Planning a Booth Day!

Howdy, reader.

My name is Ema and if you hadn't figured it out, I'm also one of the fifteen amazing TACs. You have to remember my name because it has one m.

It's March and so much is going on at the CJM. I volunteered in the first week to do the scheduling of us TACs and to assign shifts and to figure out who can work when. It wasn't too hard at the start, but it's been harder since we started our apprenticeships and are less available. I was doing the schedule for April and May and was shocked to notice that our graduation is on the calendar--our year long internship is coming to an end! Though I'm only a junior, it's also scary that the eleven seniors will be moving on from high school. Really scary.

Right now, my fellow intern Stacie and I are working on our upcoming “Booth Day”. We have our apprenticeship with StoryCorps, which is a nonprofit organization that works to gather stories from people of all backgrounds. There are three recording booths in the United States and one of these is in our very own CJM. Anyone can come in and bring a partner (a loved one, colleague, family, friend…anyone!) to record for forty minutes. Though we consider these sessions interviews, I like to think of them as a recorded conversation. The booth kind of takes away some of the shyness and awkwardness that one might usually feel when talking to someone for for forty minutes, and creates a space for them to share their stories.

Since I started here at the CJM, I've thought StoryCorps is awesome. My grandparents live in New Zealand, and the last time I saw them, in April of 2009, I actually started asking my Oma, my grandmother, all about her life story. I tried to write it down as a story on my laptop, but it's never the same to read what I've condensed her words into as actually hearing her voice. I think it's absolutely amazing that StoryCorps gives people the opportunity to bring in their grandparents and record a conversation--think of how cool that would be to show your grandkids in fifty or so years. Not only do participants get a CD of the interview, but the recordings, if permission is given, also go to the Library of Congress and become part of the national archive of stories.

For our final project Stacie and I have the task of filling six appointments for a “Booth Day.” After much deliberation, we decided to try and find interviews that will focus on a theme: the challenges teens face. This topic is fairly broad--it can include grandparents talking about their lives as teens as well as our peers in society today. But is also narrow enough to give us a specific group to outreach towards. It's really nerve-wracking, sending emails to different organizations -- "What if they think my message is spam? What if I sound like an impersonal StoryCorpsBot? What if it's too long and they don't want to read it?” But I received my first positive reply on Monday, which made me super excited. We're actually going to be successful and we're going to have amazing interviews at our Booth Day.

I’m going to stay on next year and be a senior TAC, just like Lena is now. I’m insanely excited because as much as I adore our current TACs, it’ll be really exciting to have some fresh perspectives and ideas coming in. 

Ta ta for now,

Ema

A day in a life of Friends of the Urban Forests

Why hello again everyone, it's I, Iedryn. Back to share a bit of my experience here as a Teen Art Connect! Sadly my internship here is nearing its end, and I cannot help but think that just a year ago I was applying for this job. I have to admit I knew that working at the Contemporary Jewish Museum I would have to push myself to do new things, like learn how to lead architecture tours, work on my public speaking, and build important skills. However, I was pleasantly surprised when one of our current exhibits; Do Not Destroy: Trees, Art, and Jewish Thought, gave us the chance to invite a group of teen Interns from Friends of the Urban Forest to come to our Museum. It was exciting to relate our exhibit and the whole concept of not destroying trees and Jewish Culture, to their goal of recreating life by planting trees in the city and keep mother nature alive. A few of my fellow Tacs got to lead them on a tour of an exhibit and then my coworker Stacie and I led an art project of parklets. In exchange, the Friends of the Urban Forest invited us to come with them to a tree planting in the Excelsior District. One of the greatest things about the Friends of the Urban Forest is that they will plant trees in the rain or shine, and the day I went it was raining! Now planting trees may sound like a easy task to some people, but it is far from it! They have to be properly buried in the soil, and they have to be protected. Another great thing about Friends of the Urban Forest, is that not only do they plant the trees but they come back and prune the trees and take care of them. The Teen Art Connect, here at the Contemporary Jewish Museum has without a doubt opened many new doors for me. I probably would've never heard about Friends of the Urban Forest, if it weren't for this program. I really enjoyed my day with the Friends of the Urban Forest, and I was proud to represent for Teen Art Connect program! Well goodbye for now, until then! <3

Battle of the Bands flyer!

