Keynote: “Radical Transformation & Co-Created Magic!”

The Day 2 keynote was presented by Nina Simon, who has been the Director of Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History for 3½ years. When she started, the museum had the twin problems of money (none) and relevance (many people in community who didn’t know about the museum).  Web 2.0 is software that gets better the more people use it (e.g. Google searching).  She asked: How can our work at the museum get better the more people participate?  She used three strategies:

1. Participation, such as crafts for all ages, seeking comments, a memory jar exhibit, programming featuring patron participation facilitated by local artists or historians.

2. Social bridging. She compared bonding (social experiences with people like us) and bridging (interaction with people not like us).  The museum's programming was designed to be intentionally bridging. (For example, having a knitting expert & graffiti artist together or a musical program with both opera and hip hop musicians, bringing together unlike audiences into one program.)  Exhibits featured opportunities for strangers to interact with 2 seats at every activity.

3. Experimentation – they featured a fire artist event. They engage in prototyping, putting out a minimally viable product and learning from what happens (repeating a theme from yesterday's session on start-up thinking).

The results: attendance doubled in first year, the cash situation improved dramatically, and they received positive feedback.
Things they learned:

Note 1: A revolution is not an exercise in concentric circles. The museum's mission and audience expanded but also changed and repositioned.  A few people in the original circle (audience) left but most stayed as many new people became museum visitors. They believe that the museum is for everyone: although not everything in it will appeal to everyone, there should be something there for you. The mission change has required some changes in attitude of Museum Board members.  They've used pop-up museums: for example, a Valentine's Day program (in a bar!) where people bring an object from a failed relationship and talk about it. 

Note 2: Invite meaningful action at all levels. For example, they email museum goers with wish list of items they'd like donated (e.g. cardboard boxes, old cds).  It gives people a chance to support museum, patrons who would like to but perhaps would not otherwise know how to support it. The participatory nature of the museum's mission involves trusting people, and patrons appreciate that trust.

Note 3: Be rigorous.  Be sure you know how and why you are moving forward on your goals: a) Who is the community of interest? b) What are their needs and assets? 3) Find projects and seek collaboration. The museum's strategies are bridging and empowering, with the goal of making the community grow stronger and more connected.

Note 4: Think platforms (rather than programs).  How to include everyone in participation?  (In ways that don’t require adding staff) One example: a website called One million giraffes that invited people to create toy giraffes, take pictures, and post on Internet.  See PopUpMuseum.org for more info on pop-up museums.

Note 5: Make space (a management strategy) for other people to take risks/to do work that is most important to them and to the mission. For example, they created a program that is a partnership between history buffs and homeless people, who work together to do restoration of an old local cemetery every Monday.  The program is run by volunteers with staff check about 20 minutes per month.  They made space for motivated volunteers to lead this.

Final thoughts:
In our daily work activities, are we spending time on important problems?
Take advantage of being a local institution rather than copying the "big chains". 
Participation is not make and take, but make and share.
Working with an artist allows patron participatory works to be higher quality, something they can be proud of.