Commons institutions won awards at the Media and Technology 20th Annual MUSE Awards, held on April 30 at the Loews Philadelphia!

Podcasts
Gold: George Eastman House for General Collection Podcasts.

Video
Silver: National Portrait Gallery (Smithsonian Institution) for Presidents in Waiting.

Interactive Kiosks
Bronze: Library of Congress for New Visitor Experience.

Multimedia Installations
Hon. Mention: National Museum of Natural History (Smithsonian Institution) for Digital Wayfinding.

Community
Hon. Mention: Royal Observatory, Greenwich (National Maritime Museum), for Astronomy Photographer of the Year.

Also Heard around the Commons:

• How We ‘May’ Protect Our Cultural Treasures: from the Library of Congress.
• The Powerhouse Museum celebrates its Commons collection by awarding copies of ‘Then and now: stories from the Commons’ to their blog commenters!
• They also announce their acquisition of the Bruno Benini archive.
• The Global Legal Information Network (GLIN), a database administered by the Law Library of Congress, wins an Excellence in Government award.
• TIMBER! The Oregon State University Archives presents historic mill pictures in the Harold Frodsham Photographic Collection.
• The Smithsonian’s Chandra blog resolves a galactic mystery and interviews Eli Bressert, the guy responsible for making the Chandra images. Wow. That’s a cool job.
• SQUEE! Cute overload with baby leopards at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo.
• Podcasts: ‘Face-to-Face’, from the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian.
• Petrina Foti, Computers Collection at the NMAH, Smithsonian, processes objects from Ralph Baer, the Father of the Video Game.
• The Source: news about digital libraries and library innovations from around the web, every Friday, from the National Library of New Zealand.
• ‘Visualizing search data: What’s the right amount of visibility?’ from the New York Public Library.
• ‘MW2009 Clouds, Switches, APIs, Geolocation and Galleries – a shoddy summary’, by Seb Chan, Powerhouse Museum.
• Call for submissions to the 2009 Bradford Animation Festival by the National Media Museum.
• The State Library of Queensland, Australia, reports on the success of ‘Discovering Queensland’, their community history course. They’ll hold another in October.
• Podcast of the DC Public Library Board of Trustees Meeting, held on March 25, 2009
• Notes from Anzac Day, by the Australian War Memorial.
• Join the Museum Twibe. It’s a Twitter thang.
• Sowing Culture: an interesting blog on history that we ran across this week when they linked to our Morse post.

A Call to Action:

Enter The Smithsonian Institution’s YouTube Video Contest. Tell them how to position the Smithsonian for the New Media Generation.

Go Visit!

Just opened – I Do Solemnly Swear: Photographs of the 2009 Inauguration, at the National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution. See some of them online at CNN.

April 30 through May 4 - drop by the Smithsonian Institution’s Traveling Exhibition Services booth at the American Association of Museums annual meeting in Philadelphia.

May 2 - Target First Saturday at the Brooklyn Museum; enjoy free programs of art and entertainment from 5–11 p.m.

May 7 - Star Trek IMAX, the new film by J.J. Abrams (Lost), screens at midnight at the National Media Museum! Beam me up, Scotty, with a racy, young James T. Kirk, too.

May 7 - Poet Laureate Kay Ryan reads at the Library of Congress in the Coolidge Auditorium.

Throughout May – Asian Pacific American Heritage Month at the Library of Congress.

Heard around the Commons:

