CU Art Museum News - May 2021 Newsletter

The CU Art Museum will remain closed to the public while the university continues to monitor the impacts of COVID-19.

We miss you and are committed to bringing the museum into your home by examining artwork in the collection as seen through a variety of personal perspectives. Please check out our virtual Close Looking programs and follow us on Facebook and Instagram.


This month Traci McDonald, our Visitor Experience Coordinator, responds to a work in our collection. 

Working with our fantastic student museum attendant team has always been the highlight of my responsibilities at the CU Art Museum. Our museum attendants are energetic, kind, and genuinely interested in the work they take on at the museum. One of the biggest losses to me this year has been missing the time working with them. When campus went remote in March 2020, the museum closed, and student employees went remote as well. It has been a challenge to shift a team of front-facing employees to working entirely on a screen. Without a physical museum it seemed impossible to find a place for our student employees.

During the pandemic, we have been able to keep a few students on board as we explore this new way forward. These attendants have been tasked with helping us develop ways to engage the student community. The team jumped in enthusiastically. They put together surveys, spoke with their peers, and created remote programs. We have all learned from that process and after some review, the student team is adapting the planning process further. We hope their findings from this past year will inform student programming in the future.

This past year has been a meander. Some days were sharp turns, others were steadier flows. Just as in Anni Albers’s Orange Meander, the turns are ongoing. Our students too are on this ever changing path. We are lucky to have been a short stop for them as they go through their life. I hope that as they move along on their journeys, they’ll remember the great work they did for the museum and maybe even loop back with us on occasion.

Image Credit: Anni Albers, American (1899-1994), Orange Meander, 1970, edition 74/75, screen print, 27 7/8 x 23 7/8 inches. Gift of Johns Manville Corporation, 99.12. Photo by Wes Magyar, © Anni Albers / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.


Virtual Activities

During our COVID-19 closure we’ll be sharing artworks from our collection so that you can do some close-looking exercises from wherever you are. Invite a friend and do it together (virtually or physically distanced) to spark conversation or do it by yourself for some relaxation. And check out our new collection object inspired coloring book pages, available for free download here. 

Spring 2021 Master of Fine Arts Candidates Conversations
Virtual conversations with University of Colorado Boulder Master of Fine Arts candidates and Arielle M. Myers, Wednesdays, May 12, 19, 26, 6:00—7:00 p.m. 
Click here for more information.


In The News

Math alum sows seeds of diversity in art: $25K gift establishes Diversity Acquisition Fund at CU Boulder Art Museum

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