back from oblivion

Or, really, back from the holidays. We've all been in and out quite a bit over the last few weeks. We've recovered from Gala, installed paintings in the Stairwell Gallery and travel posters in the Lower Level Galleries, taken down the Christmas decorations, and had our annual staff retreat. skets.

So, it's back to work, where it's just one darn thing after another. Our Native American basket exhibition, which had traveled to nine venues during 2006-2007, came back, and now we have to find a place for a lot of custom-made crates, not to mention proper storage for the baskets.

My next project is installing Spectacular Achievements: Audubon's Animals of North America. We've got a lot planned around this exhibition: a visiting speaker & reception, the Audubon ZooMobile will be here during Spring Break, a teacher workshop, and more. We also have Board and Committee meetings coming up on the double, so we are hitting the ground running this week.

Until I have pictures to post, I thought I'd point interested parties to this useful tool:

Copyright Term and the Public Domain in the United States

This chart lays out the extent of copyright and conversion to public domain for published works, sound recordings, and architectural works. When it comes to artworks, several copyrights are in play: both that of the artist (or her estate), and that of the photographer. If you wish to publish an image of an artwork, you must get permission from the artist and the photographer. Even if you take your own picture, you need the artist's permission. (Fair Use for educational purposes is exempt from this permissions process). Museums generally control access to reproductions of work in their collections, so if you are looking for a poster or print of a work of art you're fond of, find out who owns it and get in touch with that museum. The museum will have sorted out the reproduction rights already.

The LRMA Gift Shop doesn't do much trade in posters or reproductions, but we do have prints of several works available for sale: Millet's First Steps and Winslow Homer's The Fisherman's Wife.