As one of the few nonprofit regional conservation centers in the United States, and the only such center in the western region, the Balboa Art Conservation Center is undergoing transformational change as it shifts into a radically inclusive and accessible art conservation organization. The BACC Board helps nourish this shift while ensuring the organization's vision for inclusion has long-term systemic impact. The BACC Board of Trustees is led by Board President Dana Springs and boasts a board membership that is 50% BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color). In addition to its racial diversity, BACC board members are located throughout BACC’s service area, including Seattle, the Bay Area, Los Angeles, and San Diego. They bring a range and depth of expertise in community organizing, arts management and advocacy, fundraising, conservation, education, and financial management. Their diverse perspectives and skills are essential as BACC seeks to fulfill its vision for equity and healing within our own structure and workplace, as well as the communities we serve. Throughout 2023, we are highlighting each of our Board Members to better understand what excites them about being a part of the BACC Team at this transformative time. Kristen Mihalko (she/her) has worked in the nonprofit sector focusing on programming and community building since 2010. As the Director of Operations at the Balboa Park Cultural Partnership, she oversees a number of programs, including the Balboa Park Explorer Pass program, and utilizes her skills in communication, event planning, program development, and IDEA (inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility) to increase engagement opportunities that broaden and create an inclusive Balboa Park experience for all. In addition to BACC, she also serves on two museum association boards: California Association of Museums and Western Museums Association and volunteers her time as a Committee Member for Nonprofit Solutions in San Diego. BACC: How does your professional, community, and/or cultural work inform your role as a BACC Board Member? Kristen: I’ve worked in nonprofits my entire career which has allowed me to work with many different communities and cultures. My experience deepened my commitment to creating a world that is more inclusive, equitable, diverse, and accessible for all people. It has also given me the ability to approach topics with curiosity and to think more critically. These skills allow me to better support the many efforts of the BACC team and work alongside my fellow board members to build a board culture that is collaborative, supportive, and community-centered. B: What excites you most about being on the BACC Board? K: I love learning about all the amazing work happening at BACC. Leticia is leading a fantastic team of professionals and I very much appreciate their commitment to creating a more inclusive and equitable conservation field. I look forward to seeing the team grow and the implementation of a fellowship program that provides opportunities for BIPOC communities. B: If you could have one artwork or artifact (personal or otherwise) conserved by the BACC team, what would it be and why? K: This will sound incredibly cheesy but I have an oil painting on wood of my dearly departed cat, Riley. This particular painting is especially important to me because I commissioned it through a friend who specializes in oil painting. I love that not only did I have an opportunity to support my friend but that I have this beautiful portrait of my favorite cat. I miss him all the time but I enjoy passing by his portrait in my hallway every day and being reminded of him. I would love to be able to enjoy this piece for years to come. As one of the few nonprofit regional conservation centers in the United States, and the only such center in the western region, the Balboa Art Conservation Center is undergoing transformational change as it shifts into a radically inclusive and accessible art conservation organization. The BACC Board helps nourish this shift while ensuring the organization's vision for inclusion has long-term systemic impact. The BACC Board of Trustees is led by Board President Dana Springs and boasts a board membership that is 50% BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color). In addition to its racial diversity, BACC board members are located throughout BACC’s service area, including Seattle, the Bay Area, Los Angeles, and San Diego. They bring a range and depth of expertise in community organizing, arts management and advocacy, fundraising, conservation, education, and financial management. Their diverse perspectives and skills are essential as BACC seeks to fulfill its vision for equity and healing within our own structure and workplace, as well as the communities we serve. Throughout 2023, we are highlighting each of our Board Members to better understand what excites them about being a part of the BACC Team at this transformative time. Karen Coutts (she/her/hers) is founder of KC Nonprofits, a consulting firm which launched in 2011 and is focused on advancing the needs of nonprofit organizations through strategic planning, fundraising, and high level project management. Karen received her Master’s degree in art history and museum studies from Boston University and worked in museums on the east and west coasts. Over time