if MMU could be its home - not this year, maybe next????)

And to cement it all apparently: TED founder Richard Paul Wurman will be in Charlotte THIS WEEK (April 5-9)! Catch him on Wednesday at the Ritz Carlton or on Thursday at the Great Aunt Stella Center. Details at http://www.sirconferences.com/!

Because I can't help myself department: Here's a TED talk from last year by Margaret Wertheim and her efforts crocheting a coral reef (not kidding!) and why it is important. As she put it: "an intersection of mathematics, marine biology, feminine handicrafts and environmental activism." This is also featured on Crafts magazine's YouTube channel along with alot of other great vids about craft.

And here is the website of the Community Crocheted Coral Reef created at Scarsdale Middle School: http://shs-20.scarsdaleschools.k12.ny.us/~coralreef inspired by Margaret Wertheim's work.

A little solidarity goes a long way department: Besides being an integral part of our community, The Charlotte Mecklenburg Library has long been a partner of the Mint and many of the librarians there have worked and continue to work side by side with Mint staff. Be supportive of our public library friends and colleagues and of the libraries in our community in any way that you can.

More librarians department: Here is an article from the NY Times about the collaborative efforts of the art libraries at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Frick Collection, the Brooklyn Museum and the Museum of Modern Art and their combined database nyarc.org which just went live last month. Crazy good.

NOTE: The article above is part of the Museums Special Section in the Thursday, March 18 2010 issue of the NY Times. A hard copy is available in the library. (Thanks Phil!) This section also includes articles on using smartphones for tours, successful online fundraising, a program for teens at the Studio Museum of Harlem, and much much more.


More news you can use department: Latest issue of American Craft (April/May 2010) features a cover story on Michael Sherrill with some gorgeous photography of his work.

New titles department:
- From Process to Print: Graphic Works by Romare Bearden with many thanks to the Melberg Gallery for an additional copy for the Resource Lounge at MMU!
- Recommended by Dorie, The Indian Craze: Primitivism, Modernism, and Transculturation in American Art, 1890-1915 by Elizabeth Hutchinson "transforms our understanding of the role of Native Americans in modernist culture."
- Tim Rollins and K.O.S.: A History featuring the Mint piece which will be on display at MMU!

Did you notice? dept: MARCO has a new look! Thank you Elyse!

And for fun and a candidate for the "never would have thought" dept:

Friday, February 26, 2010

"Something wonderful is about to happen"*

*Let's start off with a pop culture quiz! What film does this tag line come from? And why is it appropriate? More at the end of this post!

First book published by the library! With donated funds from The Ceramic Circle of Charlotte in memory of Leo Kohn, The Mint Museum Library has created and published Ceramic Notes: a Facsimilie Reproduction of class notes from lectures by Professor Edward Orton, Jr. with a Table of Contents by Leo Kohn. Many thanks to interns Rebecca Stockin and Maisie McParland for scanning the notebooks that were part of a gift from the American Ceramic Society! Come by the library and check it out!

Selected new titles:
Tim Rollins and K.O.S.: A History - a great big wonderful book about Tim Rollins collaborative work with his Kids of Survival - making art and making history - featuring the Mint's painting on page 55!
American Modernism at The Art Institute of Chicago - Thank you to Friends of the Mint for this title in honor of Jonathan Stuhlman! - a gorgeous collection presented thoroughly.
Studio Pottery in Britain 1900-2005 by Jeffrey Jones - Just in time for our upcoming exhibition of the Grainer Collection in October!

Help Create the Future!
Participate in Upnext: The Future of Museums and Libraries Wiki from the IMLS. It's free to register. You, us, we are all invited to collaborate and share our ideas and expertise. The wiki will be open as of March 3 - go to http://imlsupnext.wikispaces.com/ to register. To get started, check out The Future of Museums and Libraries: A Discussion Guide. The Upnext wiki project will last until May 12. If you would like more information, just see me in the library.

Jan/Feb issue of Antiques features an excellent article on Edward Middleton Manigault - whose work the museum is trying to acquire and is part of the Collections Campaign - on view now in the Dalton Gallery!
Crafts: the Magazine of Contemporary Craft reviews a fiber art exhibition in London featuring one of our FCAs (Favorite Craft Artists) - Tilleke Schwarz! The exhibition entitled "Beware of Embroidery" contains work by Tilleke as well as four other international fiber artists.

Christmas comes REALLY early: the library is fortunate to have received an incredible gift of books and journals from Daisy and Henry Bridges. Over two hundred items - a wealth of materials. Thank you so much!

Are we famous yet? MintWiki, our online exhibition resource, is featured in the book Handbook on Developing Curriculum Materials for Teachers: Lessons from Museum Education Partnerships Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing, 2010) Woo-hoo!

FYI!
Top 50 Social Media Resources - Website Magazine

Though on this topic, a friend of mine just got back from the TED conference(the stinker) and said that Twitter was on the way out. So there's that. (PS: TED speakers this year included Jamie Oliver, Bill Gates, a wonderful artist Raghava KK who I'd never heard of before, and for some real ooohh-ahhh, Blaise Aguera y Arca and his demonstration of augmented reality maps - available now - online - bing.com maps. But the absolute best one: Temple Grandin - just watch it!

Some fun - Mint artists on film!
Nick Cave
Wayne Thiebaud

*2010, of course. And the "something wonderful" may not be the creation of a new planet, but the opening of MMU will definitely rock our world!