The Culture24 site made it into the Sunday Times last weekend in their list of “The 10 best museum websites” – the list is global so we are in rather illustrious company – Louvre, Smithsonian, Rijks, Science Museum, National Archives etc
Looks like I missed a good event at the ICA yesterday with Charles Leadbeater talking with others about his new book/pamphlet for the British Council “Cloud Culture – the future of global cultural relations” (you can download it here).
Catch up with a short but succinct interview with Charlie here.
Read a blog posts about the day from Joanna Jacobs and an ‘Open Cloud Declaration’ from Charlie on the British Council thinktank ‘Counterpoint’.
Join in the debate at the BC here.
O parecer sobre as condições geológico-geotécnicas dos terrenos da Cordoaria Nacional (Lisboa) para onde se pretende transferir o Museu Nacional e Arqueologia já estão disponíveis. Este relatório pode ser descarregado no seguinte endereço:
http://www.mnarqueologia-ipmuseus.pt/
The relays that used to send the pips through telephone lines to the various commercial radio stations in Sydney. The stations are listed on the board at the back. Picture Powerhouse Museum.
Where do the hourly pips come from? Recently the topic was extensively discussed on Adam Spencer’s Breakfast program on ABC702. For many years the pips originated from Sydney Observatory. I can well remember that on a few occasions the pips were not sent (due most likely to a fault in the Telecom Australia, now Telstra, lines) and immediately the Observatory’s two phones were running hot with complaints from the radio stations.
First a few facts about the pips:
* They are also known as the six-dot signals and it is the last of the six pips that marks the hour.
* Broadcasting of the pips began in Australia in July 1940.
* The time indicated is based on UTC – Coordinated Universal Time. This time scale is based on the rotation of the Earth but it is adjusted by the occasional insertion of leap seconds to align the scale to that of atomic clocks.
The basement of Sydney Observatory in about 1982 showing part of the time signal system including the slave clock of Shortt No. 49 to the right of the old refrigerator. Picture Nick Lomb
In the late 1970s Sydney Observatory was providing the hourly signals to the commercial radio stations in Sydney. The ABC had its own separate source of time though it still received the signal from the Observatory as a comparison. The signals were generated by a Rubidium atomic clock and then separately to each station via a set of relays – one for each station – were on display together with the rest of . the time equipment in the Observatory’s basement. This was a most eerie place to go into late at night when there was no sound except that of the ticking of a whole host of clocks.
The face of the historic 1865 Frodsham astronomical regulator clock that was part of Sydney Observatory’s time signal system. Picture Nick Lomb.
The other clocks were part of two separate complex networks that provided back-ups in case of failure by the atomic clock. The two network both included Shortt pendulum clocks that were the most accurate mechanical clocks ever devised and kept time to about one hundredth of a second a day. They each consisted of a master and a slave clock. In the master clock a pendulum swung in vacuum and every 30 seconds controlled a slave clock in a separate room. It was the slave clock that had the dials and sent the electrical signals for the time.
An astronomer using Sydney Observatory’s transit circle telescope in the early 1900s. Powerhouse Museum picture.
Prior to the arrival of the atomic clock in about 1970 the Observatory astronomers regularly used the transit circle telescope to check time by the stars. Each star crosses or transits the meridian – the imaginary line passing from north to south and through the zenith – once a day. A transit telescope or a transit circle can only move along the meridian. With it an astronomer can accurately determine the time of transit of the star. For stars with known positions in the sky the time of transit indicates the correct time and any deviation from that time shown by a clock is a clock error.
The chronograph that recorded the times when astronomers observed a star crossing the meridian with the transit circle, pictured in about 1982. The drum rotated once a minute and a pen marked each second on a large piece of paper wrapped around the drum. The observed transit time was recorded as an extra mark. Picture Nick Lomb
Sydney Observatory stopped providing the time signals soon after it became part of the Powerhouse Museum in 1982. The atomic clock broke down after a lightning strike and the Museum decided not to spend the funds for its repair or replacement as the time service was felt to be inappropriate for the Observatory’s new role as a museum and a public observatory. I then contacted Telecom Australia and arranged for them to take over the role.
