During the summer of 2019 I participated in a collections management internship at The Witte Museum, a natural history museum in San Antonio, Texas. While there I worked under Leslie Ochoa, Director of Collections, at the offsite warehouse, which houses The Witte’s entire private collection. My report will describe the institution and explain my projects.
The Witte underwent a renovation and expansion within the last five years that allowed for the introduction of contemporary techniques and spaces. The Witte continues to innovate collections, exhibits, and staff in order to promote education and bridge the gap between science and culture. These goals require a diverse staff, including curators, volunteers, social media directors, and office managers. As I mentioned previously, I worked under the Director of Collections, which gave me a close look at collections management as a whole. For example, Leslie Ochoa worked closely with a variety of people, i.e. vendors, curators, volunteers, and museum fellows; organized events, and maintained artifacts. However, her overall role is to give curators easy visual access to artifacts as a means to efficiently plan exhibits. My goal was to assist in this task by rehousing the North American plains and prairies collection, which was in boxes during the renovation.
I mostly worked at an offsite facility, which is in the southeast side of San Antonio. Unfortunately I cannot give an exact location because the Witte aims to preserve and protect the collection. This facility houses a little over 300,000 artifacts from all over the world. In fact, there was everything from dinosaur bones to automobiles. Most artifacts are on shelves but sometimes they are in boxes, on palette or hanging up. The Witte’s extensive collection at the warehouse is separated by geographical region. For example, there is a world history section, a Texas history section, a North American northwestern section, a plains and prairies section and even a military history section.
I was put to work on rehousing the ethnographic materials from the North American plains and prairies collection. The North American plains and prairies span from Canada to Texas and were home to many tribes, including Sioux, Apache, Comanche, Cheyenne, Arapaho and more. The ethnographic material in this collection contained textiles, personal gear, weapons, toys, shoes, and religious artifacts. There are a wide variety of materials in this collection — as some artifacts were composed of leather, silver, fossils, shells, stone, beads, and feathers. Often times, the ethnographic materials were covered in colorful beads that formed a variety of geometric shapes. In short, to properly rehouse artifacts, one must sort the artifacts, build a housing object for the artifact, and properly secure and store the artifact.
The first step to rehousing artifacts is to properly identify and catalog artifacts. The best way to do that is to sort them by type. For example, I will focus on rehousing personal carrying gear, which includes artifacts such as bags and pouches. Personal carrying gear is a category given in the Nomenclature 3.0 book provided to me by the Witte.
To assist and simplify the process, the Witte uses a cataloging program called Re:Discovery. To properly use Re:Discovery it helps to know the artifacts accession number. The accession number is the number assigned to the artifact as soon as it has been transfer to the Witte’s care. The accession number will vary slightly –depending on when the artifact was acquired and if the artifact was bought, gifted or borrowed. Once an accurate accession number is assigned, Re:Discovery provides employees and volunteers with a single place to find almost all the information on those artifacts. Re:Discovery became particularly useful when maneuvering through a very full box, because it provides a thorough description and sometimes there will even be a photo of the artifact. Vital information such as who provided it to the Witte and if it is on loan to another museum are often linked to a specific accession number as well.
Once the artifacts were sorted and grouped together — the focus shifted from desk and computer work to a more hands on job, because I had to create housing objects. The dimensions of the artifact dictate the kind of housing object that will be needed. For example, pouches, which tend to lie flat, are housed in tray like boxes that have a lid for easy vertical storage. However, moccasins are housed in a square tray with a vertical wall dividing the middle. Creating trays for artifacts (specifically pouches) proved difficult, because each tray had to slide neatly into the shelving system. This meant that careful and accurate measurements were imperative. Secondly, each artifact in the tray has to be 2 inches away from the edge and each other to avoid artifact damage. I had to factor in these barriers when measuring the blue board material I used to design the housing trays. Once I had constructed the trays, I added a layer of protective Valera foam as a bed for the artifacts.
Preserving the artifact and maintaining its structure is paramount when considering how to secure the artifacts in or on their corresponding trays. Often times, as in the case of the pouches, it is best to tie the artifacts down by first using an awl (a tool to punch holes in materials) to create holes for the ribbon.
Finally, all artifacts must be laid flush with the housing object to prevent any warping or damage of materials. All artifacts must be labeled with the proper accession number and a brief description. This is a critical step because it provides easy visual access for curators and researchers. The final location of the tray (for example: section plains and prairies, row a, unit 1, shelf 1) is worth noting as well because that can be transcribed in Re:Discovery.
Although the Plains and Prairies collection was my main project, I also learned how to properly clean a panoramic photo, saddles, armory, and moccasins. This often involved using a Nilfisk vacuum. A Nilfisk vacuum’s controllable suction makes it a helpful tool for collection managers, because the more fragile the artifact, the lower the suction needs to be. For example, a panoramic photo will need a much lower setting than a leather saddle unless the saddle is heavily damaged. Another helpful tip when vacuuming an artifact is to move the vacuum brush in the same direction to avoid spreading any damage or microbes.
This training in properly cleaning artifacts came in handy when starting my second small project, de-installing this years Fiesta Exhibit. Due to the Witte’s location in San Antonio it has a vast collection of dresses and costumes from the annual festival, “Fiesta San Antonio”. The size and variety of this collection gives the Witte the opportunity to create an annual exhibit that coincides with the festival. This summers exhibition showed textiles from the Court of Space and Time, which took place in 1969. The Witte enjoys a few spaces that allow for rotating exhibits and “A Blast from the Past: Fiesta ‘69” was one of them. Some of the gowns were upward 100 pounds because they are covered in beads and jewels. One dress in particular has the solar system decorating the train and it took three fully grown adults to get it down from the wall.
In order to efficiently de-install this exhibit a group of collections volunteers and past interns, including myself, were asked to assist in the task. We consolidated the tools needed to complete the project and began by cleaning the costumes with a Nilfisk vacuum. As a team, we proceeded to repack the textiles and separate loaned items from owned items. Finally we loaded the owned items into a truck and retuned them to the correct location in the warehouse. The exhibits department helped de-install the walls and palette floors that supported the mannequins and drove the truck to the warehouse.
A background in anthropology will prove helpful in a museum setting because it takes a holistic prospective on cultural norms and items. As a collection manager works extremely close with a variety of items, it is imperative that individual understands the value of living heritage. An artifact may just look like a peyote pipe to some but others will recognize it as a ceremonial artifact that is linked to a vibrant culture. People working in museum studies should understand the priceless living heritage that they are charged with taking care of and managing. In some cases individuals in the museum field will work with other countries, cultures, or even governmental systems that will require understanding cultural relativity and the importance of accurately representing a culture.
While interning at the Witte Museum I developed a skill set that operates behind the scenes of a museum, which I found particularly interesting because I would have never known of its crucial role. My past three months at the Witte have left me with an extremely broadened scope of what the museum field holds. As I mentioned earlier collections management was not the only thing I was exposed to, I was also exposed to PR agents, office managers, exhibit teams, event planners, and volunteer coordinators. Although I focused on collection management and will continue to do so, there is a vast range of job opportunities in a museum. Before this experience I had the goal of attaining a firm understanding of collections management and I think that Leslie Ochoa exposed me to a fair amount of aspects of the job. I think I was most pleased when it came to actually working with the artifacts but, second to that, the collaboration between teams was exciting and extremely successful.