In response to Mary Case's question "Are collections the audience?" I'm
assuming she means that the audience is who  we are responsible to e.g.
visitors, scholars, volunteers?  I'm a conservator and within the conservation
community there is a perception, idea, ethic (I can't decide on the right
noun)that "we" conservators are the spokesman for the artifact, that our main
responsibility lies with the artifact and it's long-term preservation.  If you
follow this line of reasoning far enough it means that you put everything into
dark, environmentally controlled storage and never use it in any way.  Of
course this is not very socially responsible if you consider that museums are
generally public institutions and the "public" has a right to access to the
stuff. I've presented the quandry of preservation and the views of
conservation in very black and white terms, but I hope it illustrates that
collections concerns can be in some ways the very opposite of public
programming interests.
 
Jessie Johnson
Texas Memorial Museum
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