News

If you're attending this year's joint CoSA and SAA conference in Austin or plan on following from afar, CAA will have lots of ways to keep up with the action! 

New this year, we're putting out a call for members to help out the social media team and sign up to promote your fellow CAA members' work at the conference. You can email the social media team your content or tweet/post your own content for sharing or retweeting. Sign up sheet and social media info here.

We also invite you to:

• Use the #CAAatSAA2019 hashtag when posting content on social media.

• Share any photos you take in the CAAatSAA photo folder.

• Follow our posts on Facebook and Twitter about conference activities, including CAA members’ participation in workshops and panel and poster presentations.

• Join us at the CAA at SAA meet up at Corner Restaurant on Sunday August 4 from 6-8 pm! Register here.

On Wednesday June 19th, eight members of the Chicago Area Archivists paid a visit to the Visual Resources Center at the University of Chicago. Staff members Bridget Madden and Kat Buckley gave an insightful tour of the Imaging Lab and explained how they handle their vast collection of slides and the equipment they use to digitize. 

Later in the afternoon members were taken to a classroom where Bridget illustrated the front and back end of LUNA, which is the main database for art images used by the university. Kat illustrated how she uses social media in order to promote the department among faculty and students.

The event concluded with a Q&A session and a lively discussion on challenges members face and how they approach their collections. Thank you to Bridget and Kat for being fantastic hosts and providing snacks and beverages during the event and also thank you to all who attended!

If you attended this event and took photos, please consider sharing and uploading them here.

The Outreach and Member Engagement Subcommittee held its latest CAA Reacts meeting last night, June 6, at Empirical Brewery. Five members attended, and we had a wide-ranging discussion on decentering whiteness in archives. We used Michelle Caswell and Gracen Brilmyer’s poster pages (http://www.gracenbrilmyer.com/dismantling_whiteSupremacy_archives3.pdf) as jumping-off points, and also talked about some of our own past and current projects.

Topics ranged from description (reparative processing, undoing "sanitized" descriptions, community assistance in identifying metadata, the role of memory in collecting) and appraisal (power structures inherent in being the collector); to access and use (requiring ID, experiences and treatment of people of color in archival reading rooms) and professional life (is CAA doing enough?).

Due to the wide range of points discussed, notes with links can be found here: 20190606 CAA Reacts notes if anyone is interested. 

Our next CAA Reacts will be September 10, and we welcome input on topics or speakers!

Feel free to upload any other photos taken at this event to our photo folder.

The Curating & Exhibitions Interest Group hosted a two-hour Strategies for Exhibit Content Development webinar on Friday, May 10^th, 2019 which went successfully. In addition to the CAA listserv, the event was promoted through other outside channels, such as the Chicago Museum Exhibitors Group (CMEG), RAILS and ILA Marketing Group, Chicago Hands-on Educators Group (CHOE), and direct emails. Twenty-five participants, including 12 CAA members and 13 non-members, attended to the webinar via Zoom. Based on the poll at the beginning of the webinar, half of the attendees was from libraries/archives, and another half was from museums.

The webinar was led by experienced exhibit developers, Tricia O’Connor and Charity Counts, with a focus of the processes, best practices, considerations, and tips in exhibit story development. Key areas that were covered in the webinar are ways of capturing the audiences, what science tells us about visitors that influence the exhibit design, tools and strategies on organizing content, writing labels, prototyping for best results, and recommendations on working and communicating with designers for building a strong collaboration for each exhibit projects. The webinar was concluded with a Q&A session, with questions from the attendees about the time needed for the planning, guidelines for exhibits on the web, and suggestions for creating interactive exhibits in small and open spaces and more. All participants receive templates and a list of resources developed by the facilitators.

On Thursday, May 9th, the Business Archives Group met at Hopewell Brewing Company to meet fellow archivists over a beer in Logan Square. Archivists from Studio Gang, Motorola Solutions, North Shore Congregation Israel, Shure Incorporate, Art Institute of Chicago, Gallagher, Allstate and the AMA joined us. Topics included how to get support from IT, how to navigate corporate hierarchy when you are at the bottom, what to do with an ever-changing corporate website and different DAM and digital asset learning opportunities. Thank you to all who attended and participated in the conversation!