• Anzac Day across the Commons. The Australia War Memorial has an excellent tribute and a report on the Simpson Prize awarded for Anzac Day.
• The John Oxley Library (State Library of Queensland, Australia) records responses on the Apology to Australia’s Indigenous peoples and also reports on the Anzac Day presentations.
• The Library of Congress reports that the World Digital Library received 14 million page views between Tuesday and Wednesday its first week.
• For Earth Day, the Oregon State University Archive recommends “The dawn of the color photograph: Albert Kahn’s archives of the planet” by David Okuefuna. Check out more of the OSU’s Earth Day resources here.
• Opposing viewpoints laid out at the Smithsonian 2.0 Forum.
• The WaPo reports on the 77 American self-portraits now on display at the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution: ‘Reflections/Refractions: Self-Portraiture in the 20th Century‘
• We Are What We Photograph: an article by Merry A. Foresta, Smithsonian Photography Initiative.
• Lincoln’s Other White House: a podcast from the D.C. Public Library.
• The Spider and the Web: an online experiment by Dan Cohen. He posts an item from the Smithsonian Institution to Twitter, asking for it to be identified. I’m anxious to see the results.
• Smithsonian Institution Facebook Page Fans: How to add their updates to your newsfeed.
• Let Freedom Ring: an article by the Smithsonian Photography Initiative on what’s legal to photograph.
• How stuff happens: H.R.586 – Civil Rights History Project Act of 2009: to direct the Librarian of Congress and the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution to carry out a joint project at the Library of Congress and the National Museum of African American History and Culture to collect video and audio recordings of personal histories and testimonials of individuals who participated in the Civil Rights movement, and for other purposes.
• The Powerhouse Museum describes the assembly of the astrographic camera.
• Meet the conservator at the Brooklyn Museum: Carolyn Tomkiewicz explains the process of arranging the debris.
• The Brooklyn Museum approves an API key for an iPhone app.
• A study by Simon Tanner at the Mellon Foundation on the cost and policy models adapted by US arts museums in arriving at pricing structures for delivering imaging and rights services.
• Don’t miss the Friday wrap-up of digital news and notes that the National Library of New Zealand puts out weekly.
• The Telegraph and Argus discovers hidden treasures at the National Media Museum.

More Info from the Museums and the Web 2009 Conference:

Shelley at the Brooklyn Museum says, Paula Bray and Seb Chan from Sydney’s Powerhouse Museum came to visit us on Monday. They just produced a Blurb book from their materials on the Flickr Commons and Brooklyn had done a Blurb book for Click! so we made a trade!

Brooklyn Museum

With the Powerhouse peeps (Seb and Paula) at dinner with the dinos in the Australian Museum.

Shelley Bernstein

Go Visit!

23-25 April 2009 – The Rochester International Film Festival at the Dryden Theater, George Eastman House – Celebrating the festival’s 50th year, this event hosts films from around the world.

Through April 26 – Photographs by Andy Lock at the George Eastman House.

27 April – An EPA official discusses global approach to environmental challenges at the Whittall Pavilion, located on the ground floor of the Library of Congress’s Thomas Jefferson Building – this event is free.

28 April – The Federal Writers’ Project will be the focus of an excerpted film screening and panel discussion, “Soul of a People: The WPA Writers’ Project,” in the Mumford Room on the sixth floor of the Library of Congress.

Starting 30 April – Directions by Walead Beshty, at the Hirshhorn Museum (Smithsonian Institution). “Beshty’s mesmerizing photographs blend an enduring fascination with modernist visual culture and an astute inquiry into the nature of photography.”

Courtney Johnston, National Library of New Zealand, explains the joint uploads in the Commons today that honor Anzac Day:

Kia ora everyone

On 25 April New Zealanders and Australians mark Anzac Day, the anniversary of the 1915 landing of Allied troops at Gallipoli / Gelibolu Yarımadası in Turkey, and the beginning of the nine-month long Gallipoli Campaign.

This year, Australian and New Zealand members of The Commons are marking Anzac Day by making a joint upload of photos either taken in Gallipoli, or relating to Anzac Day celebrations. (Thanks to Ellen at State Library of New South Wales for sparking this idea off.)

First up is the National Library of New Zealand. Courtney points out two photos from this set that illustrate life in the trenches, ‘the interior of George Denniston’s dug-out‘ and ‘the interior of Captain Withers dug-out‘. The photographs in this set depict the Auckland Battalion landing at Gallipoli, Turkey, during World War I, incredible wartime images in the moment of action.

National Library of New Zealand

Next up is the State Library of Queensland, Australia, with images of Gallipoli landing and Anzac Day celebrations throughout the years in Brisbane, Mackay, and on the Victoria Bridge. Brenda Anderson notes of ‘Australian soldier in a dug-out at Gallipoli, Turkey‘, Could just be a photo of an ordinary bloke outside until you notice the artillery that he’s handling.

State Library of Queensland, Australia

The State Library of New South Wales offers a series of poignant portraits of people killed in action on Anzac Day and crowd scenes of Anzac Day events. Courtney says of ‘Australian Sisters on board Mooltan‘, It’s great to see some servicewomen included here too, in this photo of Army sisters en route to the Third Australian General Hospital at Lemnos.

State Library of New South Wales

The Australian War Memorial offers images of the troops arriving at Anzac Beach. Courtney and Brenda both picked ‘The first field dressing station of the 7th Battalion, AIF‘ to highlight from this set. Brenda says, I’m starting to think that pipes were very popular!

