Written by Jen Oleniczak
“Museums Are F****** Awesome.”
The above phrase is written in bold on the back of a postcard handed out after every tour; Museum Hack believes it, and thinks you should too. The company is not associated with the museum, rather they are a band of renegade lovers of the Metropolitan Museum of Art that call themselves Museum Hack.
The Company
Museum Hack, at its core, seeks to get people excited about museums. While a simple thought, and common mission for all educators, it’s a complicated formula. I’ve been working as a Hacker for the past few months, leading tours with Creative Director and Chief Hacker Mark Rosen. Small in size but big in energy, Museum Hack tours are two-hour jaunts, breaking the massive museum down into individual experiences with works of art. Working with the mindset that museums should be treated like fine dining – experiences not to overindulge in – Museum Hack encourages visitors to savor the works that resonate and ignore the urge to see it all. Tours incorporate inquiry, storytelling, movement, tour guide swaps, photo challenges, power moves, and a little sass to shake up the traditional museum visit.
Essentially, the company tries to humanize museums and art. The museum is treated like an old friend you can’t wait to see again, as tours highlight the personality of the collection in an attempt to turn even the most skeptical visitor into a Met fan. As one of the largest museums in the world, the Met is daunting to even the most seasoned visitor. With that in mind, Museum Hack decided to hack in an effort to provide the kind of tasting menu that keeps visitors coming back.
Here’s a perfect example: after teaching a group about accession numbers at the beginning of the tour, and how to use them to access the Met’s online collection, I had a group using them to figure out provenance about a work – without my prompting. Before the tour, many if not all of them had no idea what the decimal number on the label was. How empowering is that to a visitor?
How is this different from other tours? Museum Hack supplements the expected lecture-based or dialogue-focused museum tour with the kind of teaching you’d expect on the best high school tour ever given, but on speed. This fearless approach to museum education is a huge part of the success of this barely five-month-old company. Tours are also $39 per person (in keeping with private tour costs in New York City) and group size is kept to a maximum of 9 participants. Thinking less tour and more adventure, Museum Hack aims to provide visitors with an experience worth every penny.
The Museum
Museum Hack is not affiliated with the Met. The Met is aware of the company, as evidenced in a Wall Street Journal piece and multiple news segments filmed on-site. As a Hacker, there have been a few times I’ve been shushed, but I’ve also been shushed in museums that employ me. A large part of the ‘why’ Museum Hack exists is the passion about the Met – everyone truly believes it is an incredible museum, and wants to share that enthusiasm.
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The Why & How of Museum Hack
Written by Mark Rosen
Why We Hack
Museum Hack was founded largely with museum skeptics in mind, those folks who know museums are important but don’t find them all too intellectually sexy. I often drop the line “people have been people since they’ve been people” while on tour to draw attention to how relateable the objects can be once you snap out of the usual museum-going mentality. While with us, we encourage visitors to be their real selves, and empower them to feel like they don’t have to change to fit the space.
We believe museums are SO much more than their highlights. That said, it seems most visitors come to institutions like the Met and end up resorting to a highlights checklist or squeezing it all into one frenzied visit. We believe museums really start to mean something when you’re motivated to hunt for what speaks to you. We’re hoping to inspire people to start to reexamine what it means to be cultured; visiting in a “got the postcard” kind of way is something, but wanting to be active and inquisitive in a visit is our idea of next level.
How We Hack
Hacking, in all of its buzzword glory, can be interpreted in a number of ways. To us, hacking involves studying the elements of a system so well that you can manipulate them to make them into something new. Make that system a “museum experience,” add in some renegade flair, and you have the core of Museum Hack. We’re building the company into a think-tank of sorts, creating space to muck with new ways of getting people to connect with museums.
Our hacking is best split into two categories: content hack and experience hack. We see the content hack as hacking the collection and celebrating its underdogs, those works in corners and thruways that you would never expect to have amazing stories. This is why we call our tours Un-Highlights tours; they’re about the hundreds of thousands of things most people breeze by on their way to the biggies. The experience hack comes in with style and the variety of activities we use to get visitors to engage in unexpected ways. You might be forced to spend seven minutes in art heaven or find yourself striking a pose and talking like a sculpture, you never know.
The common thread of all of our tours is passion. We feel people are most attracted to an infectiously passionate voice, so we encourage our guides to be unapologetically head over heals in love with what makes art and history juicy. Our scrappy team is made up of research-loving interdisciplinary thinkers who are given a toolbox but told to follow their intuition and ultimately give the tour they would give to their friends.
What’s Next?
Museum Hack is starting to think of thematic tours (Creepy Baby Jesus, The Metropolitan Museum of Butts, maybe a Ladies Night at the Met tour) and expansion to other museums. As the company continues to evolve, we’re interested in opening the conversation up to challenge our thinking and explore what more folks think of hacking the museum.