she gained expertise in various areas including: philanthropy, strategic planning, board engagement, program development, and leadership. Hallmarks of Karen’s work style include a strong belief in her client’s missions, a personalized approach to help them reach their goals, and a warm smile. She believes every Zoom meeting should include at least one cat, dog, or child. BACC: How does your professional, community, and/or cultural work inform your role as a BACC Board Member? Karen: I’m proud to work with arts-based clients with diverse missions including art museums, cultural organizations, and historical societies. Additionally I work with a variety of groups focused on under-resourced communities that serve youth, refugee and immigrant communities. Having experience with these different types of nonprofits helps me to understand the need for more traditional conservation, as well as the importance of expanding the construct of what conservation might look like to make it more accessible and equitable. B: What excites you most about being on the BACC Board? K: Having a front row seat to the work the BACC team is doing –it will change the future of conservation, and I couldn’t be more proud or excited to be a part of that. B: If you could have one artwork or artifact (personal or otherwise) conserved by the BACC team, what would it be and why? K: When I travel I am constantly seeing art and often there are pieces where I think, “This work could use a little TLC from BACC.” Last summer I was in Italy and saw some 13th-century religious icons in dire need of help; I texted the BACC conservators with a picture of one of the paintings. They suggested they hop on a plane to join me so they could get right to work. Sadly, BACC’s nonprofit budget would not accommodate;) Right now the piece I’m most interested in seeing is Ernie Silva’s Rain House at The New Children’s Museum. This is an important artwork that has some extra special needs as it was built for kids. Not only does it need to look great, and inviting– it needs to support hundreds of thousands of kids each year climbing on, jumping around, and playing inside it. I had the good fortune of being a staff member at The New Children’s Museum when it opened to the public with this version of the Rain House in 2008 (there was an earlier Rain House from 1993). Now, I’m back as a consultant for the museum, and I know they have hopes to conserve the Rain House. It’s a vibrant piece which I know will continue to enchant families for many more years. Did I interest you in learning more about the Rain House? Visit The Rain House | The New Children's Museum (thinkplaycreate.org) perhaps you’d like to support its preservation with a donation to BACC. During the 2023 spring semester, BACC collaborated with the Museum Studies Program of San Diego Mesa College to integrate conservation knowledge into their curriculum and highlight the role of art conservation within the larger museum ecosystem. The Mesa College project is part of BACC’s larger Workforce Development Initiative. Funded in part by the Conrad Prebys Foundation, the initiative aims to engage students at all educational levels in conservation. This is essential in building a more diverse conservation sector. When considering potential careers, few students know conservation is a career path. This is especially true among communities whose cultural heritage has been underrepresented within cultural institutions and who have been excluded from arts and conservation access. Home to one of the few museum studies programs in Southern California, Mesa College’s student body is 71% BIPOC. The program is led by artist and curator Alessandra Moctezuma. The lack of awareness about conservation and preservation among the public parallels the systemic lack of arts education in this country, which predominantly affects schools with a larger percentage of non-white students, low-income, and English learners. This initiative seeks to help address these inequities by working with majority BIPOC schools to expose their students to conservation as a potential career path. The programming is developed by Associate Paintings Conservator and Programs Manager Bianca Garcia, with support from Executive Director Leticia Gomez Franco, Kress Conservation Fellow Annabelle Camp, and former graduate intern and current WUDPAC Fellow, Adriana Benavides. Over the past year, the programming has taken multiple shapes, as we have responded to the needs of our educational partners. BACC has partnered with the Mesa College Museum Studies program previously, hosting students on tours in our lab spaces. However, these have been one-time interactions without opportunity for in-depth discussions and hands-on activities. Additionally, it is essential that program faculty have the materials and knowledge to incorporate conservation education routinely into their curriculum. Following a “train the trainer” model, BACC conservators established a series of conservation education modules that could be integrated into the accepted museum studies coursework. These modules included introduction to conservation, preventive conservation and sustainability, and the ethics of conservation. Each module includes a designated exercise for students and associated resources. To test and further develop the curriculum, BACC conservators acted as visiting lecturers in the