Kyle here,

I’ve been apprenticing in the marketing department here at the CJM for a couple months now, and I was recently given my first big project; creating a flyer for the upcoming battle of the bands. The project was a collaboration between my fellow TAC Stacie and me. Stacie created the artwork for the flyer, and I plugged it into Photoshop, then into Indesign, adding a little of my own flavor.

Throughout the process there were many challenges such as difficulties in the programs, proper placement of the sponsors, and color and font choice, but the most difficult thing was the deadline. This was the first time since I began my apprenticeship that I’ve had a real deadline that was not flexible. I had to finish by a certain date in order for it to get to the printers on time. As it got closer to the deadline things began to get more stressful. Since I only work at my apprenticeship once a week, I began to come in more days just to get it finished, because once a week just wasn’t enough.

I learned a lot while using Photoshop and Indesign, but over all it was a huge learning experience in time management. I already feel that I’ve gotten better and I know for future projects I will be able to finish things faster and with reduced stress.

Stacie's original art-

finished flyer- 

Movin' on Up

Hello!
First off, chag sameach to everyone! (Happy Passover!)


This is Zoe, one of the 15 Teen Art Connect interns here at the CJM  (I'm sure you are quite familiar with all of us by now!). Over the past few months, all 15 of us have settled into our respective apprenticeships, and it's been a fabulous experience for all of us to form a bond with our mentor and learn a whole lot along the way. As I've mentioned before, my mentor is Gravity Goldberg, the Public Programs Manager at the CJM. So far, I've learned a lot about past programs here at the museum (including what worked/what didn't work), helped prepare for future programs, developed literature for programs, and of course assist at the actual programs themselves. Up until a few days ago, I had been doing the simple (but very necessary and enjoyable!) tasks at all the public programs. This included passing out programs for the event, ushering, doing crowd control, and ensuring everyone who was working stayed hydrated. I had been assisting behind the scenes and quietly learning from Gravity's expertise for quite some time, though, and last Thursday I finally got the opportunity to put my new skills to work.


Last Monday, I came into work for my apprenticeship as I usually do. I sat down with Gravity, and she explained to me about the program coming up on Thursday, called "The Green City." This program was a new format that the Museum was trying out, called a "mixtape." Basically, it consists of a series of short talks and presentations by artists and innovators on a unified theme. For this very first mixtape at the CJM, there were to be five speakers, each with 10 minutes to present, on the theme of green cities. I was already quite excited for this event, because this is a topic that I'm personally really interested in. After explaining the basics, though, Gravity threw me a curveball: I was going to be the house manager for this event. So essentially, I got to do Gravity's job. I was excited and nervous all at once, but I knew I was ready.


When Thursday came, I got to the museum early and helped Gravity prepare. We folded and assembled programs, took a little fieldtrip to get snacks for the performers, and tested out all the equipment we would need for the event. Finally, it was showtime. I got to use one of the fancy walkie talkies so security could let me know when the speakers arrived at the museum, so I was able to greet them and take them to the back room to get ready. I met the volunteers who had so graciously agreed to help out with the event, and helped them establish their duties for the evening. I was able to make important decisions about when the doors should open, when the music should start playing, and various other things to make the show go on. It was exciting having that power. 


The event turned out great, and there were many more people than we were expecting. Everyone was delighted by the clever programs for the event, which actually looked like mixtapes: 

I was able to listen to Urban Adamah's Adam Berman speak on Jewish Values and Urban Agriculture, SPUR's Ben Grant on The Aesthetics of Green Density, Birder Dominik Monsur on Spring Migration and  SF Habitats, Landscape Artist Topher Delaney on Medicinal and Edible City Gardens, and Rebar's Blaine Merker on Creating Parklets. I learned more from each speaker than I thought was possible in just 10 minutes! 

Having the opportunity to essentially run my own program was an amazing experience, and it's a great feeling to know that you're trusted enough to take on such an important task. I look forward to doing it again sometime soon, but I'm sure there will be tons of other adventures along the way.

