Social Media: Connecting Curators to Museum Patrons
Museum curators often receive the stereotype as lonely librarians of culture and history that are out of touch with their visitors. Museum professionals now have the opportunity to connect with patrons through Web 2.0 and social media applications, an exchange which I examine in this post.
Today's museum-goers are different than those in the past. Museum curators are now expected to be fluent at social media and Web 2.0, as society grows more comfortable with the amounts of open culture available on the web. Kathy Jaller, Senior Associate of Design and Social Media at the Contemporary Jewish Museum believes that social media "humanizes museums which otherwise appear impenetrable" which creates a discourse between the institution and the community according to Victor Samra, Digital Media Marketing Manager at the Museum of Modern Art. Overall museum audiences are delighted when they have the response of a human touch from curators. Although curators worry that social media will dumb down their years of scholarship, nevertheless, the success of blog posts and events over Twitter like "Ask a Curator" prove that curators continue to maintain an authoritative voice in their field; social media makes a curator's knowledge far more accessible by challenging its audience into a more active and vibrant conversation over the web.
A case study on the Powerhouse Museum's "Object of the Week" blog posts is a successful example of this exchange between curators and visitors over the web. Through a behind-the-scenes approach, the posts generated interest which appealed to both casual readers, as well as those interested in a deeper level of scholarship. In their posts, curators were comforted that the exercise allowed them to retain academic authority. 
The blog was a success, and now they are up to a minimum of three "Object of the Week" posts. It is a model that the Bowers Museum and the Barrick Museum have also copied. Other museum blog posts offer more than just highlights from their collection. They can even go as far as to express the stress in building an exhibition like Lana Hum's post about the Rising Currents exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art. Sometimes blog posts even ask questions from visitors to create a general discussion about a work of art, as seen in the gallery teacher Robin Trento's post on the Getty Museum blog, the Iris. In Ms. Trento's entry she poses the question "Is beauty a gift or a curse?" in relation to her post of a Renaissance plate depicting the ancient abduction of Helen, and what results is a lively discussion about the history of the representation of beauty. As Ignacio points out Helen's "masculine features", Chad responds this was due to a lack of women models for artists because it was against "social decorum" for women to pose nude. However, as the expert, Ms. Trento responds that artists at the time actually drew from the ideal of female beauty found in ancient sculpture. Robin's moderation of the discussion demonstrates the fruitful conversations between curators and and the public over works of art. Blogging is a platform that allows curators to retain their scholarship by presenting interactive and informative posts in quick and simple way.
Despite the exchange of information presented through blog posts, the content of these posts are still driven by the curator which offers a one sided exchange between the museum and visitor. Instead, Twitter's short form replies are an excellent means of guaranteeing a lively discourse. One of the most fascinating examples of a continuing conversation between curators and patrons was "Ask a Curator" a participatory event over Twitter on September 1. "Ask a Curator" was a follow up campaign to "Follow a Museum" held in February, a day dedicated to generate followers of museums on Twitter. Jim Richardson, the Director of Sumo, a design agency specializing in the arts and cultural sector thought up the idea to take Twitter out of the "hands of the marketing department and put it in the hands of the curators." Richardson was inspired to rebrand curators as fluent in Museum 2.0. For a promotion solely promoted through twitter, it was a remarkable success. Over three hundred and forty institutions participated, generating a lot of one-to-one access between curators and the public. The campaign marked one of the first times that curators used social media at work. Even though curators were limited to responses of one hundred and forty characters, "answers were still well thought out and authoritative in tone. As #askacurator rose to become a top trending topic for the day, it was hijacked by spam. Despite this technical glitch, both curators and participants were mutually pleased with the favorable outcome of the experience. Participants were satisfied with the promotion's ability to increase the openness between curators and visitors, where approximately sixty percent of visitors were able to answer a question and around thirty percent of which received a response from a curator. Perhaps the most striking statistic was nearly seventy five percent of visitors were encouraged to visit a museum after the event. It was an equal success for curators where more than seventy five percent plan to use social media again.
Even as the discourse between curators and visitors increase, museums still control the content of what curators can and cannot do. Additionally curators simply lack the time to respond to all the correspondences generated over social media as the process of digitizing collections has increased a curator's workload for the past five to ten years. 