course, delivering modules on the introduction to conservation and preventive conservation and sustainability. Students were eager to learn about the field and pathways into conservation. As part of the hands-on exercises, they conducted condition assessments of objects from the Mesa College World Cultures collection and learned how to create archival enclosures for works on paper. Following the lecture, the class had the opportunity to visit BACC’s lab spaces, see the ongoing treatment of paintings and textiles, and discuss conservation ethics and approaches. By first incorporating conservation knowledge into their course content, students were able to come to the tour prepared with a deeper understanding of the conservators’ work and many critical questions. Professor Alessandra Moctezuma noted that the initial lecture “turned on the students’ critical thinking skills,” ahead of their onsite visit to BACC, demonstrating the importance of multiple interactions with students as they are introduced to this complex and multifaceted field. Following this pilot program, Professor Moctezuma is now prepared to integrate an introduction to art conservation into her syllabus, ensuring that generations of Mesa students will be exposed to the field, its value as a career path, and its role in the museum ecosystem. As one of the few nonprofit regional conservation centers in the United States, and the only such center in the western region, the Balboa Art Conservation Center is undergoing transformational change as it shifts into a radically inclusive and accessible art conservation organization. The BACC Board helps nourish this shift while ensuring the organization's vision for inclusion has long-term systemic impact. The BACC Board of Trustees is led by Board President Dana Springs and boasts a board membership that is 50% BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color). In addition to its racial diversity, BACC board members are located throughout BACC’s service area, including Seattle, the Bay Area, Los Angeles, and San Diego. They bring a range and depth of expertise in community organizing, arts management and advocacy, fundraising, conservation, education, and financial management. Their diverse perspectives and skills are essential as BACC seeks to fulfill its vision for equity and healing within our own structure and workplace, as well as the communities we serve. Throughout 2023, we are highlighting each of our Board Members to better understand what excites them about being a part of the BACC Team at this transformative time. Anya Dani (she/her/hers) is an objects conservator specializing in community-based conservation. She is currently the Director of Community Engagement and Inclusive Practice/Lecturer at the UCLA/Getty Interdepartmental Program in the Conservation of Cultural Heritage where she develops collaborative projects focused on preserving Black cultural heritage. She is also a lecturer in the Museum Studies Department at San Francisco State University, a Professional Associate of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC), and a co-founder of the Black Art Conservators Group. Previously, Anya has worked as a conservator for the Stanford University Archaeology Collections, the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology, and the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs. She received both her MS and BA in art conservation from the University of Delaware. She has particular interest in uplifting underserved communities through preservation, decolonizing collections stewardship, and increasing racial justice, equity, and inclusion in cultural heritage conservation. Although she’s moved around a bit, Anya mostly grew up in Delaware. She currently lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her husband, two kids, and a cat. She loves baking, lindy hop dance, and slowly nurturing her California native garden. BACC: How does your professional, community, and/or cultural work inform your role as a BACC Board Member? Anya: I’m a trained objects conservator who has worked at cultural institutions and universities both in the US and abroad, so I have a wide understanding of the conservation field and bring an insider’s view of conservation to the Board. My international work (I lived in Japan for 10 years) has helped me realize that conservation can come in many forms. I also have a background working on diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA) in conservation. I want to help the BACC Board incorporate DEIA values into everything that it does. B: What excites you most about being on the BACC Board? A: I am most excited about supporting BACC’s radically inclusive vision for conservation. I believe that the conservation field needs to evolve in order to thrive, and BACC is a shining example of how to partner with communities and center equity in conservation. I want to do whatever I can to help BACC expand its scope, to partner with historically underserved communities, and to help preserve a wider range of cultural heritage. B: If you could have one artwork or artifact (personal or otherwise) conserved by the BACC team, what would it be and why? A: Even though I’m a conservator, I’m not a paper or photo specialist. So I would love for BACC to conserve some family crayon (early photography) portraits that I have at home. They