Teaching a seminar!

I was recently given the fantastic opportunity to teach a seminar on archival basics to a small community in southern Wisconsin. I’m extremely excited about it! For this historical society, I want to help the community members understand that old doesn’t equal scarce and that things like provenance matters — where was that picture taken and who is in it and what does it tell us? The following is the description I just sent off to the community members. Do you have any helpful tips? What would you put into an archival basics course (copyright issues, acid-free boxes, software, etc)?

• June 16th: Back to Basics in the Archives by Dana Gerber
  Are you interested in your community’s history? Do you want to know how to better collect and save the items that are meaningful for you? This Back to Basics workshop is aimed towards people interested in documenting their community’s past with practical knowledge about good archival practices. It will be facilitated by Dana Gerber, a current graduate student at University of Wisconsin, Madison, specializing in the Archives track. By the end of the session, you should know about what constitutes an archive, collection policies, a deed of gift, the idea provenance, the need for good metadata, finding aids, marketing and more. You will have a better idea of what is worth saving and how to do it well!

This is what good marketing looks like.

I felt incredibly privileged to attend Bookless, an excellent and extremely well-done event at the Madison Central Public Library. According to a few of my peers in my program who grew up here, the Central Library is one many people know, but it really needs an uplift. And that’s exactly what it is getting! I highly encourage you to continue to donate to the new library here.

Three students in the UW Madison program created this wonderful project centered around art inspired within libraries called Library as Incubator, and it has thrived since originally launched. It’s really quite imaginative and inspiring on its own. Because Bookless was so focused on art within the library, I actually thought the idea came from this project. However, according to their blog, the idea came from the Gallery Coordinator Trent Miller of the library as a fundraiser. And as far as I can tell, not only was the fundraiser a smashing success, the marketing of libraries was one too!

The first great idea that I loved from this event: it wasn’t targeted to only children & families or adults (and hipsters, haha). From 10am to 2pm, families were highly encouraged to come check out the fun. I didn’t attend then but I heard from classmates who volunteered that it was extremely fun to see the kids so excited to paint on walls and do other fun art projects! Then Bookless opened again at 7pm with a bar for us adults. Lots of people were still drawing on the walls. There was a section devoted to stamps and old stickers (I put one of my face, Rainbow Brite style). There was a fantastic photo booth. Downstairs in the basement, music boomed and a trippy video played to it. Ghostlike, creepy figures hung from the walls. Art installations hugged the walls and were placed between the frames of the old stacks. The lockers of the “Lower Staxx!” workers were on display.  The pneumatic tubes were used by the Oracle. Upstairs, the old fiction room was used as a stage for various bands through the night. And, of course, more art was on display!

Everyone I saw seemed to be having fun. Unfortunately for me, it was a little too hot and smokey, so I went home feeling a little faint and overheated. Water and sleep helped me immensely. Other than that, and sometimes too-low lighting, there is nothing bad I can say about the Bookless event. Huge, huge kudos to the Madison Public Library!