Let’s conclude with my favourite time signal story which took place some years ago. I was at a NYE party and the host put on the radio so that we would know the exact time of the New Year. The radio station was broadcasting not the pips but the telephone time – “On the third stroke the time will be …”. Well and good except that the station forgot to take off the usual seven second time delay mandatory when broadcasting a telephone conversation! So the New Year arrived seven seconds late for many Sydneysiders that year.
How on earth did I miss this? IMLS Discussion Guide to the Future of Museums and Libraries — It’s hard to believe I missed this, considering it features Omeka as a case study, but the The Future of Museums and Libraries: A Discussion Guide [.pdf] seems to have escaped my notice when it was originally released this summer. Intended to help sustain discussions originally started at the IMLS-sponsored Future of Libraries and Museums in the 21st Century Planning Meeting, which took place at the National Academy of Sciences in July 2008—I actually seem to remember the tweets from this meeting—it’s a handy outline of the main issues facing collecting institutions today and even has the makings of a syllabus for a decent graduate seminar.
I think that this will be a short post tonight. I had a day bookended with meetings and a bunch of tending to details jammed in the middle so I am probably not at my writerly best this evening. The fact that I have been blindly staring at the screen for the last five minutes would seem to confirm this. At least I am not drooling... much.
Heather Vaughan, of the dress studies blog Worn Through, interviewed our very own Christina Johnson about the process of moving our collection into compact storage. This was a HUGE project that took place over several months in 2008. You can read Christina's account of the move and see before/after photos of our storage facilities here.
Photo by Torcello Trio
So, I’m not entirely certain what criteria was used to compile this list, but Juxtapoz Magazine has their Top 100 Galleries/Museums. To be accurate, it should be the Top 100 Contemporary Art Galleries/Museums, but it probably goes unsaid given who compiled the list.
Looking through the selections, it seems California-heavy, with at least 40 of the 100 ranked spaces calling the Golden State home. There are some big names on the list including The Louvre (#21), The Museum of Contemporary Art in New York (#12), Boston’s Institute of Contemporary Art (#72), and the leaders of the pack SFMOMA (#1) and the Guggenheim (#2) However, it is the small spaces, stores, and galleries around the world that are pushing the creativity envelope that dominate the list.
Some standouts include…
#39: Black Rat Press (London, UK)
#57: Reina Sofia (Madrid, Spain)
#69: Monster Children Gallery (Sydney, Australia)
#95: Contemporary Arts Center (Cincinnati, Ohio)
#86: Museum of Contemporary Art (Detroit, Michigan)
#66: Galeria Animal (Santiago, Chile)
#40: MOCA (Shanghai, China)
#16: Show and Tell Gallery (Toronto, Canada)
What do you think of Juxtapoz’s list? Agree/Disagree? What’s your number one?
The ExhibitFiles Website is a community site for exhibit designers and developers. Almost three years ago now, Ideum worked with the Association of Science -Technology Centers and Independent Exhibitions to help design and develop the site. Created with funding from the National Science Foundation, the purpose of the site is share design practices and provide access to resources that can improve exhibit design. Last week, we launched a new feature called “Bits,” which best described on the ExhibitFiles site itself:
A Bit is an individual media element that you share with your peers. It might be a photo you take of an inspiring exhibit element or design approach, or it could be a prototype you’d like people to comment on — anything you can illustrate with a photo, video, or audio file. You can also just post a question if you’re looking for help from others.
Along with support for uploaded files, you can embed flickr photos or YouTube videos. We will be adding support for PDF documents and audio files in coming weeks. The custom-developed Bits feature and the site itself was developed using Ruby on Rails.
You can try it out at: www.exhibitfiles.org/bits.
There’s more on the Bits launch on the ExhibitFiles blog and Paul Orselli’s ExhibiTrick blog. You can learn more about the ExhibitFiles site development in the Ideum portfolio (A custom-built community site for exhibit developers).
