I technically started at CAM, or, Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, a bit before the May Project officially began, by volunteering for their annual gala. Which is an unbelievably formal occasion for wealthy people to mingle and eat and then donate money to the museum. Apparently this year’s was their most successful fundraising event ever. My job at first was to stand in gallery A and help the guests figure out how to use the iPads for the silent auction and to make sure no one was touching the paintings. The first half was a bit uneventful, but the people watching made it worth it. There was one woman in an oversized, historically accurate Victorian ball gown, apparently she owns the World Chess Hall of Fame. It was a little tough persuading people to go to their seats for dinner, but once we’d herded them all to their places I was able to eat in the break room upstairs. When we came back down, we were supposed to hand out information to the people who chose to donate in their live auction, but no one at the table I was assigned to wanted to donate anything. After that, they had a DJ, and I talked with some other visitors’ services representatives in the corner. I ran into some of my mom’s friends there, as well as Ms. Gershman. We started breaking down tables and stacking chairs a bit before it officially ended, and we stayed there cleaning up until just before midnight. It was tiring, and the museum wasn’t functioning the way it usually does, but it was still a fun way to be introduced to CAM.
On my first official day at CAM my sponsor, Carianne, didn’t really have much for me to do. I arrived in the middle of one of the employee’s birthday party. They had brownies and I talked with a huge group of the staff for a while. They were all still recovering from the gala, which is why I think Carianne didn’t have a plan for me. At one point she gave me another tour of the building, she’d given me two before. And for a while I just followed her around. After about an hour she realized she had a meeting that she’d forgotten about, so she quickly hand edited the summer event calendar and had me edit it for her when she was gone. It wasn’t necessarily the most thrilling first day, deleting commas and finding “more specific links,” but I wasn’t bored. Everyone seemed nice and interesting, there are lots of people there with purple hair and nose rings.
My second real day was much better than the first. Carianne put me and Victoria, another VSA, in charge of organizing the library. Which sounds fairly mundane, but it was something to accomplish, and I could feel like I was much more useful than I did the day before. We organized the books by genre and stacked them back into the shelves. Then, we had to stamp several new books and add them into their system. The stamp was fine, but did not work perfectly, which really seemed to bother Carianne. So we spent a while trying to figure out how to make it better, nothing really worked. It also took awhile for the ink to dry on some of the books. Of course, all of the books they have at CAM are unbelievably interesting, artist biographies or gallery catalogues, so they were fun to flip through. And Victoria was nice.
I should have mentioned earlier that CAM was closed for installation until May 9, and so for the first two weeks that I was there I was able to meet the three artists as they prepared for the summer exhibitions. CAM is a non-collecting institution, which means that everything they exhibit will be rotated out after a three and a half month time frame. The artists in the main galleries for the summer exhibitions, (which are free to the public all summer thanks to the Gateway Foundation, so everyone should go see them!), are the winners of the Great Rivers Biennial. So they’re all Saint Louis based artists who all won a $20,000 grant to produce work specifically for this exhibition. And they’re all really interesting. Brandon Anschultz is in Gallery A, he does these really weird, sculptural pieces that he makes by dipping objects in paint over and over again. Which, he told me, he liked because it allowed paint to transcend the two dimensional, and show its versatility. His whole show is about concealing and revealing, and all of his pieces are odd, geode like structures displayed in these weird geometric stands. I really enjoy it. In Gallery B, Carlie Trosclair did an on-sight installation. She does lots of work with abandoned buildings, and in this show she decided to show what CAM would be like if it had an architectural history. So she build this giant, deteriorating wall in the middle of the gallery. She was driving around on a forklift detailing it for weeks. And on another wall, she installed a torn wallpaper pattern sort of thing, I’m not sure what to call it. Cayce Zavaglia’s work is in Gallery C. She does embroidered portraits, which are amazingly detailed and photorealistic, apparently it takes her a year to make each of them. Recently she’s grown really fascinated in the backs of embroidered pieces, which are much messier and more chaotic, and she’s produced several large paintings emulating the back of an embroidered face, which we also have on display. There’s also the front room exhibition, which rotates twice as quickly as the main spaces, and right now CAM is showing Brenna Youngblood’s work. She’s a painter, but also uses mixed media. The performance space is also showing some posters by Katarina Fristch, but I personally think the most impressive work is in the main galleries, and I honestly cannot decide which of the three Great Rivers artists I like the best.
