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From Current Subscribers
Andrea Frank, Boston College*
Anne Whitelaw, University of Alberta*
Henry Pisciotta, Penn State University
Joyce Kubiski, Western Michigan University*
Sheryl Wilhite, Wellesley College*
Wendy Holden, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Christina Updike, James Madison University
*Testbed participants
From Prospective Subscribers
Mishoe Brenneche, University of the South
Christine Stuart, University of California, San Diego
Vickie O'Riordan, University of California, San Diego
Maureen Lasko, University of Chicago
Kathleen Schulz, Raritan Valley Community College (N.J.)
Ann Tsubota, Raritan Valley Community College (N.J.)
Lucy Bowditch, The College of St. Rose
Keith Dills, Cal Poly State University
From Current Members
Sarah Hezel, Albright-Knox Art Gallery
Kathy Walsh-Piper, Dallas Museum of Art
From Prospective Members
John Hagood, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
From Distributors and others
Ricky Erway, RLG
Nancy Harm, Luna Imaging
Robert Panzer, VAGA
Anita Klesch, UK PhD student
Jennifer Trant introduced herself, Peter Walsh, and
Kelly Richmond; then, she asked for introductions around the room to
determine who was in attendance. J Trant stressed that this was going
to be an informal meeting, that it was NOT intended to be a presentation,
but rather an exchange of thoughts and ideas amongst colleagues.
J Trant then explained how P Walsh has been contracted
to look at the types of schools that subscribe to The AMICO Library,
the sorts of art history curriculum these schools teach, and the content
in The AMICO Library.
P Walsh briefly summarized his analysis, discussing
how he determined that certain holdings in The AMICO Library, due to
their particular depth and breadth, could be useful in the particular
areas of art historical study, specifically 19th c. European paintings
and European Old Master prints, history of American art, and history
of photography.
He went on to discuss how the second phase of his contract
with AMICO was to then create sample assignments in these areas of strength
for The AMICO Library. (Handouts had been provided to the entire group
of an example of such assignments.) P Walsh discussed how he tried to
create assignments that used traditional "compare and contrast"
paradigms, as well as more creative approaches that are available to
users of an online database like The AMICO Library, such as an auction
metaphor, in which students are to make recommendations about what to
purchase and why -- helps students think of how works fit into a broader
museum collection, address issues of authenticity and connoisseurship,
and an exhibition metaphor where students are asked to express a theme
derived from famous quotations through the curation and selection of
works for an exhibit.
He explained that much of the approach was aimed at
thinking of The AMICO Library not as a slide library but as a "virtual
teaching museum" in which all the cases and storerooms were open
for the students. Many of the assignments were created to inspire students
to start exploring the Library on their own and to play with the contents.
Since students also tend to be comfortable with the technology, the
hope was also that the assignments would help their teachers understand
the potential of the Library, in particular, the teaching advantages
to having access to material that was not published, in textbooks, or
in slide libraries. J. Trant added that much of the material in the
Library was
not available in any other form.
P Walsh then fielded questions. He discussed how The
AMICO Library allows users to get into the "back rooms" of
museum collections. As he stated because institutions focus on rotating
exhibitions, very little of their permanent collections are able to
be on display regularly in their museum. By contributing digital documentation
of works to The AMICO Library members are able to make these works viewable
to this growing educational universe and for users it opens up a whole
new world of comparative illustrations and associated works and preliminary
material that they probably never had access to.
General discussion ensued. Representatives from current
subscribers talked a little about how they were using The AMICO Library
at their institution.
Anne Whitelaw, Univ of Alberta, talked about how her
colleague, Colleen Skidmore had used The AMICO Library in her Canadian
art history class very successfully. Anne was trying to use TAL in a
larger survey class. She stated that students did not seem to be interested
in looking at works online when it was assigned as an out of class activity
and because her class was so large having all students look at images
via computers in class was not an option. A Whitelaw seemed to think
that there was resistance in using a computer to look things up. The
wider group stated that they found the contrary to be true, that most
students used only online methods to find information. So, perhaps the
problem was lack of clear training of how to find, access, and use The
AMICO Library. This could be solved by maybe having a lab session in
a computer lab or the library that is required by all students in the
first 2 weeks of class, these could be very short session of 30-50 minutes,
just providing how you find The AMICO Library on the campus network,
quick demos on searching and using notebooks, and then providing them
hardcopies about using the images in other applications (could be taken
for the How to AMICO for Educators) and how to cite works.
Christina Updike, James Madison University, spoke about
how they had created the Madison Digital Image Database which provided
several tools for professors to create lectures using their SlideShow
Builder, then, professors can download these lectures to local machines
and project them in class. Also, students are able to view the lectures.
JMU has integrated image holdings of their own and AMICO Library images
into a central database from which instructors choose works for their
lectures. Instructors are given access to the complete AMICO Library
and may select works to be added to the JMU database. C Updike did not
indicate if students had full access to The AMICO Library or just the
image lecture sets already created by professors.
Another participant asked whether assignments were or
would be created around other periods in art, specifically in hers,
which was ancient art. P. Walsh explained he had started with the strengths
of the Library, which also happened to correspond with areas of his
own expertise, but that the plan was to create assignments in all areas.
He said another area he was working on was special "subsets"
or "galleries" of the Library that were geared to specific
subjects or classes, that would make it easier for students and teachers
to access the material without doing the legwork of many searches. There
was also a discussion about the assignments about copyright and rights
issues.
There were some questions about how and what rights
are covered for works in The AMICO Library. There were questions about
downloading images. There were questions about why member museum participate
in AMICO.
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