Learn More – view December 17th’s Google+ Hangout Archive
On December 17th, Jen Oleniczak and Mike Murawski connected via a Google Hangout on Air to chat more about Museum Hack and answer questions. Thanks to everyone who watched us live and tweeted in your questions. While Jen was lost from the connection for a bit, Mike kept the torch burning and we are able to have a great conversation about what Museum Hack means and what is next. There was also a great Twitter chat happening via the hashtag #museumhack (so check that out if you have a chance). Here were some of the questions we addressed — and you can watch the video below:
- How can we hack for positive change in museums?
- What does it mean to hack a museum?
- Why has the term hack become so trendy in the field?
- How is the trend of hacking going to impact the future of the field?
- Are museum educators and institutions already doing this? How is Museum Hack different from good museum teaching?
To stay connected about this and future Google Hangouts hosted via ArtMuseumTeaching.com, join the Art Museum Teaching Google Community.
Art Museum Teaching 
I’m sorry I won’t be able to join in on the Google Hangout convo, because I love you crazy kids and what you’re up to with Museum Hack.
Here’s a question I’ve been pondering to toss out there for discussion: How is museum hacking different from the kind of good, solid, engaging museum education so many of us do? I definitely agree that museum skeptics may be won over by some alternative ways of enjoying the museum experience, but we’re a creative bunch, museum educators, and we use a lot of those alternative techniques in our teaching. Storytelling and inquiry and sass and hands-on stuff and behind the scenes info are our bread and butter in a lot of cases.
Is there something different about your concept of hacking the museum? Or perhaps, does what good museum educators do (like so much of Jen’s work that I’ve seen) fit under the umbrella of museum hacking? And then, if it’s what’s being done by the folks working for museums, do we become hackers from the inside? Can one hack a system while being part of it? I guess the Matrix sort of proved that we can.
Anyway, I’m sorry I can’t join in on the Hangout, but if others are interested in some of these questions, I add them to the conversation topics.
Hi Rachel!
I actually agree with you regarding museum educators having a lot of sass and creativity – I think some of the differences that were not explicitly mentioned might add to the conversation:
A lot of times we are dealing with adults. Not ones that have gone through the tours and inquiry of our creative museum educator minds – ones that grew up with museums being the quiet, contemplative spaces with rights and wrongs. The work we are doing as museum educators completely influences this for me – I’m getting to do what I love so much in ed programs with adults.
The age is a big difference for me, but I’m really lucky to always have worked at institutions that are supportive and inspirational. From traveling with my company, I’ve realized just HOW lucky we are in NYC to have such an open mind concerning museum ed. It’s not like that everywhere, and I dare bring up the articles like this CNN piece: http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/22/travel/opinion-why-i-hate-museums/
to say that not all programs are the same.
That’s a great question regarding the Hack from the inside. The word Hack itself is a complex thing – it reminds me of the word ‘engagement’ and a wordle a fellow educator sent me when I was brainstorming names for my company. (Look it up, it made me laugh) What does a Hack mean to you?
I’ve written a lot, I’ll let Mark chime in!
Jen
Congratulations on this insightful work and the successes you’ve shared regarding the program. Mark brought up a good point when he stated, ” There have been a few times I’ve been shushed, but I’ve also been shushed in museums that employ me.”
I think perhaps some of the success with the hack concept is that the hacker is an independent freelance educator (not being affiliated with the Met). Art museum educators often find themselves spending substantial time on documenting and evaluating program successes and failures to key funding sources. Under this model, the hacker has total latitude and freedom to customize the tour to the given audience. The hacker is freed from the administrative tasks that face “in house” museum educators.
One question / consideration: What are the future direct impacts to the field of art museum education (e.g. professionalism / best practices), if we see an continued increase in the privatization of the professional art museum teacher role?
Hi Jason!
Was actually me who has been shushed 😉 And I’ll be transparent, it was by other visitors (at my other institutions), NOT staff. I’m really lucky to work for incredibly supportive and progressive museum education departments.
I also have to disagree with you regarding substantial time documenting/evaluating. At least in NYC, many educators work on a freelance basis: I (thankfully) don’t touch admin.
As I mentioned earlier, a large part of my WHY is the difference audience. The word accessible is overused, but I really feel we make the museum accessible on so many levels. A person is interested in money (re:cost) and acquisition stories? Got it. Someone wants the highlights, but with a twist? Done. Group size is so small that you can easily spend time with each person and find out what resonates with them in the museum vs a large group dynamic. Also the adults vs students I mentioned earlier in my response to Rachel.
And wow, good question! I think few institutions allow private group tours – if this continues will they all? Will they do away with it? And how can we confirm the material being dispersed is correct? We are pretty serious about research and how things are presented at MH – as zany as we are, we are nerds and art history buffs at heart. Will everyone take it as seriously?
Like Rachel, I’m sorry to have to miss the Google Hangout as it seems a fascinating discussion. But to follow up Jen, on your observation about age being one big difference. I think of museum educators as people who are able to deal with all ages and interests of visitors, not just school kids. I think one difference might be that big museum education departments have specialists, so they can just deal with school kids, or adult public programming. But for the vast majority of museums, there’s a tiny education staff dealing with the whole package of audience and community engagement. And in a small bit of shameless self-promotion, I hope readers will take a look at Creativity in Museum Practice (http://creativityinmuseumpractice.wordpress.com/) the new book by Rainey Tisdale and I from Left Coast Press, that takes a broad look at how each of us can make creative efforts like Museum Hack flourish in museum settings (whether we’re independent professionals or staff)
Hi Linda!