The third day there was fun as well. Carianne had Victoria, Abby (another VSA), and I labeling the merchandise for the gift shop and stocking it. I also had to receive all of the items into their inventory. The giftshop was empty, and a little dirty. They had used it as a photo booth during the gala. Well, it wasn’t a photo booth. They had stocked all the shelves with props and had a camera that would film you for about fifteen seconds, then the video would be converted into a series of still images and printed out into a flipbook. Which is really awesome, I did one of them with Bailey, another VSA that I met at the gala. Lots of people were standing on the white bench for their flipbooks, so the whole thing was coated in footprints, which Carianne hated. Anyway, we started to stock the shelves. At that point all we had were some kids books, kids toys, and honey. But it was time consuming.
Hanna, Thanks for getting us started on our Blog. Your May Project sounds great. Interesting events, people and art. Carianne sounds intense! Thanks for the great pics, you are inspiring me to get to the CAM this summer.
I wouldn't necessarily call Carianne intense. She's a very relaxed, friendly person, but she can be a little calmly perfectionistic when it comes to organizational things. And yes, you should definitely stop by!
The second week was much more exciting than the first. On Wednesday when I arrived the shop had transformed. All of the merchandise had arrived, half of the shelves were fully stocked, the footprints were gone. It was crazy. Judy, their buyer, was there that day, as well as Bailey, and we spent the day organizing the shop. They are selling these hanging air plant holders, and my job was to find a way to hang them in a way that looked interesting. So I took some magnetic hooks and clamped them underneath the stairs outside the shop, then I tied the holders to them. And obviously I helped with the rest of it all as well, but since everyone has been buying the plant holders since we’ve opened, it’s what I’m most proud of. Judy also bought a bunch of air plants to put into the holders. I was having a good time, and then suddenly about forty people from the American Museum Association show up in coat and tie and formal dresses, and Carianne told me to greet them and hand out flyers. I had no idea anything important would be happening that day, so I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt, and several of these people were clearly offended by that. I also, at the time, had not learned all of the artist’s names. So when one of the women asked me about the one of the paintings in the front room I had no idea what to say to her. When they left I returned to the shop, and the rest of the day went by easily.
That Thursday Carianne was out, and I spent the day steaming the wrinkles out of the aprons on display in the shop, which took awhile since they’re made with a very thick canvas material. I also dusted and cleaned the rest of the shop again. Once Carianne came back I helped clean the whole gallery for the opening the next day. I washed all the windows and cleaned their stainless steal window frames before leaving.
Friday was the gallery opening. Before people arrived I helped clean and organize the galleries some more. And when it was open, my job was to greet and count the visitors. I stood at the front door for three hours, and I told everyone who came in where to sign in as a member. And a lot of people were annoyed with me, because they thought I was trying to guilt them into becoming members, but I was just doing what I was told to do. I’m sure the event was much more exciting for the guests than it was for me, and I wouldn’t call it boring necessarily. But it was tiring and a bit mundane. I was glad to go home. Though 766 people came, which is apparently a much greater turnout than usual.
My schedule changed for the last week that I was there, but Carianne didn’t remember until that morning. She called me right before a big group of CAM staff were about to leave and volunteer at Food Outreach, who they’re partnering with for a project this summer, and said I could go with them if I could be there by 10. I couldn’t, so I ended up spending the day at the front desk with Victoria and some other VSA’s. When people came in I told them about the exhibitions. Despite the rain, it wasn’t a slow day. One old German man came in, and after he walked through he told me all about how he’s traveling route 66 for his 66th birthday. I spent 7 hours there that day, and he was definitely a highlight. When Carianne returned she mentioned that one of the senior staff had seen a kid touch a painting at the opening, and that there was “no VSA in sight,” so I figured out how to go back in the security footage and see what happened. The kid didn’t touch the painting, and a VSA was in the middle of telling her to be careful when the senior staff came and yelled at the kid and scared her away. So that was exciting.
