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Subject:
From:
Mindy Lehrman Cameron <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Museum discussion list <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Wed, 8 Nov 1995 22:43:18 -0500
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Please allow me to put in my two cents regarding exhibition credits.

It has always surprised me when people are not acknowledged for their work. I
remember a few years ago being happy but shocked when I noticed a credit
panel in a San Francisco museum that credited the designers, among others;
 happy that it did and shocked that I had never seen a panel like that
before.

Many times it seems that a client (when it is an institution -- not so often
when it is an individual) believes that exhibitions were formed through
spontaneous combustion even when people on its staff are part of the team who
developed the show.  As an exhibition designer who is hired to work with
museums and institutions, I am pleased whenever I see a credit panel that is
(or seems to be) comprehensive.  I want to read about every detail.  Who is
(or who are) the curator, the designer, the graphic designer, the
illustrator, the writer, the lighting designer, the fabricator, the
assistants, and so on.  Of course it can conceivably become ridiculous and
all too Academy Awardish if we add the stat printer, the xerox shop, the
manufacturer of the car the contractor drove to the site, the families...  In
a good credit panel, I believe what is particularly of interest to the
visitor is to learn about the process and the number of players involved, and
it is a small but welcome reward to those of us who put our love and labor
into our work to see individual and public acknowledgement for it.

Architectural and interiors magazines used to list only the "architect" of a
building -- which might actually be the name of the architectural firm but
which reads as though it is one person -- but within the past few years they
have graciously and gratefully acknowledged that a building is the work of
many people and have tried to list everyone on the design team as well as at
least the name of the construction company, and sometimes even the
manufacturers of particular products.  Among other good reasons for doing so,
I think that it is useful for others who might do similar work.

Anecdotally, one time I worked with a team of people on a project that took
about a year and a half and, on the credit panel, the client institution
decided only to list its Director who we might have met once and its Board
members who were people we NEVER met during the course of designing and
building.  Further, though it was in our contract that they MUST acknowledge
us in any publication, their in-house documents and many outside articles
were published that didn't mention us at all.  It was heartening when a
graphics magazine, that gave us an award for best in exhibitions for that
same show, asked for and published the names of everyone on the team.

As I said, just my two, raw-nerve cents.
Mindy Lehrman Cameron
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