Autry Museums

The museum represents the distinct way in which many of these artist were uplifted due to the ideas set forth by Ortiz. He was able to set out to gather a community in which people would feel proud and inspired by their cultural background. The main purpose of the museum was to promote a sense of identity and give the Latino community a way to promote their culture. The museum would eventually bring together the community and inform others of their prominent role in society. Also, it would help empower the Latino community, as the museum would voice their opinions through the artworks shown. El Museo is a representation of the cultural history and the way that people were able to establish a foundation of cultural unity. The positive impact that the museum had on the community was forced upon the people as they realized how important the culture was, as the community began to crumble. El Museo served as a way to preserve the culture and enforce the voices of the Latinos for future generations. (Hackshaw,

The museum believes in a pastiche and populist pathway, in which the history of all people is displayed. Its interactive viewpoint allows this museum to convey history in a way that would be more accessible to its audience. For example, patrons are given the opportunity to record their own history. However, academics, such as Keith Windschuttle, assert that the NMA is a “profound intellectual waste”. He argues that although it displays accurate history, it’s purpose of entertaining its audience detracts from its value, thus creating “waste”. Although Windschuttle’s view may be extreme, it demonstrates the considerable extent to which the tension between academic and popular historians exist.

By including African-American women at the Louvre, Ringgold comments on the absence of both female and African-American artworks at the museum. The prejudice that

“This world is but a canvas to our imagination”; which always has been throughout the years. Art has been separated in different categories such as architectures, sculptures, photography and paintings. For my semester project, which was to visit an art or historic museum; my classmates and I went to the Reynolda House Museum of American art which provided us both the art and history. At first, we all assume that the visit would be boring or the art gallery would be dull. What shocked us the most was the actual experience being in the museum instead of just talking about it. We experienced multiple feelings during our visit in the art gallery as well as the historic area. From the art gallery which held many paintings of artist, to the house that R.J Reynolds and his family once occupied. Furthermore, it also showed us the legacy of R.J Reynolds and his family has left behind for the people of Winston-Salem.

One of those negatives is that the museum is misunderstood, so they have very few visitors. This is bad because the museum cannot present their works of art to anybody. Few people know about the museum, and the people who do know think it’s boring. This is because often people have the stereotype that only traditional people can go to museums. However, by creating advertisements, and by raising money for the art curator so that they can pick art that is more interesting for the neighborhood, people will be attracted to the museum. Also, as a student, my advice is that they need to make the museum more visible because before I did not know that there was a museum in Manhattan that represented the Hispanic culture. However, now that I am doing this work about the museum I have realized that the Hispanic Society of America is very interesting and an incredible museum to know, and because of that, we have to do campaigns and field trips to make the museum more

Fred Wilson is an art activist for minority groups, especially the African American population, which in today`s generation, is looked upon as the unseen minority group (Grinberg 2012). Wilson creates innovative exhibitions to display art and artifacts found in museum collections with arrangements that represent minority contemporary artists. His ideas lead the audience to acknowledge that changes in the perceptive view transform the whole meaning of what is presented.

I walked up the stairs from the cool basement and stood outside for five minutes in the humid Savannah air to clear my mind from becoming unnecessarily emotional about something that happened long ago. It’s not that I refused to transcribe the names or desire to keep this part of my family history hidden. My mind struggled to see history from an objective point of view since this document revealed the sins of my ancestors. America’s Human rights issues were no longer ingrained in my mind as something that occurred in the past. History became personal. I had to remind myself that I am not Willie Martin, Roswell King Jr., or John Maxwell. If investigations were made further on the family tree of humankind, one would ultimately find themselves to be descendants of the oppressed and the oppressor.