I technically started at CAM, or, Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, a bit before the May Project officially began, by volunteering for their annual gala. Which is an unbelievably formal occasion for wealthy people to mingle and eat and then donate money to the museum. Apparently this year’s was their most successful fundraising event ever. My job at first was to stand in gallery A and help the guests figure out how to use the iPads for the silent auction and to make sure no one was touching the paintings. The first half was a bit uneventful, but the people watching made it worth it. There was one woman in an oversized, historically accurate Victorian ball gown, apparently she owns the World Chess Hall of Fame. It was a little tough persuading people to go to their seats for dinner, but once we’d herded them all to their places I was able to eat in the break room upstairs. When we came back down, we were supposed to hand out information to the people who chose to donate in their live auction, but no one at the table I was assigned to wanted to donate anything. After that, they had a DJ, and I talked with some other visitors’ services representatives in the corner. I ran into some of my mom’s friends there, as well as Ms. Gershman. We started breaking down tables and stacking chairs a bit before it officially ended, and we stayed there cleaning up until just before midnight. It was tiring, and the museum wasn’t functioning the way it usually does, but it was still a fun way to be introduced to CAM.
ReplyDeleteOn my first official day at CAM my sponsor, Carianne, didn’t really have much for me to do. I arrived in the middle of one of the employee’s birthday party. They had brownies and I talked with a huge group of the staff for a while. They were all still recovering from the gala, which is why I think Carianne didn’t have a plan for me. At one point she gave me another tour of the building, she’d given me two before. And for a while I just followed her around. After about an hour she realized she had a meeting that she’d forgotten about, so she quickly hand edited the summer event calendar and had me edit it for her when she was gone. It wasn’t necessarily the most thrilling first day, deleting commas and finding “more specific links,” but I wasn’t bored. Everyone seemed nice and interesting, there are lots of people there with purple hair and nose rings.
ReplyDeleteMy second real day was much better than the first. Carianne put me and Victoria, another VSA, in charge of organizing the library. Which sounds fairly mundane, but it was something to accomplish, and I could feel like I was much more useful than I did the day before. We organized the books by genre and stacked them back into the shelves. Then, we had to stamp several new books and add them into their system. The stamp was fine, but did not work perfectly, which really seemed to bother Carianne. So we spent a while trying to figure out how to make it better, nothing really worked. It also took awhile for the ink to dry on some of the books. Of course, all of the books they have at CAM are unbelievably interesting, artist biographies or gallery catalogues, so they were fun to flip through. And Victoria was nice.
ReplyDeleteI should have mentioned earlier that CAM was closed for installation until May 9, and so for the first two weeks that I was there I was able to meet the three artists as they prepared for the summer exhibitions. CAM is a non-collecting institution, which means that everything they exhibit will be rotated out after a three and a half month time frame. The artists in the main galleries for the summer exhibitions, (which are free to the public all summer thanks to the Gateway Foundation, so everyone should go see them!), are the winners of the Great Rivers Biennial. So they’re all Saint Louis based artists who all won a $20,000 grant to produce work specifically for this exhibition. And they’re all really interesting. Brandon Anschultz is in Gallery A, he does these really weird, sculptural pieces that he makes by dipping objects in paint over and over again. Which, he told me, he liked because it allowed paint to transcend the two dimensional, and show its versatility. His whole show is about concealing and revealing, and all of his pieces are odd, geode like structures displayed in these weird geometric stands. I really enjoy it. In Gallery B, Carlie Trosclair did an on-sight installation. She does lots of work with abandoned buildings, and in this show she decided to show what CAM would be like if it had an architectural history. So she build this giant, deteriorating wall in the middle of the gallery. She was driving around on a forklift detailing it for weeks. And on another wall, she installed a torn wallpaper pattern sort of thing, I’m not sure what to call it. Cayce Zavaglia’s work is in Gallery C. She does embroidered portraits, which are amazingly detailed and photorealistic, apparently it takes her a year to make each of them. Recently she’s grown really fascinated in the backs of embroidered pieces, which are much messier and more chaotic, and she’s produced several large paintings emulating the back of an embroidered face, which we also have on display. There’s also the front room exhibition, which rotates twice as quickly as the main spaces, and right now CAM is showing Brenna Youngblood’s work. She’s a painter, but also uses mixed media. The performance space is also showing some posters by Katarina Fristch, but I personally think the most impressive work is in the main galleries, and I honestly cannot decide which of the three Great Rivers artists I like the best.