Despite these circumstances, as the profession successfully navigates social media whether through blogs or Twitter accounts, it elevates a curator's work into a conversation found in a more engaging and interactive experience on Web 2.0. Social media inspires audiences and creates new interests about the work museums do. Today, curators are using a wide range of social medial tools through Youtube, Flickr and Twitter accounts, Facebook pages, Wikis and Nings in order to connect with museum patrons. These platforms have the ability to reach a younger demographic of twenty and thirty somethings who will eventually become a much more mature museum audience of "sixty and seventy-year-olds with cultural capital, time, money, and even art collections." Without a doubt, museums will benefit intellectually and financially from creating lifelong loyal visitors by engaging in these discussions. Connecting curators through social media is more than just disseminating information; it's about connecting visitors to a dialogue. If conversations were occurring about museums before, they are now occurring over these platforms. Curation was always an interdisciplinary exercise long before social media because in the past, curators were taught to just be experts in one field; however it is apparent that they need to be experts in the field of digital technologies. Social media is responsible for the changing role of the curator, where they must be flexible to work in the fluid and dynamic medium of Museum 2.0.
September 23, 2010 11:56 AM | Reply
Stephanie, after reading through your post, it was quite clear that you are genuinely interested in the implementation of social media in the museum world. Instead of a one-sided exchange of information, museum-goers can now go online and interact with curators on a give-and-receive level. In this time and age, when people are spending less time outside of their homes and more time in front of their computer screens, this is an interesting social phenomenon that can still connect the public with art. The conversations between curators and visitors presents a new way of experiencing art that could not have taken place without the forms of social media like Twitter and the World Wide Web. I am most interested with your paragraph on “Ask a Curator.” An event like this has the capability to include people all over the world. It would also be interesting to look into the visitor statistics in order to understand where they are coming from and whether or not they are repeated museum visitors or merely one-time participators. The website shows that you can “Ask a Curator around the world.” It would be interesting for you to test the system yourself and to reveal these results, in terms of timeliness and thoughtfulness.
Despite this new form of curator-visitor interaction, how do you see the increased use of social media affecting museum-goers? Will people continue to visit museums if they can access the material online, from the comfort of their homes? If this online interactive system is a success, museums may struggle in the future to attract visitors. You mention, “Although social media makes a curator’s work more accessible, some are concerned it makes them lose their authoritative voice.” While their work may become more accessible in an online environment, it may in turn lose its true sensorial qualities that can only be experienced in person. For me, social media works best as a follow-up to a curator’s work for a museum. It presents an interesting platform that allows quick and easy interaction between the curator and the visitor. Your post can be appreciated because it focuses on an issue that is relevant to a society that has become increasingly engaged with social media and their influence on the way we live.
October 5, 2010 11:49 AM | Reply
Hello Stephanie, let me begin by saying that your entry is well thought out and flows nicely from one point to the next. I appreciated your usage of links and especially liked how you incorporated the authors’ of these sites into your blog. After reading your entry it is quite clear that you have done a substantial amount of research on this topic. Perhaps what I found most interesting was the point you made about curators feeling as though engaging in Web 2.0 would result in the “dumbing down” of their scholarship. I believe this is a concern many professionals have and as you mentioned, it does not necessarily result in such an outcome but instead keeps them current with the times. I believe that it is important for professionals in general to keep up with current technologies but should not become so overwhelmed by them that they deviate from the purpose of their original profession.
You brought up the issue of time, or lack thereof, to update these social media and to digitize the artwork present in the collections. Perhaps a new position can be created that works to keep up with these rising technologies? I envision the position being filled by someone who is literate in art history and art but also has a background in communication and marketing; this individual can then work to connect the public with the museum in ways that are out of the jurisdiction of a traditional curator. I understand that your entry focuses on expanding the role of a curator but this could be a viable solution for larger museums. As you mentioned that museums are gaining followers on sites such as Twitter, I must ask, who are these people who are following museums on social media? This is an important question because museums must know who their audience is and based on that decide how they will expand their target audience. It is encouraging to know that hundreds of people are following a museum on a site such as Twitter but if the majority of those followers are people in the field of art or visitors of the museum, the social media is not adequately working to generate a loyal visitors’ base. Overall, I believe you post if very engaging and brings up a pertinent issue in this field. I enjoyed reading it and agree that curators and museums can benefit from the usage of social media and Web 2.0.
October 18, 2011 9:27 AM | Reply
I must say that as a patron, I welcome the modernization of museums in the sense that they are now creating more engagement through social media. Some of my favorite museums are outside of regular driving distance, so visiting their websites and participating in online chats (or any online experience the museum may offer) only solidifies why I like them in the first place. I also love the use of QR codes so that I can get additional information not afforded by the simple 2 or 3 sentence plaque next to and explaining the display.
I am one of those people who find it easier to follow a museum online via Facebook or Twitter vs. actually visiting. I would also expect that younger generations will also find it mandatory that museums need a social media presence if those museums wish to remain open.
I live about 5 minutes from a major national historic battlefield and the information I receive about the park is not through any sheet of paper they have given me in the past but by their Facebook page.