Institutional Change for Museums

Marianna Pegno is Director of Engagement and Inclusion at the Tucson Museum of Art and Historic Block. In this role, Pegno focuses on building a culturally relevant, community-based institution through programs, exhibitions, and partnerships. In practice and research, she is committed to exploring the implications of collaboration and multivocal narratives in art museums. Pegno holds a PhD in Art and Visual Culture Education and an MA in art history from the University of Arizona as well as a BA from New York University. In 2018, her dissertation was awarded the Elliot Eisner Doctoral Research Award in Art Education from the National Art Education Association. Kantara Souffrant is the inaugural Curator of Community Dialogue at the Milwaukee Art Museum, where she oversees art experiences rooted in vulnerability, feeling interconnected, and building sustainable community partnerships. Souffrant is a Haitian-American artist-scholar who brings her passion for community engagement, dialogue, and facilitation to her work as a performer, educator, and community member. She holds a PhD in performance studies from Northwestern University, with certificates in critical theory, African and diaspora studies, and teaching, an MA in performance studies from New York University and a BA from Oberlin College. Her scholarship examines visual and performance art in the Black Atlantic, Black feminist aesthetics, and museum pedagogy. She is the founder of Souffrant Creative Consulting, LLC, a firm that leverages the power of dialogue, the arts, and the humanities to build authentic connections and facilitate individual and collective transformation.

Introduction; Part I: Interrogating and Redressing Colonial Legacies: Chapter 1 – Diasporic Notes on the Future and Death of Museums; Chapter 2 – Framer Framed: Constituting, Instituting and the Making of a Radical Museum; Chapter 3 – The Museum is a Portal; Part II: Rethinking Structures and Operations: Chapter 4 –“I Just Want It to Feel Like Something Real”: What Museums Can Learn from Independent Black Feminist Curating; Chapter 5 – A Case Study From Chicago: The Challenges and Opportunities of Curatorial Diversity Initiatives; Chapter 6 – A Restorative Approach to History: Prototyping New Practices at a National Museum; Chapter 7 – Mildura Migration Stories: Scenographic Exhibition Design Strategies for the Staging of Co-Authored Community Narratives; Chapter 8 – Good Morning Museum Workers: A Satire of Museums of Future Pasts; Part III: Agency and Ethics of Care: Chapter 9 – Foreign Exhibit: a tale of theft and reclamation in fourteen parts; Chapter 10 – Uneven Terrain: Stewarding New Archaeological Collections; Chapter 11 – Spirits of the Jewel Case: Initiating An Ethics of Care for Africana Sacred Arts in the Museum World; Chapter 12 – Ethical Curating for the 21st Century: Curating Black and African Art; Chapter 13 – Sustainability and Sociality: Two Urgent Commitments in Today’s Museum Policies; Conclusion; Contributing Author Biographies; Index.