ReplyDeleteThe third day there was fun as well. Carianne had Victoria, Abby (another VSA), and I labeling the merchandise for the gift shop and stocking it. I also had to receive all of the items into their inventory. The giftshop was empty, and a little dirty. They had used it as a photo booth during the gala. Well, it wasn’t a photo booth. They had stocked all the shelves with props and had a camera that would film you for about fifteen seconds, then the video would be converted into a series of still images and printed out into a flipbook. Which is really awesome, I did one of them with Bailey, another VSA that I met at the gala. Lots of people were standing on the white bench for their flipbooks, so the whole thing was coated in footprints, which Carianne hated. Anyway, we started to stock the shelves. At that point all we had were some kids books, kids toys, and honey. But it was time consuming.
ReplyDeleteHanna,
ReplyDeleteThanks for getting us started on our Blog. Your May Project sounds great. Interesting events, people and art. Carianne sounds intense! Thanks for the great pics, you are inspiring me to get to the CAM this summer.
I wouldn't necessarily call Carianne intense. She's a very relaxed, friendly person, but she can be a little calmly perfectionistic when it comes to organizational things. And yes, you should definitely stop by!
ReplyDeleteThe second week was much more exciting than the first. On Wednesday when I arrived the shop had transformed. All of the merchandise had arrived, half of the shelves were fully stocked, the footprints were gone. It was crazy. Judy, their buyer, was there that day, as well as Bailey, and we spent the day organizing the shop. They are selling these hanging air plant holders, and my job was to find a way to hang them in a way that looked interesting. So I took some magnetic hooks and clamped them underneath the stairs outside the shop, then I tied the holders to them. And obviously I helped with the rest of it all as well, but since everyone has been buying the plant holders since we’ve opened, it’s what I’m most proud of. Judy also bought a bunch of air plants to put into the holders. I was having a good time, and then suddenly about forty people from the American Museum Association show up in coat and tie and formal dresses, and Carianne told me to greet them and hand out flyers. I had no idea anything important would be happening that day, so I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt, and several of these people were clearly offended by that. I also, at the time, had not learned all of the artist’s names. So when one of the women asked me about the one of the paintings in the front room I had no idea what to say to her. When they left I returned to the shop, and the rest of the day went by easily.
ReplyDeleteThat Thursday Carianne was out, and I spent the day steaming the wrinkles out of the aprons on display in the shop, which took awhile since they’re made with a very thick canvas material. I also dusted and cleaned the rest of the shop again. Once Carianne came back I helped clean the whole gallery for the opening the next day. I washed all the windows and cleaned their stainless steal window frames before leaving.
ReplyDeleteFriday was the gallery opening. Before people arrived I helped clean and organize the galleries some more. And when it was open, my job was to greet and count the visitors. I stood at the front door for three hours, and I told everyone who came in where to sign in as a member. And a lot of people were annoyed with me, because they thought I was trying to guilt them into becoming members, but I was just doing what I was told to do. I’m sure the event was much more exciting for the guests than it was for me, and I wouldn’t call it boring necessarily. But it was tiring and a bit mundane. I was glad to go home. Though 766 people came, which is apparently a much greater turnout than usual.
ReplyDeleteMy schedule changed for the last week that I was there, but Carianne didn’t remember until that morning. She called me right before a big group of CAM staff were about to leave and volunteer at Food Outreach, who they’re partnering with for a project this summer, and said I could go with them if I could be there by 10. I couldn’t, so I ended up spending the day at the front desk with Victoria and some other VSA’s. When people came in I told them about the exhibitions. Despite the rain, it wasn’t a slow day. One old German man came in, and after he walked through he told me all about how he’s traveling route 66 for his 66th birthday. I spent 7 hours there that day, and he was definitely a highlight. When Carianne returned she mentioned that one of the senior staff had seen a kid touch a painting at the opening, and that there was “no VSA in sight,” so I figured out how to go back in the security footage and see what happened. The kid didn’t touch the painting, and a VSA was in the middle of telling her to be careful when the senior staff came and yelled at the kid and scared her away. So that was exciting.
ReplyDeleteSo cool that you've got to do so many different things around CAM
ReplyDelete