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Exhibition
Mar 06, 2018
throughMay 11, 2018

Downgraded & Upcycled: A Museum Studies Seminar Exhibition About Legacy Media

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University of Richmond Museums presents Downgraded and Upcycled: A Museum Studies Seminar Exhibition About Legacy Media, on view from March 6 to May 11, 2018, at the Lora Robins Gallery of Design from Nature. The exhibition focuses on the awareness of legacy media and the potential loss of history and memories currently stored in increasingly obsolete formats.

What is legacy media? Legacy media refers to formats of storing content that are slowly becoming obsolete, such as Video Home System (VHS) tapes, audio cassette tapes, vinyl albums, CDs, DVDs, and many others that might be found gathering dust in the back of closets. These formats are being replaced by new media storage platforms such as the internet and cloud storage, smart phones, and mobile apps.  Students in the Museum Studies Seminar class explore different types of legacy media and present it as a form of experience and exploration.

About the exhibition

The exhibition features two segments, the first will focus on educational opportunities to provide viewers the resources to learn about legacy media in different ways such as the opportunity to see the inner workings of a VHS tape. There will also be information about how to preserve or get rid of legacy media in a sustainable way. The second segment of the exhibition will be a multisensory experience. Museum visitors enter a space designed to be reminiscent of a 1980s living room. The space includes different media to interact with, such as VHS tapes, vinyl records, and CDs along with players to use the media. The goal of this area is to provide visitors with a unique physical experience that only these older forms of media are capable of providing due to their physical properties. Visitors are encouraged to take their time with this section and experience the nostalgic feel of legacy media.

Students in the seminar will be given opportunities to interact with various audiences to analyze the responses to legacy media and to create a more comprehensive understanding of what legacy media means to people, particularly to different generations. The museum opening will be on Tuesday, March 6, with “Meet @ the Museums” an event catered for students at the University of Richmond. During the exhibition, children’s activities will be created for visiting school groups and for families attending the upcoming Family Day. The campus community as well as the general public are also invited to explore and experience past forms of media storage.

Organized by the University of Richmond Museums, the exhibition is curated by students in the spring 2018 Museum Studies Seminar offered by the University’s Department of Art and Art History and taught by N. Elizabeth Schlatter, Deputy Director and Curator of Exhibitions, University Museums. The students are Kristen Ciapciak, Jay Do, Lucas Martins, Morgan Mitchell, Spencer Turkington, and Kate Wiley. Assistance in developing this exhibition has been provided by Molly J. Fair, Film/Cinematic Arts Librarian, Boatwright Library, and Rob Andrejewski, Director of Sustainability, both of the University of Richmond.

Programming

Sunday, April 15, 2018, 1 to 3 p.m.
University Museums Family Day,
Lora Robins Gallery of Design from Nature
Join us for a FREE! family fun day with the exhibitions
Turtles in Time: From Fossils to the Present, Stitching Culture: Chinese Textiles from the Carver Collection, and Downgraded & Upcycled: A Museum Studies Exhibition About Legacy Media, hands-on art activities, and refreshments

Downgraded & Upcycled: A Museum Studies Seminar Exhibition About Legacy Media

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