2012 Annual Report - Nasher Museum of Art - Duke University

UNIVERSITY PARTNERSHIPSDuke Faculty and StudentsWhile the Nasher Museum is a stand-aloneinstitution that serves as a gateway to thesurrounding community, the museum thrivesbecause of Duke University. The campuscommunity also finds inspiration and richresources at the museum.To that end, Marianne Eileen Wardle, themuseum’s Andrew W. Mellon Coordinatorof Academic Programs, continued to workwith faculty to invite connections betweencourses and research with upcomingexhibitions and the museum’s permanentcollection. This outreach brought 146 classvisits and a total of 906 students to StudyStorage, a 45 percent increase over the pastyear. A total of 2,180 faculty and studentsvisited storage and galleries.The schedule of visiting classes (and 53faculty members) reflects the museum’sinterdisciplinary vision: not just art historybut also African & African AmericanStudies, Asian & Middle Eastern Studies,Chinese Classical Studies, CulturalAnthropology, Divinity, English, French,German, History, Italian, Literature,Medical School, Nicholas School of theEnvironment, Philosophy, Pratt School ofEngineering, Psychology, Religion, Spanish,Theater Studies, University Scholars,Women’s Studies and the Writing Program.First-year medical students visited thegalleries as part of a required coursefocusing on doctor-patient relationships.First-year engineering students toured thebuilding—including the wood shop—to learnabout facility management.Wardle worked closely with Duke professorsCarla Antonaccio and Sheila Dillon to publisha fully illustrated catalogue on the museum’scollection of classical antiquities, The Past isPresent: The Kempner Collection of ClassicalAntiquities at the Nasher Museum of Art.Professors and students alike worked withWardle and Molly Boarati, the academicprogram assistant, to design a series ofrotating installations in the museum’sEducation Gallery, located in the corridorbetween the two classrooms.The museum collaborated with Duke’sOffice of New Student Programs with aninstallation inspired by the book EatingAnimals by Jonathan Safron, the summerreading assignment. During orientation week,first-year students took part in discussionsabout the summer reading book, attendedtalks presented by the author and enjoyedthe installation during an exclusive party atthe Nasher Museum. Boarati selected worksfrom the permanent collection that reflectedthemes in the book and invited faculty to writeresponses to works of art in relation to theirfields of study.The Nasher Museum continued to trainstudents interested in museum careers.Museum Director Kimerly Rorschach taught11 students in the course “Museum Theoryand Practice,” and 16 students learned aboutmuseum careers through Art and Art Historyinternships for course credit.The Trent A. and Susan L. CarmichaelSummer Internship Award went to AnneDrescher, T’15, who worked in the museum’seducation department. The museum waspleased to award three exceptional Dukestudents grants to serve as interns for thesummer of 2011, thanks to a generous grantfrom the Mary Duke Biddle Foundation.Molly Superfine, T’13, and Nicole Whang, T’14,worked at the Whitney Museum of AmericanArt, New York. Sarah Soltis, T’14, worked inthe Nasher Museum’s curatorial department.Duke’s Vice Provost for the Arts awardedgraduate internships to Camila Maroja, PhDstudent, who worked at Colección PatriciaPhelps de Cisneros (CPPC) in New York, andMFA student Annabel Manning, who workedat the Bechtler Museum of Art in Charlotte.University Partnerships3128031_Text.indd 3112/3/12 8:39 PM