Meeting TM: Orientation Week

So internship week one was actually all orientation. And what an orientation it was! Each day we took tours of galleries and departments led by personable and incredibly knowledgeable museum staff. I loved it all, even the moments when my feet ached! (Which was quite a few. Still working on the right ratio of shoe cushioning.)

I'll run it all down for you here.

Monday
On Monday we started with breakfast, during which they thanked us all for being here. THANKED US!! I still can't believe I'm getting paid to go to TM five days a week! After breakfast, we hung out in the roof sculpture garden while other interns got IDs, and then we took a very quick highlights tour with one of the museum's volunteers. Even this short tour was very interesting and enjoyable. The college interns are training to give similar tours. There's so much to remember!

After the highlight tour came the Facilities Tour. This primarily involved the ground floor, where only the staff has access. The ground floor is fairly non-descript, and there are few signs. "Better" yet, there is no floorplan. The tour was a whirlwind that involved lots of pausing at hallway intersections and pointing down one way or the other with a comment like, "And if you went all the way through this hall and through the room at the end, you'd be in..." Those of you who know me well can understand why this quickly became nightmarish for me! I had scary visions of being asked to go pick up a printing order and getting hopelessly lost. In fact, I began joking that they planned the photo of all the interns later in the week so they could tell which of us had gone missing. Fortunately, our guide informed us halfway through the tour that we would invariably get lost, and everyone does. I planned right then to just throw myself on the mercy of the security staff to help me find the the places I need to be. I overheard other interns murmuring nervously, too, so I think I'm not the only one with that plan.

Lunch was a pleasant surprise. We ate in the "Staff Caf," which offers hot and cold food options daily. The prices strike me as being quite good, and there's variety every day. I'm not sure their vegetarian options are so great, but that doesn't affect me directly. I'll talk a little more about the cafeteria food I've partaken of this week later.

After lunch we took a tour of the Luce Center, which is open storage for 19th-century American decorative and fine art objects. Wow! This is really amazing, and something I recommend all visitors to the museum take time to see. Even if this isn't your thing and you don't plan to spend a lot of time in this area, it's still amazing to just wander between the glass cabinets to see the astonishing panorama of objects. And as our guide pointed out, somewhere in those cases is something that every American will find familiar, either from their house, or their grandparents' house, or a friend's house.

The remainder of day 1 was a reception. Most of the time I chatted with other interns, but toward the end of the day I did have the opportunity to meet four of the six people who work in my department. Everyone was very friendly. One of the women said she also came from a background that wasn't arts/textiles, so I'm excited to learn her story. And she said they're looking forward to teaching us all the useful things they know, so that made me exceptionally happy! I'm still not sure exactly what projects I'll be working on, but they did mention rehousing velvets and laces, building boxes, and assisting researchers who come to use the library and textile database. All of that sounds good to me.

Tuesday
We started Tuesday with a tour of the Greek and Roman galleries. Hurrah! The witty curator who led our group was also from a non-arts/non-museum background, so I found that also encouraging. My new mental game is to try to imagine what the statues in the Greek and Roman galleries would have looked like when they were polychrome. Now we just associate the clean, elegant white marble with an aesthetic of Greek and Roman art, but in actuality these pieces were brightly colored. There are traces of pigment still extant on some of the statues. I think this could be a really fun Photoshop project for someone who's much better at Photoshop than I am. An explanation of the audience development efforts came next, and it was interesting and, unsurprisingly, very polished. Then a museum architecture tour followed lunch, and I started taking notes about the multiple architects who have shaped and changed the museum over time. It's a fascinating story about one of the major cultural landmarks of our country. Spotting remnants of the work of these various architects has been a fun pastime since that tour.

The rest of Tuesday included pictures at the Temple of Dendur and working in small groups with other graduate interns to create a themed "treasure hunt" for adult visitors. That project continued for the rest of the week. If you visit the museum next Valentine's Day weekend, perhaps you can take the tour my group worked up. Just ask at the information desk. Tuesday was also good because I met an ethnomusicology student who was also flying "under the radar" of not being an art history major. I think we were both relieved to learn that we aren't alone!

