The oral arguments for Kelley v. Chicago Park District are online over at PodcastDirectory.com.  They took place a few days ago, Thursday, September 10th, before the Seventh Circuit.

Interesting article over at WSJ.  Here is the first paragraph; click anywhere in it to access the original article:

“Artist Robert Fontenot . . . who is based in Los Angeles, bought about 50 textiles and vintage clothing items, which had been in the permanent collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Lacma), at three Bonhams & Butterfields auctions last winter and spring. One lot featuring several traditional Korean garments had been assigned an opening bid of $100 and an estimated sale price of $250 to $300; Mr. Fontenot paid $73 with fees. So far, he has turned the garments into things like a kite, a dog bed and a barbecue apron.”

The following is an email I received from MAAM (Mid-Atlantic Association of Museums):

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AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF MUSEUMS

Advocacy Update

***TIME SENSITIVE ISSUE***

Act Now! Ask Congress to Join House Appropriations Letter Supporting Office of Museum Services

Great News!  Representatives Paul Tonko (NY-21) and Louise Slaughter (NY-28) are circulating a “Dear Colleague” letter in the House of Representatives encouraging Members of Congress to join their letter to the House Appropriations Committee urging $50 million for the Office of Museum Services (OMS) at the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).

CLICK HERE to ask your Representative to SIGN THE TONKO/SLAUGHTER APPROPRIATIONS LETTER Today!

“The strength of this letter will be determined by how many Members of the House of Representatives sign on to it, and they are most likely to do so when asked by a constituent,” said AAM President Ford W. Bell.  “If enough Members of Congress sign on, it could lead to increased funding for the IMLS Office of Museum Services, which has been level-funded for several years.  I applaud the leadership of Representatives Tonko and Slaughter on this issue.”

The Tonko/Slaughter letter highlights the many educational and other vital services museums provide and asks the Appropriations Committee to support $50 million for FY10 (a $15 million increase over FY09) for OMS. These funds will help to protect collections nationwide and to help museums continue to meet the increasing demands for their unique programs and services.

To get involved in more advocacy for museums visit www.speakupformuseums.org today!

To make a donation to further AAM’s field-wide advocacy efforts, CLICK HERE.

[Personal information redacted]

Our mailing address is:

Mid-Atlantic Association of Museums

2300 N Street, NW

Suite 710

Washington, DC 20037

Copyright (C) 2009 Mid-Atlantic Association of Museums All rights reserved.

A friend of mine sent me a link to this video, and it was so hysterical that I had to share.  I’m not sure if anyone who doesn’t have a familiarity with museums will find it funny, but trust me – it’s roll-on-the-floor hilarious.

Link to original post at The Center for the Future of Museums News Department.

An extreamly geeky, law school-focused post.

Yesterday, I had the pleasure to watch some arguments before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.  Especially fun was having the opportunity to see Judge Diane Wood, who was considered as a potential replacement for Justice Souter.

I’m really enjoying the opportunity to witness lawyer, and to be able to witness how different attorneys behave in court.  It has also been really great to realize how much I have learned in the last year.  From procedural issues to legal concepts, there are so many things that have come up in just the short amount of time I have been in judge’s chambers that show how much I really did learn in 1L.

(Though, it would be nice to get those spring grades. C’mon DePaul!)

There is an interesting article posted at the New Yorker about a retrospective exhibition on the works of Frank Lloyd Wright being held at the Guggenheim (NYC).

Something I’ve always said about the Guggenheim (and I am fully aware that this is not an original statement) is that I love the building but I don’t like the building as a museum.  The space is just too gorgeous and too assertive to serve the purpose of displaying art.  The ramps are at times awkward to navigate, because they serve both as a walkway and a place to stand and contemplate the works on  display, all at the same time being slanted, putting you off-kilter while trying to navigate crowds and works of art.  The walls are all at strange angles, which is disorienting.  And while I don’t know this from personal experience, a friend who was a registration intern told me that they have to hang all the works at angles so that they appear straight to the viewers – an optical illusion to overcome the angles and slants of Wright’s design.

Some shows are well suited to the space – Cai Guo-Qiang’s “I Want to Believe” exhibition from last year comes immedietly to mind – but some don’t.  And I guess that begs the question: Should the museum bend to the art, or must the art bend to the museum?

Not that I’m a fan of the white cube aesthetic – nothing can deaden a work of art like a coffin-like all white gallery under harsh, unforgiving lighting.  But I think something can be said for spaces that introduce a little color, variations of light levels, and more human proportions – spaces that don’t try to deify the art or deaden it, but make it accessible and approachable.