Self-Portrait with a Black Eye, Lucian Freud. Estimate: Image via Sotheby’s
Sotheby’s auction house will kick off this week’s major round of contemporary sales in New York with an 80 lot sale that is expected to realize in excess of £32 million on Wednesday, February 10. Christie’s expect to fetch at least £26,290,000 from 52 lots at their evening sale on Thursday, February 11. In November, Sotheby’s Postwar and Contemporary Sale in New York marked a major turning point in art market history when Andy Warhol’s 200 One Dollar Bills, sold for $43,762,500 over an estimate of $8-12million. The coming week could therefore be seen as an important one in establishing price-levels in a still relatively undetermined contemporary art market – the area most heavily effected by the global recession. The many heavyweight pieces on offer this week undoubtedly reflect a confidence in sellers resulting from November’s impressive sale – the sales are spearheaded by important and rare works by Peter Doig, Yves Klein, Lucian Freud, Gerhard Richter, Chris Ofili, Neo Rauch and Martin Kippenberger. Contemporary week also falls in the wake of the incredible $104.3 million sale of Giacometti’s “L’homme qui marche I” (The Striding Man I) at Sotheby’s that set a new world record by becoming the most expensive work of art ever sold at auction. This week overall, Sotheby’s and Christie’s expect to bring in at least $365.3 million combined, $144.6 million in 2009, up from $332.5 million in February 2008.
More text, images and related links after the jump….
Relief éponge (RE47II), Yves Klein Estimate: £5 -£7 million. Image via Christie’s
Sotheby’s star lot is a recently rediscovered self-portrait by the celebrated British artist Lucian Freud. Self-Portrait with a Black Eye was painted in 1978 following an altercation between Freud and a taxi driver – with characteristic eccentricity, Freud ignored the pain and inconvenience from a punch in the face and retreated to his studio to immediately create a work using the circumstance as inspiration. The image has remained in a private European collection for the past 30 years and is expected to fetch between £3-4 million. Discussing the self-portrait, Sotheby’s Senior Director and Senior International Specialist in Contemporary Art, Oliver Barker, said: “The sale of this remarkable rediscovery, which exhibits all the psychological intensity and painterly virtuosity of Freud’s most celebrated works, represents only the third time a self-portrait by the artist has ever appeared at auction.” The last self-portrait by Freud to be offered at auction was in 2005 at Sotheby’s Contemporary sale in London – Man with a Feather (self-portrait) sold for £3.7 million – the record for a self-portrait for the artist.
Self-Portrait with a Black Eye headlines a group of five important works by the artist in the auction that have come from the same collection – the sale conveniently coincides with the Retrospective of Freud’s work at the Pompidou Centre in Paris.
Madonna 1, Andreas Gursky. Estimate: £900,000 to 1.3 million. Image via Sotheby’s
Another work on offer at Sotheby’s Contemporary sale is a nine-foot tall, Andreas Gursky photograph of a Madonna concert taken – the photograph was a gift to the singer from the artist himself and is inscribed “For Madonna” on the reverse side – the pre-sale estimate is £900,000 to 1.3 million. While Sotheby’s have not disclosed the name of the present seller, who has had possession of the picture since 2005, Lindsay Pollock speculated whether it could be the singer’s ex-husband Guy Ritchie.
Saint Anton (Flat Light), Peter Doig. Estimate: £2-3 million. Image via Sotheby’s
Another highlight of Wednesday’s sale at Sotheby’s is Peter Doig’s Saint Anton (Flat Light) that is expected to fetch at least £2 million. In 2009, Christie’s realized three of the four highest ever prices for works by Peter Doig. Along with Sotheby’s offering, Christie’s will offer another important painting – Concrete Cabin West Side – inspired by a building in northeast France designed by Le Corbusier, the large-scale canvas is estimated to realize £2 million to £3 million.
Christie’s sale is highlighted by an important group of works from the early 1960s which are united by their expression of art during the Space Age – arguably the most influential period of Post-War history. The work that dominates the sale is the masterpiece Relief éponge (RE47II), one of only two gold sponge reliefs ever created by Yves Klein. The painting was acquired by the present owner in 1980 directly from the collection of Francois de Menil, the son of Dominique and Jean, the celebrated collectors, philanthropists and founders of the museum in Houston of the same name. It is expected to realize between £5-7 million.
