News and Updates
MESSAGE FROM THE DIRECTOR
Birthdays, holidays and anniversaries have always been time for reflection. As the Museum Loan Network (MLN) approaches its tenth year, we would like to take a moment to thank all of our colleagues for the knowledge that they have shared with us, the experiences that we have learned from, the trust that they have shown us and their commitment that has made our work possible and successful. Knowing that ten years of stories could not have been confined to our yearly newsletter, we have decided to honor the work with a more substantial document that will be published later in 2005. For now, we would like to share our vision for the next year.
The past decade has been a time of remarkable change for the museum field. We have been privileged to be part of this process of change, as institutions large and small in communities across America have demonstrated new ways of thinking about the objects they hold. We have witnessed the use of these “cultural ambassadors” to further dialogue and understanding and, simultaneously, create joy and vibrancy through the beauty they reveal and the memories they evoke.
In 1995, with the vision and support of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and The Pew Charitable Trusts, the MLN was formed to make objects of cultural heritage more accessible and understandable to the public by encouraging collecting institutions to share works over extended periods of time. To achieve that aim, we created a coordinated means of identifying and sharing objects held by museums in storage. The MLN’s survey grants have enabled museums to catalog nearly 200,000 objects in storage, leading to more than 13,000 objects from more than 1,000 cultures available for loan through the online MLN Directory. Communities from Mobile , Alabama , to Billings , Montana , have borrowed and exhibited works previously inaccessible to them and have shared these works with learners of all ages. To facilitate these partnerships, the MLN has awarded 342 grants totaling $5.5 million to 229 institutions in 51 states and territories.
Stephen E. Weil, scholar emeritus at the Smithsonian Institution, described MLN saying: “Established originally to facilitate collection sharing, the MLN has evolved into the field’s most powerful and effective advocate for collaboration. Reverberations from its pioneering work in showing how museums – by working in tandem – can leverage scarce resources and achieve higher levels of public service can be felt today throughout this nation’s museum community.”
W e began by facilitating museums’ relationships with one another. Before long our vision and opportunities broadened, focusing on relationships between museums and communities, relationships of museums with other cultural and educational institutions, and relationships among colleagues working in different disciplines – bridging not only history and music, for example, but also visual arts and public media.
Now we are looking ahead to our second decade. With help from the museum community, artists, historians, funders, educators and other forward-looking thinkers, we are assessing the MLN’s strengths in an effort to steer our programs and priorities in directions that will best serve museums and communities.
Our end users are not organizations but individuals. We value objects and collections, but what matters most is the way objects and collections are viewed, appreciated and understood by people. Along with our focus on objects, therefore, is an intense focus on communication. How can museums use art and artifacts to convey stories about the cultural forces shaping the world? How can we encourage people of different points of view to come together, share ideas and collaborate in more meaningful ways?
As the Museum Loan Network matures, our role as catalyst has become increasingly important. We have a strong track record as facilitator of collaboration – through our Directory, grant programs, convenings, online tools and publications. Based on this experience, we have developed a plan for the coming year. We will focus resources on the areas where we can achieve the greatest impact and pursue some new initiatives that have emerged from your experiences.
The MLN Directory will continue to grow. Support from The Henry Luce Foundation will enable us to add a significant group of American portraits to our shared database, facilitate collections sharing, foster new long-term relationships between colleagues and thereby energize the study and teaching of early American art. In addition, the Directory will benefit from a community-focused cataloging project that is being developed to encourage stronger museum-community collaboration. By involving the community in deepening understanding of a museum’s objects, their meaning, and their relationship to the issues and experiences of the people and cultures they represent, museums can benefit more directly from community expertise and increase their significance to their communities.
We will be exploring broader use of the Directory, not only by museums but in partnership with schools. One example is Searching for Treasure: Connecting Collections to Curriculum and Connecting Classrooms to Collections, a program in development that enables primary and secondary school students to explore collections related to their curricula, thus finding new paths to discovery and gaining appreciation of museums as sources of enjoyment and lifelong learning. We are grateful to the J.P. Morgan Chase Foundation for their generous support for the planning of this program.
In the past, MLN travel grants have been likened to “think-tanks,” and we will be encouraging interdisciplinary and inter-generational teams to take full advantage of these opportunities. Based on conversations sparked by Museum as Catalyst for Interdisciplinary Collaboration and building on experiences gained in Museums, Composers and Communities, our partnership with the American Composers Forum, we are working to expand further the range of museums’ interdisciplinary collaboration. Together with the National Center for Outreach, an entity funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, we are exploring partnerships with public television to create unique opportunities to blend museum and television assets in innovative ways to better serve communities.
The MLN will continue to advance the understanding and practice of collaboration among museums, the community, and other cultural and educational partners. For, we are convinced that if museums engage communities more profoundly and prove their indispensable value more clearly, then support from communities will also become deeper and more lasting. The MLN will build on our core strengths – our grant program, the MLN Directory and our proven ability to facilitate collaboration. Over the past decade, the MLN and the world around us have evolved in ways we could not have imagined a decade ago. The power of objects to bring people together, to transmit history, and to provide a moment of pause and reflection is needed now more than ever.
Lori Gross
Director