Apprenticeship in the Education Department

Hi, my name is Francesca, and I’m one of 15 Teen Art Connect Interns here at the museum. We’ve just hit the halfway-mark in our apprenticeships, so this is a perfect time for me to blog about what I’ve learned so far and how I hope to use the knowledge I’ve gained for the rest of the program.

Preparing for tours!

Being an intern in the education department, I’ve learned a lot about tour styles and methods from my mentor Janine, associate director of education(she deals mostly with school and teacher programs), as well as the educators, who give private tours here at the museum. The inquiry-based tour style is used at the CJM, meaning that instead of the educators lecturing the visitors on solely information, they ask the guests questions about what they think, weaving information into a group discussion. I’ve taken a lot of museum tours in my life, but it’s been really cool to see sort of the behind-the-scenes learning and planning that the educators do so they can give their tours. Most of this planning involves discussion amongst the educators about how to present certain pieces to visitors, making the tour stops informative yet sticking to the inquiry-based method used at the CJM.

Most of the beginning of my apprenticeship was spent in educator meetings, in which the educators discuss the exhibit, specifically tour stops, themes, and discussion questions. It was interesting to learn that educators prepare for their tours in a similar fashion to us TACs preparing for our architecture tours, including research, discussion with peers, and formulating questions.

Another interesting thing I’ve learned in my apprenticeship is the different approaches to presenting information while giving tours. I was used to most tours being lecture-style, where you arrive at a piece and are given information by the educator. I’ve since learned that information can be presented in a variety of different manners. The first is by asking questions of the visitors and using their responses or questions they might ask to guide your conversation about the piece, embedding information throughout. The second is to make an activity for the visitors to do that will convey some sort of information to them. For instance, I just finished making an activity that asks the visitors to choose a piece within the invitational section of the exhibit that inspires them to take some sort of action, whether it be to start a campaign to save a certain species of animal or to tell others to stop using excessive amounts of paper. The third way I’ve learned to present information to visitors during a tour is by creating a game—kind of similar to an activity, but it doesn’t necessarily have to involve a conversation. The educators are just right now testing a game on iPads in the California Dreaming exhibit that encourages visitors to explore different aspects of the exhibit through a scavenger-hunt like game. It’s pretty cool and it’s also a great way to get information across to visitors without boring them.

I used the information I learned from the educator meetings to give my fellow TACs a presentation on Do Not Destroy: Trees, Art, and Jewish Thought, the new exhibit. I used some of the themes that stood out to me from the educators’ discussions to share an overview of DND that was supposed to prepare the other interns, as well as myself, to give tours.. Just like the educators do to prepare for their tours, I chose a couple pieces from the exhibit that I really liked and I felt like embodied the general themes of the exhibit. I had gained some awesome information from sitting in the educator meetings, which helped me give a tour-type presentation. I employed the inquiry-based method in my presentation, and although I had used it giving architecture tours this past fall, it was really cool to use questions to further discussion and thought about the art in the exhibit.

With my tour group after an awesome tour with WritersCorps

Now, the TACs and I have moved on to giving tours for teen groups, and I still use a lot of the skills I picked up in the educator meetings. One of my favorite questions that I use during the tour is with the piece entitled “The Tree Gazed upon Anne Frank While in Hiding”, by Jason Lazarus. I’ve recently begun to take the groups in front of the piece, which is installed in video-format in the exhibit, and stand so I’m blocking the information on the wall. So, without the guests knowing that the tree they’re watching has special significance, I ask them how the tree makes them feel, what they notice, and if there is anything striking about it. Then, I tell them the name of the piece, and read a quote from her diary about the tree. Then, I ask them similar questions as I asked them before, but the conversation is much different. It’s really cool to use some of the techniques and information that I observed the educators using in my own teen tours.





A Revised Wish for the Wishing Tree

Hi everyone that is reading this blog post. My name is Moises and I was tasked with writing this  blog entry because my internship supervisor was confused about something I wrote.  As a wish on the Yoko Ono Wishing Tree, I wrote down "World Domination" as a wish, partially just trying to be humorous.  My supervisor asked me to write about the Wishing Tree and its point, since I seemed to have missed it. So here we go...

