Daly Conservation

It is a issue that students in the fine arts and performing arts usually have no business coursework.  This means they graduate with degrees in art conservation, theater, dance, or visual arts and then what?  They could look for a low-paying internship or fellowship, but that is really a temporary fix, if they want to eventually retire they will need a pension plan or a 401K and those are not offered to those type of temporary employees.  They are left with the option of going into business for themselves, and that is a complicated prospect.  To learn how to be a successful entrepreneur is something business schools have been teaching for years, and current arts graduates must teach themselves this skill entirely on the job.

I attended a lecture at Arizona State University a few days ago, Reinventing the Business of Charity: emerging alternatives to traditional non-profit business models. The lecture was supported by p.a.v.e. - the performing arts venture experience, their mission and vision, taken from their website are:

Mission
The performing arts venture experience paves the way to the future of the arts by investing in student innovation and creativity, supporting arts entrepreneurship education and undertaking entrepreneurial activities.

Vision
p.a.v.e. focuses on educating students, artists and educators about how the principles of entrepreneurship can support the development of creative opportunities for artists of all kinds.

The lecture I attended is part of a series supported by p.a.v.e. and the lecturer was Adam Huttler, founder of Fractured Atlas, a group that offers artists and arts organizations tools to help them function more efficiently.  He began his lecture by saying that there are a lot of problems in the way the arts are funded in America, he doesn’t have the answers to how to fix these problems, but he does have a number of very interesting questions that would give more insight into these problems.

1.  501(c)(3) non-profit organizations are excessively complex which creates barriers for small entrepreneurs

2.  These organizations have no stock, which is the capitalist mechanism by which employees and board member participate in financial success.  They cannot profit, but employees and board members can still be fired if things go badly, this breeds extreme conservatism because there is no reward for taking risks.

3. Non-profit organizations are almost all undercapitalized, which means they rare accrue reserve funds or build flexible working capital.  Surplus budgets are frowned upon, managers are unwilling to undertake new projects without 100% of the funding in place, and investment in long-term value is rare which means non-profits are not building infrastructure.

Currently, the solution to these three problems is to find funding from grants, which creates 2 problems

1. Who’s your customer? If it is your audience, the consumer of your art, teaching, etc. doesn’t give you the money to keep your doors open you are more likely to listen to your funders and meet their requests instead of your customer.

2. What is your relationship with your funder?  Foundations know that your non-profit relies on their money to keep your doors open, not a very good relationship for either the non-profit or the foundation.

Maybe a tradition non-profit is not the correct model for what you want to do?

501(c) organization

• Intended to be a perpetual entity - outlive the founding members
• The corporation owns all intellectual property
• There cannot be any investors
• They have different and very complex reporting laws, especially about tax deductible donations, operating expenses, accounting rules, AND they are ineligible for any small business incentives.

However, even with these barriers, since 1998 the number of 501(c) organizations has doubled

Fiscal Sponsorship

• This is when a non-exempt entity is “sponsored” by an exempt organization
• Grants and contributions can be made to the sponsor on behalf of the sponsee
• A project can be temporary
• This may allow for donors or investors
• The ownerships of the work stays with the artist

This is the model that Fractured Atlas uses, and I believe they sponsor more projects than any other source in the USA.  This model is appealing to me because of my interest in contemporary art and artists, this would provide artists a way to have financial support from a non-taxable entity for the creation of their work.

L3C

• Low-profit limited liability company
• Profit is secondary to charitable goals
• This is legally allowed in 8 states and amongst 2 tribal nations
• This is to attract program related investments, from foundations to further purposes, there can be a 5% disbursement on the investment to funders and it is possible to have  loan
• This is a new business entity so there is no legal casework about how this will be enforced
• This gives more flexibility for the organization, but this does not have tax deductible status, and the organization cannot apply for grants or donations

The speaker closed with a few ideas about how arts organizations over the past few years have begun professionalizing, going from small staff and volunteers to larger staff and many departments dedicated to a variety of purposes (marketing, fundraising, donor relations, etc.).  He generally questioned if these departments are all necessary, or if these large institutions have begun to shift in their mission from creating art to maintaining themselves.

I recently went to Los Angeles for a weekend to work for Rosa Lowinger & Associates.  Rosa was great and I was really happy to see LA.  The last time I went to LA was in 2001 and I saw a number of museums, but mainly took a lot of yoga classes, good times!

Rosa really pushed me to see the Pacific Standard Time shows, and I took the weekend to check out shows at the Getty, LACMA, and the Santa Monica Museum of Art. I have also been reading some of the critiques of PST, from The New York Times(where the critic couldn’t get the name of the LA MoCA correct, and seemed to only want to talk about how much being in LA made them miss New York), and the hilarious response to this article from C-Monster.

From the Getty webpage about PST

“Pacific Standard Time is the culmination of a long-term Getty Research Institute initiative that focuses on postwar art in Los Angeles. Through archival acquisitions, oral history interviews, public programming, exhibitions, and publications, the Research Institute is responding to the need to locate, collect, document, and preserve the art historical record of this vibrant period.”