Exhibitions should represent a democratic view of art; “Exhibitions are the material speech of what is essentially a political institution, one with legal and ethical responsibilities” (Greenberg, Reesa, Bruce W. Ferguson, and Sandy Nairne 1996, pg.182). The way in which we appreciate art is primarily determined through the context of the exhibition. Because of this museums and art galleries should ensure that they have a democratically elected leadership charged with upholding this responsibility of

History and culture has for a long time been preserved in places such as museums which allow different people learn from past events thereby, allowing them to have a better understanding of that particular culture. Many countries around the globe ensure that the preservation of their culture and heritage is protect thereby creating places such as museums for that purpose. One of those museums is the Japanese American National Museums which showcases their history and culture and how all this has shaped its peoples history.

The film validates the new information that is slowly working its way into the fabric of the world’s view of the Underground Railroad and the Black struggle for freedom. Unlike all other ethnic groups, Black people were betrayed by both their homeland and America. Most came to America unwillingly, and those that came here free were kidnapped into bondage. Black people dimensioned to the lowest class, only because of the darkness of their skin. Even in the rhetoric of class distinction, one truth always comes to light and that is the power of their spirit. No longer are Black children denied the truth of their history. The long awaited National Museum of African American History and Culture due to open in 2016 was created from a 2003 Act

In the U.S. South, selective remembrance often produces a romanticized and glorified image of plantation sites that consequently silence and ostracize enslaved community members’ stories, memories, and experiences. Within broader U.S. political and ideological contexts and worldviews, White elites dominate the perceptions and valuations of heritage circulating on plantation museum sites, especially with regard to African American identities and histories. Docents and interpreters at plantation museums tell narratives that in particular typically abridge the negativity of slavery with “noble tales describing the lives of the plantation owners and the architectural intricacies of their homes” (Buzinde & Santos, 2009, p. 439). The absence and

Subsequently, Americans borrowed this European form of the gallery but gave them a distinct American meaning. Conveying concerns about a deteriorating society the The New York Times wrote in 1889, “The great foreign population, largely uneducated, has so upset municipal politics that it is hard for an American of education to be firmly friendly to the civic majority” (Duncan, 1995, p. 56). This statement reveals the notion that the poor and the foreign required civilizing and thus formed the basis for the next phase of museum development. Accordingly, as the number of museums and public access to them increased throughout the 20th century, curators used an orderly display of objects to create a worldly interest and a respect for authority from

If not for the people, the museum would be only a building full of objects without meaning and without importance. From the very young to the old, men, women, any person imaginable can be seen viewing and appreciating the art and enjoying the experience. Many can be seen with quizzical looks when viewing different pieces. It can be assumed that many of these looks can either be attributed to the strangeness of what is being viewed, or perhaps because it is difficult to understand why some of the things shown were made in the first place.

Once the visitors have ventured through one exhibit they are then directed to next culturally diverse exhibit. Like most ritual space, museum space is carefully marked off culturally designed as reserved for a special quality of attention in this case of contemplating and learning (Duncan, p. 425). Visitors can enter the Western American Art, which takes the visitors on a different cultural journey of enlightenment. One would see, the magnificence behind the objects and paintings in the exhibit to realize that the works are art are here for their sheer thought provoking beauty. If art objects are most properly used when contemplated as art, then the museum is the most proper setting for them, since it makes them useless for any other purpose

Ang argues that cultural diversity is “a predicament for the museum: engaging with it is a task and a responsibility as crucial as much as it is irresolvable” (Ang, p. 319). She states that the goal of creating a truly ethnic and culturally diverse area in which to display art may be outside of the ability for museums currently. The negative responses from art critics is representative of the dichotomy perceived by them between those of social class and those that are not. As Horace Miner (1956) relates in his article, Body Ritual Among the Nacirema, the cultures and practices of the western world are irrational, prone to strange behaviors due to the ideals that those with resources force upon the general populace. In the case of Ang’s article, the extremely odd practice of displaying a visual art form in a visually sterile environment, characterized by white or blank walls that surround the artwork, is characteristic of a strange behavior that can only be explained through what a society values, which in this case, is art merely for the sake of art. Due to the very nature of how the Western world views art, the functional aspect of an object, which in this case would be religious in nature, though it