The Exemplary Museum. Art and Academia

The Exemplary Museum is the product of an extensive, year-long study into campus art museums in the USA commissioned by the Samuel H Kress Foundation. The resulting findings and methodology are of international significance for both university museums and art museums generally. Although visitors to America's 700-plus campus art museums have almost quadrupled in the last 50 years, until now little was known about the visitor experience within them - a situation reflected internationally. This pioneering book changes all that. Focusing on "exemplary" museums - those which are models of best practice - the book explores the challenges and conditions for success for university art museums. Among the fundamental issues explored are: * how are these museums integrated into the lives of their users? * how do users interact with these museums beyond the academic curriculum? * what organisational cultures and systems best support these museums? "Few can rival the Samuel H Kress Foundation's ongoing commitment to academic art museums. Fewer have developed a deeper understanding of the central pedagogical importance of our nation's academic art museums, particularly their vital contributions to interdisciplinary learning and visual literacy. The Exemplary Museum encapsulates the Foundation's understanding and is a must-read for university and college trustees presidents, provosts, deans, and museum leaders. David Alan Robertson, Executive Director, Associatio...