Wednesday
On Wednesday we had an orientation to the main research library, and we took a tour of the African Art galleries. I started to hit my stride a little more and was able to ask some worthwhile museology questions about labelling decisions. (This is a pretty big issue in post-colonial areas, among others.) Among the pieces are some of those that inspired Picasso. We also learned that many of the power sculptures have been "cleaned up" significantly from their appearance when they were in use in their land of origination.

We had a talk from the chief security officer and got to hear entertaining stories about major events held at TM with famous people. I learned that all of the security staff have college degrees, and many "work their way up" (words of the chief security officer) through the ranks to other positions in the museum. I've really enjoyed all of the interactions I've had with the security personnel so far, even though they've all been short exchanges. I'm so envious of their knowledge of the museum! If I can stop taking wrong turns to the basic places I need to go before my time here ends, I'll be pleased.

Thursday
The big event for Thursday was Human Resources training. Although it was listed as being about professional image, the graduate students actually took a workshop on communication styles. I found out that I'm fairly balanced between the four styles, but I tend slightly toward analytical. (Does this surprise anyone? I had predicted it before we took the quizzes.) Now that we know each other's communication styles, it has been engrossing to watch the different type of interactions that take place.

Friday
Friday already? How the week flew by! We started the morning with a 19th Century tour. Once again, our tour guide was wonderful. She pointed out that telling the story of collectors is important for the museum and these galleries. These stories help explain the museum's collection, and the gaps therein. They're also interesting vignettes of specific personalities and practice through different time periods. This curator also pointed out the very deliberate arrangement of the galleries, which simultaneously groups works in a way that leads viewers to compare or contrast them in predictable ways while also meeting all donor stipulations (certain collections must remain together, etc.) and leading the viewer on from one gallery to another. (At last! My virtual inability to pull myself out of museum spaces explained.)

Next we moved to a tour of scientific research. Those folks are solving exciting mysteries (and providing basic information needed for condition reports, artifact assessment before purchase, etc.). They have really cool equipment, too! We saw a huge HUGE X-ray setup, a mass spectrometer (and the detailed output from it), an electron microscope, and even a ray gun! It's art history meets detective work meets science fiction. Very impressive.

The Registrar tour was an unexpected gem of orientation. These staff members have astonishing stories to tell! I particularly enjoyed the accounts of art moving operations that met suddenly with filming on the steps; as they pointed out, it's not always easy to tell which swat team operations are real and which are staged for TV in this city. The explanation of what couriers do, the crates that are used to transport art (with proprietary colors for each institution), and the process of securing and protecting loans (such as filing for immunity from seizure) provided terrific insight into the behind-the-scenes workings of the museum. And the fact that people in this department specialize in incoming or outgoing loans, and even further beyond that, highlighted the difference between a huge institution like this and other, smaller museums I've worked in. If I get a chance, I hope I can spend some time trailing one or more folks who work in the Registrar department.

Monday, Week Two
One of the (many) fabulous things about this internship program is that every Monday throughout the summer is set aside for professional development/orientation activities. Our second Monday was no less engaging than any of the previous week.

We started the day with a tour of Objects Conservation. Amazing! The highly-skilled staff members and contractors in this department specialize in materials more than in time periods (although some of them also have period specializations). I was particularly engrossed by the discussion of restoration of a piece of intricate wood furniture.

After a break, we took a tour of the special exhibit "Superheroes: Fashion and Fantasy." This exhibition is a production of the Costume Institute that will be on view through September 1, 2008. I like it. The exhibit combines costumes from recent (and fairly recent) movies featuring superheroes and pieces from fashion collections by major designers such as Theirry Mugler, Dolce & Gabbana, and Gianni Versace. The exhibit is broken into sections focusing on different types of bodies reflected in different superhero depictions. Non-costume artwork in the exhibit includes some original comic books at the end of the show, movie stills and original backdrops throughout, and an iconic print by a major Pop artist.

After lunch we saw a presentation by the Scientist in Charge of scientific research, reinforcing much of what we saw and heard on our tour. Those folks do amazing work! What a great career that must be. What a lot of great careers there seem to be here!