Probably the best quote from the article:

“Wright died, at ninety-one, in April, 1959, six months before the museum was finished. He last saw the building in January of that year, when he was photographed looking out from the spiral ramp with the contractor, George Cohen. Notably absent from that picture was the museum’s director, James Johnson Sweeney, who fought with Wright over almost every aspect of the building. Once the architect was gone, Sweeney painted the interior white, instead of the ivory that Wright had wanted; rather than hang the paintings directly on the backward-sloping walls, where Wright wanted them to appear as if they were on artists’ easels, he installed them upright, on metal rods projecting from the walls.”

The tension between architect and director must have been palpatable at the time, and as more and more blockbuster architects build major museum projects, this type of tension has probably become (I would think) more common.

Museum building projects should not be vanity projects for celebrity architects to the detriment of the museum and its ability to perform its core function – collect, preserve, and display artworks for the benefit of the public.  If the architecture makes that function overly difficult, than the architect has failed at her project, regardless of how beautiful or important the final design may be.

Below is an email I just received from Save Ellis Island.  I was the summer Education Intern in 2007, and they are a really great organization that are doing a lot of amazing work to rescue and interpret one of America’s treasures: the public health complex on the South Side of Ellis Island.

(Save Ellis Island retains any and all copyright in this post.)

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Friday May 8, the entire “Today” show on NBC will be broadcast from Ellis Island. During the first hour (7:00-8:00 am EDT) Judith R. McAlpin, President of Save Ellis Island, will introduce “Today” show anchor Meredith Vieira to the health and legal inspections required for all immigrants entering the United States through Ellis Island. Judy will take Meredith through the experience immigrants had when undergoing these screenings. Immediately following, Matt Lauer will interview Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar who will be on Ellis Island conducting a press conference, later in the morning,  where he will discuss stimulus funding for Ellis Island improvements under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009

Save Ellis Island is the National Park Service’s official fundraising  and programmatic partner to restore and re-open the abandoned hospital buildings on the south side of the island as the Ellis Island Institute and Conference Center.

Ellis Island had the largest U.S. Public Health Service hospital in the early 20th century. Behind the three main Hospital Buildings across the Ferry Slip from the Great Hall lies an entire complex with contagious and infectious disease wards, a Recreation Hall and Outdoor Pavilion, and a host of support buildings including a laundry, laboratories, autopsy theater, morgue and more where
1.2 million immigrants were inspected for disease and treated for illnesses like measles, tuberculosis and trachoma. The complex also includes the Baggage and Dormitory building, residing on the north side of the island, built in 1908 to house immigrants who were detained on Ellis Island.

For more information ,please visit our website at www.saveellisisland.org

I think I am finally happy with my fall schedule.  The main two “issues” with the classes I am registered for are: (1) I don’t have the Evidence professor I wanted, but that’s mostly because of the two, I’ve only heard anything about one of them – this does not necessarily mean that the professor I have is not good, and the old syllabi I’ve found online make me think the class will be pretty much perfect; and (2) I really wanted Biz Orgs, and didn’t get it.  But, oh well, I can’t drive myself crazy.

The finalized class list (as of now) is:

Art and the Law
Focuses on issues concerning legal issues and the arts. Includes the international regimes for copyright protection, comparison of different national copyright systems, and definition and treatment of artists’ (moral) rights in their works. Ethical and legal aspects of international trade in art objects and antiquities, national and international attempts to control such trade, and issues involved in protection of cultural property and cultural resource management, as well a conflicts of law in the recovery of stolen art works.

Evidence
A survey of the rules governing the presentation, admission and exclusion of facts in civil and criminal judicial proceedings, including rules of competency, relevancy, privilege and hearsay.

Intellectual Property Survey
Surveys the legal interests recognized by American law in intellectual and artistic creations. Legal problems involved in the economic exploitation of intellectual and artistic property rights also are discussed.

Federal Income Taxation and Policy
Examines economic and government policy context out of which tax laws arise and ethical issues in tax practice as well as substantive tax law. Designed for those who have never studied taxation. Examines how Congress uses its revenue power to shape the economy as a whole and to implement its philosophy of taxation.

Legal Analysis Research & Communication III
Builds upon the research and writing skills established in the first-year required classes. Focuses on appellate brief writing and oral advocacy skills.

It’s like a friend’s bad relationship – you complain about it, you say you don’t want to hear one more comment or get sucked into one more conversation, but a part of you is always waiting for the next juicy bit of gossip.

The TaxProf Blog has this year’s rankings up, and DePaul is number 87. Go team go!

I admit it, I’m looking forward to seeing how the IP program is ranked. Yeah, I’m that girl.

Today I had to register for fall classes.

It was pretty exciting to be able to pick out classes, because during 1L you don’t have any say in what you take. At the same time, it was a little frustrating, because two of the classes I really wanted were full. But, I hear that people will keep re-working their schedules during the upcoming weeks, so I’ll just have to keep checking.

But, I did get two classes I am very interested in – Art and the Law and the Intellectual Property Survey. (Shocked?)

Anyway, I’d say I’m 80% happy with my classes for next semester, so hopefully by fall I’ll actually be at 100%.