Recap of the April Drinking About Museums @ ICA

April’s event was a good time by all accounts. I missed all the happenings that Pennie Taylor had set up for us at the ICA, because I was stuck in traffic for two hours! Bleah! Anyway, here are some pics from the evening. We’d like to thank Pennie (@penellohpee) and all the folks at the ICA who were so obliging about us crashing and making art messes. Big thanks also to Kellian Adams of Green Door Labs for hooking us up with Scott Tongue, who demoed his work on the Oculus Rift. 

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Next month’s date hasn’t been selected yet, but we’ll hopefully be having a special guest. Mia Ridge, thinker and author of the Open Objects blog will be in town for THATCamp New England at the end of the month. You should follow her on Twitter if you don’t already. We’ll try to grab her while she’s in town for a special Drinking About Museums: Digital Humanities edition. I hope she brings her mini Ed and Drinking About Museums Melbourne badge!

mini Ed 1 and #drinkingaboutmuseums:MELB badge. courtesy of Mia Ridge

Next Drinking About Museums: Boston, Thursday, April 17, 5 pm

DAM: Boston at the ICA

Thursday, April 17, 5 pm

Pennie Taylor of the ICA has invited us to view the following interactive exhibitions: Second Skin, in the Poss Family Mediatheque; and Body Work, in the Bank of America Art Lab. Descriptions of each are below.

Additionally, Kellian Adams of Green Door Labs fame will be bringing a guest who will have an Oculus Rift headset for us to try, as some point while at the ICA.

Where: The Institute Of Contemporary Art, 100 Northern Ave., Boston, MA 02210

and then The Barking Crab, 88 Sleeper St, Boston, MA 02210

ICA show info

Second Skin consists of two felt walls with silhouettes of Cave’s Soundsuits, two bins of felt shapes- and acts as a giant felt storyboard, where visitors can cover the silhouettes with the felt shapes. It was realized to activate the space of the upper Mediatheque, which has had a smattering of things in the past (a record player and some archival cases) but is usually a couple of couches and a stack of books. It has been popular and doesn’t require much oversight. A similar project was done at the Denver Art Museum, and they gave project management advice that was very useful. Interested in feedback, ideas, etc. We have also noticed this activity attracts more adults than the Art Lab activity- why?
http://www.icaboston.org/programs/drop-in/nick-cave_second-skin/

In Body Work, we invite visitors to see the Nick Cave exhibition, then use materials from a materials bar, and collage/decorate life-sized coloring book pages/posters that they can take home. It’s in our Bank of America Art Lab/classroom space, and was commissioned to offer a drop-in art making activity at more times (it’s open Thursday 5-9, and all day Saturdays and Sundays). We also aimed to create a buzz and invite visitors to spend more time at the ICA, thinking about the work they see here. We have had a hard time encouraging adult participation. This project was a new concept for Cave and studio, and has had a learning curve in terms of managing it.

http://www.icaboston.org/programs/drop-in/nick-cave_body-work/

Hope to see you all there!

Ed & Jenn