Australian War Memorial

You can find out more about the Gallipoli Campaign & Anzac Day on the NZ History website. Visit each set above by clicking through the photos or try this tag search on Flickr for AnzacDay.

April 22 is Earth Day, marking the anniversary of the birth of the modern environmental movement in 1970. Across the Commons, we bring you the beauty of our Earth from times past in hopes of inspiring you to think green for our future.

We begin at the foot of our planet, with a photograph taken on the first Australasian Antarctic Expedition, 1911-1914, by Frank Hurley.

State Library of New South Wales

From there, it’s a short hop to the Franz Josef Glacier in New Zealand, ca. 1879-1892, photographed by James Ring.

National Library of New Zealand

Journey to the vast continent of Asia in the 1890s. Here is Shiraitono-Taki, near Mount Fuji.

New York Public Library

The sweeping deserts of the Middle East are the next stop — Egypt at the turn of the last century.

New York Public Library

Cool off with a dip in the rapids at Ringerike, Norway, in the 1890s.

Library of Congress

Then, it’s off to the Americas and the splendor of the west, Yosemite Valley. Photographed by Carleton E. Watkins, ca. 1865-66

New York Public Library

We’re unable to bring you images of South America, so a challenge to all our Commons institutions: Please, upload some stunners of the Galapagos, Brazil, the Dutch Antilles or Suriname, French Guyana, Bolivia, the Andes, Chile and the Patagonias — one of you needs to represent!

In the DC area? Check out the Smithsonian’s Earth Day events.

The highlight of Friday at the Museums and the Web 2009 conference in Indianapolis was — obviously! — the  Best of the Web Awards, where the Commons community and institutions represented. (Here’s George Oates with the actual award for the Flickr Community!) But we hear a lot else went on Friday, too!

Over on the #mw2009 Twitter feed, people were taking about:

The Steve Museum Project — this one’s about user tagging, and what good it is anyway.

@10ch: Steve.museum results are remarkable. 88% of user tags found useful by staffers, 86% of which were new words to describe art. #mw2009

@smannion: Tiffany Leason on what motivated taggers: Curiosity, fun, to learn about art. Research interface didn’t exploit those. #mw2009

@smannion: Helping local museums document their collections was another motivating factor, especially for existing members. #mw2009

@smannion: @bwyman on deck with his ideas for tagging interfaces: 1) New tours based on single tags, e.g., images tagged ‘rapture’ #mw2009

Digital NZ — led by Commons institution the National Library of New Zealand — also attracted attention:

@homebrewer: Cool. Digital NZ lets users build a set of filters and then generate a custom search widget for their own site. #mw2009

@homebrewer: Data inconsistencies exposed when seen in combined results – crowdsourcing the cleanup to users. #mw2009

And Nina Simon’s talk “Going Analog: Translating Virtual Learnings into Real Institutional Change” posed challenging questions as well as provoking discussion:

@pgorgels: Museums as libraries… Back to 19th centuries study collections? #mw2009

@stevegardam: #mw2009 For Nina Simon’s organistional change workshop, how to make museums more like the web. Museums: friendly like Flickr

@georginab: ninaksimon: Don’t try to change visitor behavior, think about what they ALREADY do in your museum and how you can intervene. #mw2009

@smannion: @ninaksimon is concered about *physical* not online. If your museum doesn’t work in the physical world, it’s not gonna work online. #mw2009

But maybe it all comes down to baseball?

@smannion: Hilarious moment in @ninaksimon’s session: Q: If museum were like fantasy baseball what would you do? A: ‘I would trade my curator.’ #mw2009

More soon, including talk about the Commons!

Heard around the Commons:

Chandra telescope x-ray
A Young Pulsar Shows its Hand, 2009
Smithsonian Institution: PSR B1509-58

This pulsar is spinning around almost 7 times a second and has a magnetic field at its surface estimated to be 15 trillion times stronger than the Earth’s magnetic field. It spans 150 light years. In other space news, the Smithsonian’s Chandra blog asks, “Is it easy being green?”