I was impressed at how each museum interpreted PST in different ways. The Santa Monica Museum of Art (SMMoA) had an exhibit of art by Beatrice Wood, whose life spanned most of the 20th Century and the exhibition includes Wood’s drawings, ceramics, and a film interview where she candidly discusses her libido. The museum is only a few rooms but the exhibit was very well presented and focused.

The exhibitions at the Getty included an incredible work in cast polyester resin, Gray Column by De Wain Valentine.  The exhibit includes a discussion of the conservation of the piece and why it was important to preserve the pristine surface, even though it meant removing a layer of the original material.  Tom Lerner makes a appearance in a video in the exhibition discussing this ethical dilemma.

And of course LACMA has the exhibition ‘California Design‘.  I personally love modern design, having grown up with George Nakashima’s furniture in our modern house designed by Curtis Besinger. California design is incredible, clean lines, beautiful wood, good use of color.  The Eames livingroom has been reproduced for this exhibition and it is fantastic.  California fashions are also included, some have regrettable color combinations, but the Barbie Dreamhouse and the LACMA Barbie are amusing and fun. I also saw Five Car Stud at LACMA, and then I remembered why I don’t watch horror movies.

The great thing about these exhibitions is that it forces people in LA to talk about the art that has been made in LA.  There is a lot of focus on collecting oral histories, interviewing artists, and archiving LA Art.  I was glad to see this effort and in my conservation head I thought, this is going to make telling the story of LA Art so much easier, Thank you!

The 2011 Triennial meeting for ICOM-CC has just wrapped up.  It was amazing - Lisbon is a beautiful city and the conference center was right on the water so we could take a walk during lunch or just get outside occasionally and admire the The 25 de Abril Bridge.  The bridge is remarkably similar to the Golden Gate bridge in San Francisco, and because Lisbon also has cable cars it is often compared to San Francisco.

My paper on ‘The Conservation of Materials and Resources’ was presented on the first day, which was nice, I could focus on it early and then I wouldn’t feel guilty when I was out until midnight the other nights of the conference.  And I was out much too late most nights, it feels like you want to speak to so many people and you’ll never fit it all in, and there were many late night events organized by ICOM like a dinner and cultural show.

The next ICOM-CC meeting is in Melbourne, Australia in 2014,  the next general ICOM meeting is next year in Rio de Janiero, Brazil.  I like that the ICOM meetings are in such far-flung locations, it allows for more participation from museum professionals internationally, and it takes me to places that I may not visit otherwise.

My husband Daniel Cull and  I are now off to Porto, then on to Tui where we will begin to walk the Camino Portuguese to Santiago de Compostela. I am excited to have a relaxing, contemplative walk to let all the information in my head settle down before I return home.

A few weeks ago, I received an e-mail from the head of graduate studies at the University of Delaware about an upcoming Fulbright scholarship information session.  The Fulbright scholarship sponsors American students to study abroad and foreign students to study in America. The purpose of the scholarship is to develop mutual understanding between countries by developing understanding between people.

I thought I would look into the scholarship some more and consider whether my research interests and professional experience could be applicable to art conservation in another country.  After discussions with colleagues I focused on India as a country that has an active contemporary art market, a long history that includes archeaological and historic structures and artifacts, and the field of art conservation is developing rapidly to take care of cultural property. Organizations like The Indian National Trust For Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) are based throughout the country to address conservation issues in a variety of settings like museums, palaces, and sites.  I was also impressed by the variety of climates in the country, from the Himalayan mountains, the Thar desert in Rajasthan, tropical monsoon climates, and marine environments. 

I am particularly interested in continuing my research about art conservation, museum environmental controls, and sustainability in India.  In the Western museum world the museum environment has been controlled by installing large HVAC systems, which are expensive and unsustainable and now museum building managers and conservators are running these systems less to try to be more sustainable.  Perhaps India could find solutions to creating a more favorable museum environment without installing these huge systems? Perhaps the museum professionals in India already have found these solutions?

I have been contacting professionals who work or have worked in India to see if they can put me in contact with museums or universities there that would be willing to affiliate themselves with a Fulbright fellow.   I am excited to see where this path will take me, and who I will meet along the way.

I was thrilled to see my classmates and have our Oral Presentations this past Tuesday.  Renee Wolcott’s presentation was one of the most memorable, because the projector began shaking part way through and someone in the audience shouted out ‘it’s an Earthquake!’ and then 10 seconds later everything was calm again, and Renee continued with her presentation.

Of course this would be my class, natural disaster - ha! we just keep going, I am hugely proud of all of my classmates and watching all of them present about the work they have done has reminded me of how far we have all come in the past three years. It is also exciting to hear about where they will be going and what they will be doing, I hope we will stay in touch and keep each other informed.  It is exciting to hear about their research about separating water damaged photographic negatives, protective coatings for murals, coatings and cleaning methods for stone, the paintings of Richard Caton Woodville, and architectural paint analysis.  The whole day was like a miniature AIC meeting, I feel like I contributed and learned many interesting ideas.

