I N D I A N A S TAT E M U S E U M A N D H I S T O R I C S I T E S
CROSSROADS EMPLOYEE NEWSLETTER AUGUST 2022
HANGING
PICTURES AT AN EXHIBITION At the 98th Hoosier Art Salon, which opened on Aug. 27 at the Indiana State Museum, visitors will see 150-plus works by artists from around the state. What they might not notice – but should – is the artistry involved in hanging the exhibit to make it look as impressive as possible. That’s the work of Meredith McGovern, the museum’s arts and culture collections manager, and Ron Kellen, exhibit preparator/production and lighting specialist. Once the judges selected the pieces that won awards, McGovern and Kellen spent a solid week organizing, laying out and hanging the art that now covers the walls in the Ford Gallery. Here, in her own words, McGovern, who’s been with the museum for 17 years, explains the process. I didn’t know how to hang an art show until I’d been here for several years. It’s something I really enjoy doing. I work with the art collection here at the museum, and so I’m always handling art in my everyday job. So, it became one of my projects – I’m handling the art, I’m getting it to the gallery, I’m helping hang it. Initially, I didn’t design the show. The Hoosier Salon would contract with someone, or one of their volunteers would do it. I took over laying out the show three to four years ago. Laying it out, you have to have an eye for design and understand the balance, finding pieces that complement each other and recognizing when you don’t have that yet. It’s a real team effort to get this into the
building. Coordinating with the Hoosier Salon, the artists and our staff. The first day is daunting. There are 150-plus pieces. How do I make sense of this? Usually where I start is I try to divide them by size. Trying to fit everything in the gallery is my first challenge. So, I start with the largest pieces and try to set large pieces on the walls because I know I’ve got to get those in. From there, I can get the medium pieces and then the smaller pieces in. But trying to set the large ones around each wall – that’s my first task. How can I get a good mix so it’s not all oil paintings next to each other or all abstracts on one wall? I want to make sure abstract work is mixed in with traditional landscape with the portraiture so that as someone’s
coming through the gallery, it’s not like they’re seeing the same thing over and over. You don’t want to walk through a gallery and there’s 20 faces lined up. You lose something. But by spreading them out, it becomes a treat to see a portrait among a landscape among an abstract. I want to get a good blend of what we have on every single wall. From there, I’m looking at elevations. I don’t want anything to be stacked too high. I try not to stack three high because it takes away from the artwork. When you’re craning your neck to see a piece, that’s not what we want. We want people to come through and have a comfortable experience viewing the artwork and for each artist to be able to have a good representation. We want continued on next page