Nomadic Grove is a large installation by Rebar, now on the Plaza in Front of the Contemporary Jewish Museum. It was strategically placed there in order to draw a connection between the indoors and the outdoors, a theme in the new exhibit Do Not Destroy: Trees, Art and Jewish Thought.

At first, only one of the trees of the Nomadic Grove was designated towards wishes, but this concept was so powerful that people decided to involve the adjacent trees. This is a true example of how art can evolve and grow from one little girl tying white ribbons onto a tree into hundreds of people illustrating their own wishes. 

Another intern, Evan, wrote this wish: 
"that all may have a spring in their step"

Among the Nomadic Grove, there is a special tree, one that takes part in Yoko Ono’s series of Wishing Trees. This work of art was designed to allow visitors to write down their hopes for the world and inspire others to do the same. This idea was inspired by her memories of her childhood; she would tie white ribbons onto a tree close to her temple so that they would resemble white flowers.




For my revised second wish, I will be wishing for wealth equality for the world. I realize now that even though I was just joking around with my first wish, that wishing for world domination did not fit with the artists' intent for this project.  To me it seems unfair that a very small percent of the global population enjoys excessive wealth while a greater majority live in poverty without their basic needs being met. This is a better wish for this project.


Now it’s your turn, 
what will you wish for?

Trees, Teens, and (lots of) Thinking

Greetings!

Francesca, Anthony, and I begin our tour of Do Not Destroy

My name is Simone and I am one of the TAC interns here at the CJM.  One of my favorite aspects of the program thus far has been the opportunity to lead tours; I love the chance to tangibly be a teen ambassador for the Museum.  Recently, we trained to guide visitors through the CJM’s latest exhibit, Do Not Destroy: Trees, Art, and Jewish Thought.  I had a particularly special chance to dive into this exhibit through my apprenticeship with Elizheva, the museum’s fabulous Jewish Community Liaison.  Under her guidance, I prepared and gave a presentation to my fellow TACs on the Jewish themes present in Do Not Destroy: bal tashchit (the “do not destroy trees” commandment in the Torah), tikkun olam (the Jewish value of repairing the world), Tu Bishvat (the Jewish new year for the trees), oh my!  

Our first tour was for a fabulous group of teens from WritersCorps.  San Francisco WritersCrops is organization that “places professional writers in community settings to teach creative writing to youth” (from the SF WritersCorps website).  The teens visited the CJM not only to tour, but also to attend and participate in “WritersCorps Live,” an event featuring readings by WritersCorps youth poets, teaching artists, and the award-winning writer Daniel Alarcón.

Right before the tour, my fellow tour guides and I learned that many of the WritersCorps students have recently learned English as a second language.  (Though we have played improvisational theater games and discussed the importance of thinking on our feet during a tour, we were not quite prepared for this curveball!)  We quickly tried to simplify our questions – “how does this work speak to the theme of environmental stewardship?” became “what did you notice?” and “do you like this piece of art?” and “how does this make you feel?”  In this exhibit chock-full of evocative art, pieces like the Jason Lazarus 16-minute video of the top of the tree that Anne Frank gazed at while hiding from the Nazis provided a wonderful context for exploration.

WritersCorps students observe Zadok Ben David's "Blackfield"

The tour was a whirlwind experience, but it was deeply rewarding and thought-provoking.  The WritersCorps students answered our questions with depth, emotion, and thoughtfulness.  Both the questions and their answers allowed me to come to the understanding that this is why I love the art at the CJM: it makes space for us to feel and have opinions.  Yes, I love art that allows me to appreciate beauty, but I have never looked at a piece by van Gogh and thought “wow, I don’t agree!”


The night was capped off by the incredible readings at “WritersCorps Live.”  It was such a treat to be able to hear the students’ poetry after being with them in the gallery.

All in all, it was a fantastic evening, and just one of many eye-opening experiences that I have had while working at the CJM.  Thanks for reading, and have a wonderful day!