• Again, happy Commonsversary to the Powerhouse Museum!
• Learn more about the Powerhouse’ Commons images impact on their image sales.
• Also, Paula at the Powerhouse informs us on the future of image licensing.
• Courtney Johnson, of the National Library of New Zealand, announces the call for contributions for the 2009 National Digital Forum Conference.
• The Library of Congress, UNESCO and 32 partner institutions will launch the World Digital Library on 21 April 2009.
• The Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs and Oregon State University renew their bond. The OSU Archives’ blog has lots of information on this historic event.
• Jacki Rand, formerly of the Smithsonian, discusses what it’s like to be a Native American working on a committee of white men to plan an Indian museum, from the History News Network.
• Art museums in U.S. hope that technology will sustain interest, from the AP. The Brooklyn Museum gets a mention.
• Also, the Brooklyn Museum discusses the results of their online quiz.
• The History Engine looks like a fun website. Hat tip to OSU.
• Marvin Heiferman, of the Smithsonian Photography Initiative, asks, “What should reality look like?”
• Gays Picket White House: a 1965 film from the Smithsonian.
• Jazz Oral Histories: the Smithsonian presents a number of clips from jazz legends.
• Voices of Slavery: Did you know the Library of Congress has these podcasts online?
• A wrap-up of the State Library of Queensland, Australia’s, 75th anniversary of the John Oxley Library.
• 11,000 Easter Eggs!
• Where’s Smithy?

Go Visit!

14 Apr 2009 – Imperial Superimpositions: The Graphing of Empire at the National Galleries of Scotland, a talk by Lee Fontanella, Carnegie Centenary Professor, University of Stirling. The photographing of Spain by nineteenth-century British photographer Charles Clifford may be understood as a visual narrative in which the image of Empire is underscored.

15-18 April 2009 A Northwest History and Heritage Extravaganza, including the 2009 Oregon Heritage Conference, the Pacific Northwest History Conference and the annual meetings of the Northwest Archivists and the Northwest Oral History Association, will take place in Portland.

Through 19 Apr 2009 – Bradford Babies at the National Media Museum, is a celebration of the babies and their families in our local community, past and present.

Celebrate World Theatre Day across the Commons!

Robert Percy Moore
Courtenay Place, Wellington, 22 February 1923
National Library of New Zealand: PA6-017

From the art of backstage craft …

State Library of New South Wales

… to the splendid auditoriums of theatres around the world …

Biblioteca de Arte-Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian

… the actors take their places.

Library of Congress

Take a respite with a group of summering actors at Harry Woodruff’s cottage in Siasconset.

Nantucket Historical Association

Or take a stroll down a Japanese theatre street.

New York Public Library

Inquire at the stage door …

State Library of New South Wales

… for your chance to perform.

George Eastman House

All the world’s a stage, so …

Smithsonian Institution

Curtain up, light the lights!

George Eastman House

We’ve got nothing to hit but the heights!

Nationaal Archief

Tour more theatrical photographs in the Commons.

Recent uploads from the Commons:

In the past, we’ve grouped these in with the Friday Carnival of the Commons. We’re now splitting out new uploads to the Commons, to help you focus on the photographs. Stay tuned near the beginning of every week.

The Swedish National Heritage Board adds to their Carl Curman set. See snowy Sweden set in a prior century.

Carl Curman – Sweden

Incredible landscape architecture from the Biblioteca de Arte–Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian. Visit Viseu, Portugal, without leaving your chair.

Viseu

The Powerhouse Museum adds to its Tyrrell set with formidable landscapes of impossible feats.

Tyrrell Collection

Heard, understood and acknowledged! The Library of Congress adds photos of marines and ships at sea to the Bains collection of news photography.

News in the 1910s

See more glorious ships of the sea from the National Library of New Zealand.

William Hall Raine

The State Archives of Florida sings the blues with Richard Williams.

Florida Folklife Collection

The bustle of Sydney, Australia, in the ’30s, as captured by Max Dupain, from the State Library of New South Wales.

Discover Collections – Sydney Exposed

They’ve also got bohemians of every sort!

Literature

Heard around the Commons:

• Catch the National Library of New Zealand’s blog every Friday for a digital library carnival.
• The Smithsonian Institution (SI) discusses museum transparency and the dashboard.
• The National Museum of American History (SI) muses about the future of digital history.
• The SI also launches the Latino Virtual Museum in Second Life.
• The Washington Post posts a great video on the great cats of the SI.
• Baby anteater born at the National Zoo (SI)!
• Powerhouse Museum asks, “Why photograph signs?”
• View the Library of Congress’s webcast “Digitizing American Imprints.”
• Watch Historic Panoramic Photographs from the State Library of Queensland, Australia — a gem of a show with insight into the library’s processes.

Recent uploads to the Commons:

Everything from the Swedish National Heritage Board is new! Try out this set of Carl Curman’s travels in Denmark, Holland and Germany. He was a physician and a scientist who did a lot of traveling abroad in Europe, to study health resorts, art and architecture.

