Recently at AAM 2009 in Philly I went to a session called "Eye On Design II." The point of the session was to have ten people from the museum world look outside the museum world for inspiration. The concept is not new to me and I think it is important for anyone to look outside their career field for inspiration. Frankly, it's a pretty simple way to keep the creative juices flowing.
Until recently I have always looked to the education field for inspiration. I mean after all there are a lot of similarities. Both fields have the goal of instilling knowledge. Both often have inadequate budgets and all to often staffs are not really paid what they are worth. Through several educational podcasts that I listen to I've found teachers are fabulous resources for figuring out how to achieve wonderful things with no budget.
But this session at AAM has inspired me to open my eyes even more and search out other fields that can inspire my work in museums.
Well, I’m still looking for the interview tapes of my grandfather and my mother-in-law. In this round I’ve learned not to trust labels. I found a commercial tape in a “homemade” cassette holder. That prompted me to go back through all my commercial tapes and look in the cases. I found some home tapes in them and got all my commercial tapes back in their cases. I found a tape that was labeled with my husband’s name, but I listened to it anyway. It was an accompaniment tape from my voice lessons. I updated the label. I found another tape that was labeled Heather’s Birthday Present. I listened to it. Turns out it was my birthday present TO my husband. I updated the label to be more precise. So what did I uncover in this round of listening? Lip Sync contest tape from Elementary School. I still can’t believe we didn’t win with Ghostbusters. But also on that tape was my sister singing, and the B side was some square dance calling. I’m going to have to ask my parents if they recog...