Thanks for your comment!
I agree with you that educators should be able to deal with all ages and interests, but unfortunately that isn’t always the case. Some friends of mine who are educators admittedly are uncomfortable giving tours for peers or adults. I think the stereotype of a museum tour for adults is an essential dump of information, a highlights exploration.
That model is true in large and small museum education departments – adult tours can become vehicles for massive amounts of information vs activity and inquiry – and it can be incredibly overwhelming for the visitor. The ‘spray and pray’ mentality we are trying to get away from happens in all kinds of institutions. Speaking from my own experience, in larger institutions, I think the educators that deal with school and family programs tend to get paid for the work they do vs a volunteer basis for adult educators.
But that is just my experience – is that the case in other museums/cities?
I’m curious, outside of our museum-centric bubble, to ask visitors what they think adult tours should include?
Great post, and awesome discussion! When I first heard about Museum Hack, I was so fascinated that something like this could live within the walls of an ‘authoritative’ institution like the Met. I wondered — what do they think about this? Are they, the institution, going to let this continue? How does this affect docents and other tours/programs happening at the Met?
Then I realized that this collision (or confluence) of museum experiences is quite inspiring, and I became instantly impressed with the Met. The museum is letting go of controlling the visitor experience and allowing a diverse range of creative experiences to happen within its walls. And the concept of hacking is certainly nothing totally new to the Met — they did, after all, host the first art museum 3D printing Hackathon (learn more: http://bit.ly/1bByriq) and their staff continue to be among those in this country who push that form of experimentation in new directions. I also know that in their school and teacher programs area, adult programs, and gallery & studio programs, the Education staff at the Met have been ‘hacking’ from the inside for years. They are working to rethink the relationship that museums build with teachers and schools; they have a history of some truly incredible adult in-gallery teaching experiences; and they recently began a new Public Practice fellowship position to allow artists a way to rethink museum experiences and forms of public engagement (http://bit.ly/1h6Wb3y).
Hacking the Met from the outside, like Museum Hack is doing, seems only so fitting at an institution that currently is quite good at letting go, allowing for unexpected experiences, and being open to unplanned directions. And I hope more institutions can begin to think more broadly about the types of experiences that can happen inside their walls. Would your museum allow Museum Hack to lead tours there?
I’m so glad that we have the Google Hangout coming up on Tuesday to unpack some of these questions and ideas. Continue posting your comments and questions here, and we’ll wrap those into our Hangout conversation.
AWESOME questions Mike! And the Met really is fantastic for letting us do what we do – I’m curious if other museums would let it happen as well?
This is something else I’m interested to see as Museum Hack goes forward: how will institutions respond. I agree, the Met has been great, and the Museum Hack Powers That Be have done a good job walking the line between unaffiliated independence and respect for the museum’s policies.
I think one of the risks Museum Hack runs is defensive museums and defensive educators. Jen, your comments above are spot on about how many museums’ adult tour experiences are some of their least creative offerings. However, that’s definitely not true for all institutions, and it definitely leaves a bad taste in museum education staff mouths to admit to it. No one wants to admit that what they do isn’t terribly interesting, and I imagine a lot of institutions and educators/programmers might not be best pleased at the idea of someone independent and unaffiliated coming in and doing something new and more exciting.
(Also, I’ll put in a plug for some of those “standard format” adult tours being engagingly presented by good, solid educators without employing all the interactive, playful elements that make up Museum Hack tours. Certainly not true of all, or even most, adult tours, but just as certainly true of some. There’s a reason that format is tried and true and has lasted so well for as long as it has.)
This conversation has brought up some really interesting questions, it has also highlighted some museum stereotypes.
I completely agree that educators might not be best pleased about a group of unaffiliated educators coming in to do something new. But I would really love to see this initial reaction turn into a conversation about sharing information and possible collaborations working along Hub lines to foster best practice. It would of course be counter-productive for Museum Hack to take such an us vs them approach.
Just putting in my two pennies worth, that the “standard format” is tried and tested can also suggest that it appeals to a very loyal (but select type of) audience. A museum’s mission (from an educator’s point of view at least) should be to strive to bring in new audiences and make collections accessible. The standard format has lasted so long but as we move forward it’s important to always strive to push boundaries to see what new ways we can both engage our audiences and prove to them that museums are relevant to them.
Hola, soy Lila Pacheco de Caracas-Venezuela. Leo inglés y lo entiendo, pero me cuesta hablarlo. Soy museóloga y aunque estudié 5 años museología en la universidad y luego me especialicé en museos de trajes y tejidos antiguos y en Conservación preventiva; pues dado que Venezuela no tiene una museología actualizada, decidí cambiar de rumbo hace muchos años. Soy también especialista en innovación tecnológica. Nunca he ido a NY, pero deliro por el MET. Creo que no me puedo ir de este mundo sin conocerlo. Me gustaría hacer algo con ustedes