Carl Curman – Europe

While you’re visiting Europe, the Biblioteca de Arte–Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian has another set of photos from the Mário Novais studio, all about exhibitions: agricultural, farming, industrial or service photography.

Exposições de cariz económico

Swing by France to see magnificent castles from the Bibliothèque de Toulouse.

Châteaux

The Oregon State University Archives takes you to Ireland to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day.

Whiddy Island

Don’t drink too much, though, or you’ll ride off the rails. The Nationaal Archief documents all sorts of troubles.

Ongelukken / Accidents

Did you know that the US Army set up logging camp in Oregon to build spruce airplanes for World War I? The Oregon State University Archives tells us how.

Gerald Williams Collection: Spruce Production Division

Don’t forget, all photos from the Nantucket Historical Association are new. This actor’s colony escaped the stifling city heat in summer for anything goes on the island.

‘Sconset Actors Colony

The State Library of New South Wales presents … Katharine Hepburn!

Film & cinema

Derek Powazek’s session at SXSW mentions the Brooklyn’s Museum’s Click! exhibition.

Click! at SXSW

Another captivating video from the Powerhouse Museum. The Powerhouse keeps adding to its Tyrrell Collection, too, where the photo in this video is from.

Exploring Martin Place

More scientific women from the Smithsonian! You’ll enjoy Adventures in the Morgue.

Women in Science

Go Visit!

20 Mar.–24 Apr.: Attend an interactive 6-week Queensland history course at the State Library of Queensland, Australia.

Heard around the Commons:

• The Luce Foundation Center, part of the Smithsonian, discusses how Flickr “citizen curators” help with their projects.
• The Powerhouse Museum reports on a talk given by Shelley Bernstein, Chief of Technology at the Brooklyn Museum, at the Transformation in Cultural and Scientific Communications Conference.
• Free photos, an audio report on the Commons from Radio New Zealand, featuring our own Brenda Anderson and Courtney Johnston of the National Library of New Zealand (audio file – 16 min.).
• The National Library of New Zealand summarizes the Designing & Sustaining Creative Communities workshop from Webstock, including good bits from Heather Champ, Director of Community at Flickr.
• Peer inside Lincoln’s watch, from the National Museum of American History (Smithsonian).
• Tweet! “Smithsonian Photos on Flickr Commons got as many visitors in the first 3 months, as last 5 years on our sites.”
• The National Museum of American History (Smithsonian) discusses the portrayal of women in science, a nice adjunct to its Flickr set for Women’s History Month.
• Oregon State University Archives and the Powerhouse Museum also blog about International Women’s Day here, here and here.
• Humour: Web Tech Guy and Angry Staff Person, from Michael Edson of Smithsonian 2.0.

Recent uploads from the Commons:

An enjoyable set of lighthouses from the Nantucket Historical Association, the newest member of the Commons. The waters around Nantucket are deceptively dangerous. Many boats have been ripped apart in the shoals and rips around the island, and few older Nantucketers don’t have stories about shipwrecks and disasters at sea.

Nantucket Lighthouses, Lightships, and Lifesavers

Photos of heroism from the Australian War Memorial. In the clear skies over the Western Front in France and in the Middle East, young men fought in flimsy machines of wood, linen, and wire.

Over the Front: aircraft and airmen from the First World War

The Biblioteca de Arte-Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian features photographic advertising for products, companies, and shops, produced by Studio Mário Novais.

Publicidade

The State Archives of Florida brings to life folk musicians, artisans, storytellers, folklife interpreters, and other Florida peoples and their traditions.

Florida Folklife Collection

Elegance and grace, from the State Library of New South Wales.

Ballet

I want to ride my bicycle … and you can, virtually, with this set from the State Library of Queensland, Australia.

Bicycles and more

And a re-cap on all the fabulous uploads for International Women’s Day in the Commons!

International Women’s Day

Go Visit!

18 Mar. – The Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History and the National Portrait Gallery present two films by Bonnie Kreps: Don’t Fence Me In: Celebrating Women and Girls of Wyoming and Arctic Dance: The Mardy Murie Story, a biography of a woman who played a key role in preserving the magnificent wild and scenic landscapes of Alaska.

19 Mar. – Alex Harris discusses his journey into Cuba, part of the Wish You Were Here travel lecture series at the George Eastman House.

Every Thursday – Meet our Museum at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History.