museums

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• SOURCE: Forward
  12/15/2020
  

  After an Online ‘Onslaught’ over Exhibit on Racial Justice, a Florida Holocaust Museum Vows Not to Back Down

  A Florida Holocaust museum's decision to feature an exhibition of photographs taken during recent protests over police killings of Black Americans raised questions about the museum's mission and whether the Holocaust can be remembered and its victims honored by comparing the genocide of European Jews to other instances of systemic racism. 

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• SOURCE: New York Times
  12/9/2020
  

  Lockdown Gardening in Britain Leads to Archaeological Discoveries

  Locked-down Britons have unearthed many potentially valuable objects both modern and ancient, prompting consideration of expanding a law that would enable museums to claim such objects after compensating the finder.

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• SOURCE: Hyperallergic
  12/9/2020
  

  Illuminating the Legacy of Slavery at a New York Museum

  Artist Reggie Black is projecting a message about the history of slavery in New York City on the façade of the ​Dyckman Farmhouse Museum in Manhattan, where six people were enslaved.

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• SOURCE: USA Today
  12/10/2020
  

  'Hyphenated Identity Groups': Utah GOP Sen. Mike Lee Blocks Legislation For Latino And Women History Smithsonians

  "Claiming 'the last thing we need is to further divide an already divided nation,' Lee blocked proposals to establish the National Museum of the American Latino and the American Women's History Museum."

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• SOURCE: Worcester (MA) Telegram and Gazette
  12/7/2020
  

  Last Pearl Harbor Fighter Plane that Still Flies a Historical Highlight at American Heritage Museum in Hudson

  A series of accidents allowed a P-40 fighter plane to survive the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor; after crashing in service a month later, the plane lay on a Hawaiian mountainside until 1985, when it was restored to flight condition using parts from other planes. It is now an attraction at the American Heritage Museum in Hudson, Massachusetts.

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• SOURCE: Washington Post
  12/3/2020
  

  Congress Takes Crucial Step toward Establishing Latino and Women’s History Museums

  The proposed museums would follow the National Museum of African American History and Culture, which opened in 2016. 

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• SOURCE: New York Times
  11/16/2020
  

  Academy Museum Gives Debbie Reynolds Her Due as a Costume Conservator

  For reasons likely including institiutionalized sexism, costumes have been a neglected part of the preservation of cinematic history. The new Academy Museum of Motion Pictures hopes to work with the late Debbie Reynolds's son to change that. 

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• SOURCE: New York Times
  11/15/2020
  

  Where Is the Smithsonian Museum for American Latinos?

  by Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Ken Salazar

  A former Florida Congresswoman and the former Interior Secretary present bipartisan advocacy for an American Latino Museum. 

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• SOURCE: New York Times
  11/13/2020
  

  Thieves Grab Nazi Memorabilia in Museum Heists, Puzzling Police

  Since March, four museums in the Netherlands and Denmark have been broken into, and memorabilia, including Nazi uniforms, has been stolen. 

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• SOURCE: Smithsonian
  10/26/2020
  

  Radical Protests Propelled the Suffrage Movement. Here’s How a New Museum Captures That History

  A prison employee named Irma Clifton was instrumental in preserving the site's legacy as the place where suffrage picketers in Washington DC were incarcerated, beaten and tortured in 1917.

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• SOURCE: Daily Gazette (Schenectady, NY)
  10/24/2020
  

  Schuyler Mansion Works to Bring Clarity to Alexander Hamilton’s Role as Enslaver

  Jessie Serfilippi of the Schuyler Mansion State Historic Site examines Alexander Hamilton's relationship to slavery and challenges his image as a proto-abolitionist. 

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• SOURCE: Washington Post
  10/12/2020
  

  Coronavirus Shutdowns and Charges of White Supremacy: American Art Museums are in Crisis

  The year of the COVID pandemic is not an opportune time for museums to weather controversies over the content of exhibits, but many face criticism from across the spectrum about racial inclusivity and provocative works. 

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• SOURCE: Washington Post
  9/30/2020
  

  Smithsonian Taps N.Y. Cultural Director To Lead African American Museum

  Since 2016, Kevin Young has been director of the Schomburg Center, a division of the New York Public Library and an important cultural organization in Harlem.

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• SOURCE: The Guardian
  9/28/2020
  

  Philip Guston's KKK Images Force Us to Stare Evil in the Face – We Need Art Like This

  "Art shouldn’t be polite. Guston’s work puts you into a headlock and forces you to stare into the face of evil, rearranging your sense of reality into a better one – and that’s what art needs to do more than ever."

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• SOURCE: New York Times
  8/27/2020
  

  In His Own Words: Jacob Lawrence at the Met and MoMA

  The artist Jacob Lawrence died in 2000; he spent a day in New York museums with Times art critic Michael Kimmelman four years before, discussing art and his creative process. 

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• SOURCE: New York Times
  8/27/2020
  

  The British Museum Reopens to a World That Has Changed

  Finally reopening after a COVID-enforced hiatus, the British Museum is making concessions to an audience that is more skeptical of the museum's relationship to colonialism and the slave trade.

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• SOURCE: Vanity Fair
  8/24/2020
  

  What Should A Museum Look Like In 2020?

  "A call for divestment involves an acknowledgment of the ways that museums rely on local police departments to do the work of mental health providers and emergency medical technicians, as well as the implicit ways contracts with police departments protect property over people," said MoMA curator Thomas J. Lax.

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• 8/16/2020
  

  Abridging History is Dangerous

  by Greg Bailey

  You cannot understand the pain and purpose that constitutes our heritage by hiding.

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• SOURCE: New York Times
  8/11/2020
  

  Museum’s Future Clouded by Chance Discovery: Swastika Hiding in Plain Sight

  The discovery of a Nazi symbol in the mosaic floor of a German museum has prompted bitter debate about its creator’s past and the institution’s role.

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• SOURCE: Foreign Policy
  7/28/2020
  

  Is It Time to Repatriate Africa’s Looted Art?

  Museums now face a moral reckoning over artifacts stolen by people who took colonial violence and racial superiority as a given. It is time to start having honest conversations about righting those wrongs.