Anthropométrie (ANT 5), Yves Klein. Estimate: £1.5 – £2 million. Image via Christie’s
The second Klein on offer is the largest of only six works from his Anthropométries series to incorporate a mixture of fire and blue pigment. The Anthropométries series which saw Klein attempt to become one with the immaterial realm through the practice of levitation or, as he famously referred to it, ‘Leaping into the Void.’ Klein sprayed paint around the contours of the model’s body leaving a shadow-like image, with fire from a Bunsen burner leaving golden patterns on the paper ground.
Related Links:
Christie’s Post-War & Contemporary E-Catalogue
Sotheby’s Contemporary Art Evening Auction E-Catalogue
London Sales Preview [ArtInfo]
Freud Shiner Expected to Earn Millions are Sotheby’s [ArtInfo]
An Art Market Suddenly at Dizzy Heights [NY Times]
Lucian Freud’s black-eyed portrait up for sale [BBC News]
Black-Eyed Freud Boosts $104 million sale [Bloomberg]
Lucien Freud’s black eye portrait to fetch $4 million [Times Online]
Gursky’s gift to Madonna hits auction block [Lindsay Pollock]
In the spirit of Iron Chef, the eliminator on American Gladiators, ultimate showdown, and the winter Olympics ice skating competition, Marcus and I decided to finally settle question of which one of us owns the anti-gravity mirror exhibit now and forever. With all due respect to the dude with the stache and the mini-fro in the “Palace of Delights” documentary (considered to be the Dr. J of mirror battles), a new generation of performers has entered the Exploratorium explainer program. So continuing the analogy and channeling the spirit of Micheal Jordan vs. Dominique Wilkins, we present the video of this epic battle.
The only question is after the dust has settled, who takes home the coveted trophy and bragging rights for eternity? Some questions have answers and others simply exist to be debated by philosophers throughout the annals of time.
INTERNSHIPS SUMMER 2010: June 7 - August 13
Museum of the Moving Image offers full-time, paid summer internships. Under the supervision of department heads, interns have the opportunity to learn about the full range of Museum operations and to work on projects related to the fall 2010 opening of the Museum's renovated and expanded facility. Undergraduates entering their senior year in fall 2010, college graduates, and graduate students are eligible to apply.
Internships are offered in the following areas:
We've got our game faces on!
Hard to believe it’s only a few days until the 2010 Olympic Winter Games descend on Vancouver; more than 350,000 visitors are expected to visit Vancouver and Whistler over the two-and-a-half weeks of the games. You can’t imagine how much we want to see some of those folks come through our doors…
The only problem? We’re not exactly rich, so we don’t have a million-dollar marketing budget. Buying advertising during the Olympics? Not unless you’ve got a sizable pile of cash. Guerrilla advertising? Risky, to say the least, since the rules are (understandably) super-strict for events like this. Do nothing? Seems foolish when so many people are coming to town.
Swiss House, German House, and... Big House?
So, what *is* our Games-time strategy? We can’t pay for advertising, but thankfully nothing beats word-of-mouth. We hope that our friends, both online and offline, will help us spread the word that we’re open, we’re worth visiting, and we’re up to interesting things during the Olympics.
We are offering our popular Sins of the City tour every day during the Games; we’re also extending our hours by staying open on Sundays. Some have even suggested that we re-brand ourselves as the “Big House” for the Olympics. (Not so sure about that idea… but if you want to get your mugshot taken here, we’d be happy to oblige!).
So, to put it as plainly as we can, we need your help.
Not for you. (But you can have a great t-shirt!)
Do you have a great idea on how we can promote ourselves or our walking tour over the next few weeks? Do you know someone (who knows someone) who’s profoundly influential and willing to let people know we exist? Can we put our logo on the side of your poodle? If so, or if you have a better idea, post them in the comments below or send us an email at chris@vancouverpolicemuseum.ca. We’ve got a stack of “Sinner” shirts looking for new homes, and we’re happy to pay (in apparel, not in cash… although $1.2 million looks appealing, doesn’t it?) for your great ideas.
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