probably date to the late 19th century. The photos are yellowed, brittle, and in much need of help. Throughout the 2022-2023 school year, BACC collaborated with Herbert Hoover High School to introduce students to art conservation and engage them in the treatment of “Girl Reading,” a sculpture located in the school’s library. The sculpture was carved by Donal Hord in the 1930s. Other works by Hord, which he carved in the 1930s as part of the Works Project Administration, can be found throughout San Diego. The Hoover High Project is part of BACC’s larger Workforce Development Initiative. Funded in part by the Conrad Prebys Foundation, the initiative aims to engage students at all educational levels in conservation. This is essential in building a more diverse conservation sector. When considering potential careers, few students know conservation is a career path. This is especially true among communities whose cultural heritage has been underrepresented within cultural institutions and who have been excluded from arts and conservation access. Located in the City Heights neighborhood of San Diego, Hoover High’s student body is 99% BIPOC. All student participants in the project are part of the 11th-grade Sustainable Academy of Building and Engineering (SABE) program. Lack of awareness about conservation and preservation among the public is closely tied to a systemic lack of arts education in this country, which predominantly affects schools with a larger percentage of non-white students, low-income, and English learners. This initiative seeks to help address these inequities by working with majority BIPOC schools to expose their students not only to conservation but the broader arts ecosystem and career paths. The programming is developed by Associate Paintings Conservator and Programs Manager Bianca Garcia, with support from Executive Director Leticia Gomez Franco, Kress Conservation Fellow Annabelle Camp, and former graduate intern and current WUDPAC Fellow, Adriana Benavides. Over the past year, the programming has taken multiple shapes, as we have responded to the needs of our educational partner. The Hoover High programming was inspired by a request for treatment of Hord’s sculpture, which is carved from white onyx. Prior to its current display in the school library, “Girl Reading” was displayed outside for decades. It was therefore very grimey, stained, and has lightly carved graffiti in numerous areas. When contacted for treatment, BACC turned the opportunity for a contract into an opportunity to educate students on the field of art conservation and the role of preservation in sustainability. SABE English teacher, Julie Millen explains the importance of the project within the larger Sustainability curriculum: “Sustainability is about keeping what we love and what’s important for the world alive and well. For us, preserving art is more than just preserving objects; it’s preserving history, culture, and all of the things that make humans special, and that’s worth sustaining; it’s worth preserving; it’s worth keeping.” BACC conservators worked with the educators to build a curriculum that integrates history, English, engineering, and chemistry, while investigating the history and care of the sculpture. BACC began by presenting to the 100 11th-graders participating in the SABE program to introduce them to conservation, where it fits within the arts and culture ecosystem, and the questions we must consider prior to undertaking a conservation treatment. Following this initial introduction, students came to the BACC labs in Balboa Park to gain a better, first-hand understanding of conservation practices and decision making. Students participated in hands-on activities in paper conservation, received a tour of the paintings conservation lab, and learned about the agents of deterioration. Students engaged in conversations on conservation ethics and ways to mitigate the agents of deterioration currently affecting “Girl Reading.” Following discussions with students, teachers, and alumni and based on testing conducted by BACC conservators, the statue was cleaned with student assistance. Conservators Bianca Garcia and Annabelle Camp selected a methyl-cellulose poultice for cleaning, which students helped to apply and remove. The cleaning formula selected was nontoxic and allowed important cleaning concepts, such as chelators, surfactants, pH, and capillary action to be demonstrated and explained to students. Students were eager to engage in cleaning and demonstrated a clear pride in preserving the school’s cultural heritage, as well as shock at how much grime came off of the sculpture surface! Additionally, because the sculpture was treated in situ, students outside of the SABE program and teachers were able to observe as they entered the library and ask questions. BACC conservators were also interviewed for the school news, ensuring that knowledge of BACC and the field of art conservation reached the entire student body. The Hoover High collaboration resulted in the successful treatment of the sculpture. More importantly, however, it empowered the students to care for this sculpture they are accustomed to seeing daily, encouraging them to become increasingly committed to and engaged in the preservation of other art and cultural heritage throughout their communities. |
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