This is a rare weekend blog post from us, but we found out that Brooklyn Museum iPhone app hit iTunes and, well, we just can’t contain ourselves—yay!
If you read this blog, you may remember this app is a product of a real-world use of our newly released API by developer Adam Shackelford at Iconoclash Media. The creation of the app was announced on our blog about a month ago and as Adam was shepherding it through the app store approval process, I’ve been keeping in touch and hearing stories about Apple’s pretty thorough rounds of testing. As Adam mentioned at one point, “It never occurred to me, for example, how the app would function if the phone were in airplane mode.”
That said, version 1.0 is in the store for free download now and we are already starting to see the feedback roll in via Twitter and the app store rating system:
So, we’ve seen some early responses and Adam is graciously asking for feedback. We are grateful to him for his hard work on this app and it amazes me how he and others are using our API to show off our data in innovative ways, all on their own time!
Nick Fortunato is the second artist selected via the open call for the 1stfans Twitter Art Feed. Similar to An Xiao’s work with Morse Code, Nick’s proposal for the feed explores the delivery of news and evolution of communication through the ages. As you’ll see, Nick came up with a great concept that will be a welcome addition to the feed:
This project is an attempt to draw parallels between Twitter, a modern day social networking tool and Benjamin Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanack, perhaps the original social networking publication. 275 years after publication of Franklin’s Almanack the form still holds, only the delivery method has changed—a singular voice, communicating to the masses. Then, Franklin’s masses were Colonial America, today it’s the world.
My goal is to “skin” the Twitter feed with content directly pulled from the original Almanacks. I believe that there is very little difference between the common observations people post today on Twitter and those aphorisms and proverbs found in Franklin’s texts. I will not modernize the language, keeping it in the older English as a way to reinforce the mashing of times from then to now.
The experience for the viewer will be one where my posts, in a voice from the past, are sprinkled in with their friends modern up to the minute updates.
Images: Poor Richard’s Almanac - 1758 - Franklin, Benjamin (author) - Philadelphia - Library of Congress
In preparation for renovation to the glass corridor roof, two of the museum’s exterior architectural elements, a stone dragon and a zinc lion, needed to be temporarily relocated for safekeeping.
The dragon is carved from limestone and although the artist is unknown, it was likely made in the early 20th century. The sculpture’s original perching place was on an insurance building in Manhattan’s financial district, somewhere near Liberty and Williams Streets. The dragon came to the museum as a gift in 1974. The zinc lion is one of three lions originally associated with the “El Dorado” carousel in Coney Island Brooklyn. This carousel was manufactured in Leipzig by Hugo Haas for King William II, and imported to Coney Island in 1910, where it was originally shown on Surf Avenue near Dreamland and Luna Park. The lions and carousel survived the 1911 Dreamland fire and were relocated to Steeplechase Park where the front façade, including the lions, was separated from the carousel and installed as a doorway to the “Barrel of Fun.” In 1923, the carousel pavilion enclosure was dismantled and the three lions were installed at another site in the amusement park where they remained until Steeplechase Park closed in 1964. The lion was donated to the museum in 1966.
In order to move the sculptures to their temporary home, Mariano Brothers, Inc., a company specializing in the rigging and movement of art objects was contracted.
The lion was the first to be lifted. High strength rigging straps were secured around the lion and its cement base to ensure that it was properly supported and safe as it was removed from the roof. The hook on a truck mounted crane was then attached to the rigging straps and the lion was gently transported to the flatbed truck below.
The dragon was the next to be lifted, however first it transported on a pallet jack to the other end of the roof so the crane could reach it.
Following the same procedure as the lion, the dragon was safely hoisted onto the flatbed truck.
Once both sculptures were secured on the truck they were driven to their new temporary home. While the sculptures are on the ground Conservation is going to take the opportunity to examine and clean both of the sculptures. Stay tuned for upcoming blog posts on the treatment of the dragon and lion this summer.
For those of you who have been missing the arts of the Islamic world (or wondering what it is you’ve been missing), we are almost finished with our reinstallation of the past several weeks. The galleries had been a sandy beige for some 2-3 decades, so the new dark color will probably be the first thing you notice on your next visit. When I came to the Museum in early 2007, I knew that it would be a few years before we would be making any big structural changes to the second floor, where the Islamic galleries are located. But I really wanted to do something in the meantime to bring some attention to the arts of the Islamic world, which are a constant reminder of the positive and beautiful aspects of Islamic culture. I wanted the objects to “pop out,” for the focus to be on the art rather than the space in which the art is exhibited. I thought a dark, grayish or charcoal blue would be a nice change of scenery and a great backdrop for the objects of various media in rich cobalt blues, turquoises, deep reds, and purples found in the arts of a territory spanning from Spain to China and Southeast Asia, and even the contemporary diaspora. Golds and silvers also look great against this blue, whether on metalwork or paper; luster ceramics now feel like they sparkle!
To give the designer, Lance Singletary, a sense of what I imagined, I picked up a couple of paint swatches from the hardware store and he took it from there. I can’t stress enough how important these conversations with the designer are, because if Lance didn’t “get” what kind of vision I had for the space, it would have ended up looking a lot different than what you’re about to see in this video. He will explain how he came up with the subtle details that make for an extraordinary change on a relatively modest budget. It’s been an intense project that came together in an incredibly short period of time, thanks to the help of a whole team of people— curatorial staff, conservators, editors, designers, painters, electricians, art handlers, maintenance staff, technology staff, the security staff who kept an eye on me on many a late night at the museum, and more (I really hope I haven’t overlooked anyone here!). Ultimately, though, you will have to come see for yourself when the galleries open to the public on June 5, 2009—in the meantime, check out this “behind-the-scenes” video of some of the reinstallation:
The Museum recently acquired some great new photography. Much of it will be on view this coming August when we open a new show with material from the Contemporary Collection.
In this delicate group of black and white photographs, Dash Snow captures his family and extended family of friends in an intimate and unguarded fashion. In a diaristic snapshot of Chinatown at night, a young woman (Snow’s wife Jade) sits in a doorway with the stroller on the sidewalk close by. Despondent, head in hand, or just tired after a long night out (Dash forgetting the house keys, or so the story goes), the mundane snap shot is full of emotion. Another image shows the couple’s baby daughter in bed sound asleep, humorously juxtaposed with the child-unfriendly traces of a parent’s night out. The poetic rendering of Jade’s naked back bears trace of an intimate encounter and a street portrait of a friend hints at the androgynity of adolescence. A refashioned old portrait of the artist’s grandmother adds glamour to the group while an intense self-portrait shows the bearded artist in profile, the whites of his wildly gazing eyes glowing against his mud covered face. Best known for his often candid Polaroid snapshots, Dash Snow has received much attention over the past few years. An elusive graffiti tagger turned visual artist and Whitney Biennial participant, Snow is part of a tightly knit group of downtown artists who turn life into art in the manner of artists such as Nan Goldin, Larry Clark or Wolfgang Tillmans.
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