I have also been thinking about what makes a student decide to go to Delaware for grad school, there is a lot of bucolic beauty in Delaware and most of my classmates really enjoy the outdoors, a few of us have pets like dogs or cats that we love, and we were all really supportive and helpful of each other while each working very independently. I am

I am going to be sad to leave Delaware, I just went for a walk in Brandywine park, probably for the last time, and tonight I am going to the beach with my friend, Delawarian Josie Albert.  I love the trees here, the way it will slowly rain all day and how that makes staying inside and working seem really cozy and pleasant.

The end is in sight, by the end of August I will have completed all the coursework and evaluations needed for a M.S. in Art Conservation from the Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation (WUDPAC).

One of the final requirements is a portfolio showing the work I did over the past year while I was an intern at the Nasher Sculpture Center and the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.

Since portfolios are daunting tasks I want to share my table of contents so others who are creating a portfolio for grad school or for any other professional reason could check it out.  I encourage comments about what I have included.

 

 

Portfolio Contents

Prologue - Nasher Sculpture Center

Introduction to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art 

Treatments

Henry Moore Large Torso: Arch

Louise Nevelson End of Day: Nightscape IV

Persian ceramic bowl

Josef Hoffman Silver Creamer

Maintenance

Examinations

Research

Environmental Monitoring

Analysis of the rate of tarnish on silver in the presence of scavengers

Photography Guidelines

Outreach and Public Relations

Professional Development

References

Monthly Reports

 

My portfolio probably includes more outreach and PR than other students, and it is important to emphasize that everyone has a different portfolio depending on where they worked and their specialization.  It is possible to perform numerous small treatments throughout a year, but treating a sculpture that is 9 feet x 13 feet will take some time.

Good luck to all the students pulling together their work and all the best to the class of 2011 at all conservation programs.

Today has been a reflective one. Around a year ago I was leaving Delaware and driving across the country to go to an internship in Dallas and be at my younger sister’s wedding in Galveston, Texas. In the year since I have moved from Dallas to Kansas City and I married Daniel Cull in March.

Conservation graduate school is extremely stressful and competitive, and it feels like the emphasis is on travel to other countries or taking on huge scientific research projects. I was more interested in helping those entering the field and connecting to collections in need and it is hard to make that sound glamorous or exciting as it involves those that are already being neglected. But, I have accomplished great things in the past year and I am glad that I took a different path. I do fit into the international conservation community and I belong there.

In August, I will move to Phoenix, Arizona to begin working freelance in conservation. I am excited to actually be in the same city as my husband and to go to a region that has some great art but does not have a large conservation community. I wonder if I will always be searching for the neglected communities, projects, or art and if their recognition will be my biggest contribution to the field.

Onwards,

A little Rocky reference and Philly reference.

I am planning on attending the AIC 2011 annual meeting in Philadelphia. I am arriving on Monday evening and leaving on Sunday afternoon, I was really intrigued by the Research and Technical Studies lectures, I think I will probably attend many of those talks. I am also attending meetings for the committees I am involved with - the Emerging Conservation Professionals Network (ECPN) and the Committee for Sustainable Conservation Practice.

This year my funding for attending this meeting was provided by the George Stout Grant. I am very happy that my proposal for this meeting was funded because it will allow me to continue my studies in preventive conservation and environmental systems by attending the one-day workshop ‘Saving energy in HVAC for conservation environments’. I have been continuing to refine the research I began in 2009 at Winterthur on sustainability and I have edited the final report for publication in the preventive conservation working group at the ICOM-CC 16th Triennial Conference in Lisbon, Portugal. While the paper has been completed, I would like the lecture to have the most up to date information possible to facilitate discussions amongst the preventive conservators who are present at the meeting.

Tuesday evening I will be at the ECPN informational meeting, 5:30-6:30PM in meeting room 406 on the 4th floor of the hotel. We welcome all who are interested in learning more about ECPN.

Wednesday I am looking forward to seeing Thomas M. Edmondson and Nancy Heugh receive the Sheldon and Caroline Keck award for conservation training, this is a great year for Tom Edmondson, he won the rubber chicken award at the 2010 MRCG meeting and now the Keck award at AIC. I interviewed Tom for the FAIC oral history archives a few weeks ago and it was great to hear him speak about the importance of mentoring and why he believes it is the duty of established conservators to be mentors. Speaking of mentoring, there is still a need for mentors for the ECPN mentoring program, and applications are available online and I will have a stack with me at the annual meeting to recruit new mentors. Wednesday I am attending the RATS talks on Microclimates.

Thursday I am attending the joint ASG/RATS session in the morning, but the afternoon is currently open, I think WAG and EMG both look good and the NCPTT study of rust converters looks really interesting, but I wonder if I could make the trek back and forth in the afternoon to each of these talks. Friday evening is the ECPN happy hour and dinner, and if you are still in town (and even if you are not an emerging conservator) we would like you to drop by.

As with most of the annual meetings, there are many talks I would like to hear in many different sessions and I won’t have time to be in both places at once. Rachael Perkins Arenstein is recruiting bloggers to cover all sessions and I hope I will be able to get an overview of the lectures I cannot attend by reading the AIC blog.

See you in Philly!