Susan Gail Johnson Museum Consulting

07/24/2022

Check out my review of the exhibition There and Back: The Journey to Vietnam and Home at the Vietnam Era Museum for New Jersey Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal

https://njs.libraries.rutgers.edu/index.php/njs/index

05/07/2021

I'm thrilled to announce the launch of Jacqueline Hudson's website! Jackie is a 4th Year PhD student (ABD!) and emerging museum professional. She says "I look for innovative ways to tell under-told stories of the past from underrepresented communities — to understand the present in order to inspire future generations." Check out her amazing work - and give her a call if you need a curator!

I am a fourth-year doctoral candidate in the American Culture Studies program at Bowling Green State University and an emerging museum professional. I look for innovative ways to tell under-told stories of the past from underrepresented communities – to understand the present in order to inspire f...

03/17/2021

I highly recommend checking out this NYTimes OpDoc from the wonderful video artist Neil Goldberg. In 2012 I was lucky enough to work on his exhibition Stories the City Tells Itself at MCNY. His work creeps up on you - it seems simple, yet it is anything but.

In this new short film, an artist finds hope in an unlikely place — the city’s storefront gates, rolling up day after day.

03/12/2021

New on the blog, Close Readings, a look at a quiet Metropolitan Museum of Art, and missing those normally big, loud, crowds.

The normally boisterous Met was quieted by the pandemic, and it's vast atriums missed it's usual crowds.

02/19/2021

Sometimes 19th-century cartoons are funnier than you might think. This edition of my new blog Close Readings features an artifact from my personal collection, found while doing research for my essay in the exhibition catalog Gilded New York. It takes a deep dive into what, exactly, makes this cartoon funny, and what it can teach you about how funny Gilded Age New Yorkers really were.

Sometimes 19th century satire is just as funny today as it was then.

01/31/2021

Seems like a lifetime ago that Sean Corcoran and I were looking through unpublished photos for an exhibition to celebrate Jackie’s centennial- what a great opening party that was!

Jackie Robinson, the Brooklyn Dodger who broke The MLB's color barrier, was born in 1919.⚾
📸 Frank Bauman/Look magazine, Baseball - Brooklyn Dodgers - Jackie Robinson, 1949 Museum of the City of New York X2011.4.12183.33

01/29/2021

I'm thrilled to introduce my new blog, Close Readings, looking at the stories museums tell through art, artifacts, and architecture. Check out the first post, A Visit to Pandemic MOMA.

We walked into the gallery and there he was, Jackson Po***ck. One: Number 31, 1950. Seeing a star of MOMA’s collection can be like visiting an old friend, and seeing it free of the usual crowds was transformative.

01/02/2021

Check out this podcast with the great Autumn Nyiri talking about the amazing new exhibition she curated for the Petersen Automotive Museum about custom off-road vehicles. They talk about off-roading, making exhibitions, and some of the more important differences between New York and LA. A great listen.

We are The Trailchasers Podcast, a weekly audio production show that highlights people, products, and services in the offroad and overland communities. If you have a story to tell, we want to hear it.

12/31/2020

I love this - thanks, Autumn Nyiri for sharing.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vAJrVXaPe9s&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR3vK193QUmw_4wt9vyB6PIuEbXC7Qrv1yMHcq9SDZC1AAC0Sd_ZEO17Z1E

MinnMax's Ben Hanson walks through the best museums in video games this year with the curator/chair of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum's space ...

12/01/2020

It's - if you have the means, and love a museum in your community, please consider making a donation. According to the AAM, 1/3 of US museums are at risk of closing permanently due to the pandemic, and more than half only have enough operating income to make it through the next 6 months (more than 80% have a year or less of operating income).

Museums are not just good for the cultural and emotional life of a community, but they have a direct economic impact. In 2016 museums contributed $50 billion to the GDP, 726,200 jobs, and $12 billion in taxes to local, state, and federal governments.

Between October 15-28, AAM and Seattle-based Wilkening Consulting conducted the second iteration of a survey of 850 museum directors to assess the impacts of COVID-19 on the museum field. The surve…

11/26/2020

When I was at MCNY I got the biggest kick out of these Carl Van Vechten photos of the Macy’s parade, imagining the Harlem Renaissance Bon Vivant in some fab apartment on the route, snapping away.

We can bear-ly contain our enthusiasm for the holidays! These gorgeous images of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade are now on display across NYC on LinkNYC kiosks. Let us know if you catch a glimpse!
📷: Carl Van Vechten, 1945, Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, X2010.8.227, ©VanVechtenTrust