On Friday May 3rd, members of Chicago Area Archivists, International Association of Sound and Audiovisual Archives, the student chapter of Audio Engineering Society of Columbia College  and the Association for Recorded Sound Collections gathered at Columbia College Chicago for a fruitful discussion around time based media preservation challenges and solutions.  Thank you to all who attended and participated in the conversation!

If you missed out on this event, don't worry, there are other events planned throughout the year!

Did you attend this event? Upload and share your photos here

Job title: Library Exhibition Designer, University of Chicago Special Collections Research Center

Description: The Library Exhibition Designer provides leadership and coordination for the Special Collections exhibition program and displays across the library, including all phases of planning and production for physical and digital exhibitions. The Library Exhibition Designer works with the Special Collections exhibition team to conceptualize gallery and digital exhibitions and to set production calendars. In collaboration with exhibition curators and staff, the Library Exhibition Designer produces online exhibitions and works to enhance and develop the Library’s Web exhibits. The Library Exhibition Designer acts as the project manager and oversees multiple production deadlines. For each exhibition the Library Exhibition Designer develops the overall graphic design themes, develops floor plans for the gallery and case layouts, and creates posters, signage panels, and related visual materials. The Library Exhibition Designer oversees all aspects of exhibition planning, preparation, production, and de/installation according to accepted preservation best practices. The Library Exhibition Designer coordinates exhibition-related services including photography, scanning, in-house and outsourced graphic production, media production and reformatting. The Library Exhibition Designer trains and manages part-time student assistants and freelance preparators. The Library Exhibition Designer participates in the conceptual and design development and production of printed exhibition publications and in planning outreach events associated with the exhibition program.  The Library Exhibition Designer works with the Library Director of Communications in the development of news stories and other publicity materials related to exhibitions.

Hiring manager information: Patti Gibbons, Head of Collection Management

Application deadline: position posted until filled

Official link to the job announcement: https://www.lib.uchicago.edu/about/thelibrary/employment/staff-opportunities/Lib_Ex_Design/

The view from the MAC hotel, the Marriott Renaissance Center in Detroit. Photo by Rebekah McFarland.

Attending MAC 2019 in Detroit this year was an EXPERIENCE. The wow-factor began the moment I got into my hotel room, opened the curtains, and found myself looking over a glistening river at Canada. I took a quiet moment to reflect; I had never been to MAC and had never been to Detroit. Winning the Chicago Area Archivists’ Archives and Archivists of Color Travel Fund Award allowed me both opportunities, and I only vaguely knew what to expect from either. I took in the view and my expectations--then my phone rang, and things kicked into fast gear.

It’s hard to sum up an experience that I am still absorbing. I feel like I had a whirlwind conference: meeting up with fellow archivists for the first time, attending incredible presentations, spending time with friends, seeing the city, participating on a panel, attending the reception at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, a rare quiet moment walking along the river, running into colleagues I hadn’t seen in years--I’m still revisiting it all.

Rebekah McFarland on the Imposter Syndrome panel at MAC 2019. Photo by Derek Potts.

I have to say that the moment which most affected me was participating in the panel My Comeback Story: Overcoming Imposter Syndrome in the Archival Profession with April Anderson-Zorn, Amber Dushman, Britt Farley, Jennifer Ho, Beth Loch, Danielle Nowak, and Alison Stankrauff. Presenting itself was a personal accomplishment--I had never participated on a panel before--but getting to know my fellow presenters and hear their stories has really made a lasting impact on me. Though we unfortunately didn’t have time to hear other stories during the allotted time I am still floored by the amount of support and reflection provided by people who approached me to talk afterward. I hope we all began a conversation that will keep on going.

I am so happy to have attended MAC this year. I came away feeling like a part of something bigger--a feeling I always welcome, especially as a lone arranger. I’m excited for others to have this opportunity through the Travel Fund Award, and for my own continued participation in MAC.

MAC Members gathered at the Renaissance Center in Detroit, April 3-6, 2019. Photo by Kheir Fakhreldin.

I had a great time at the Midwest Archives Conference in Detroit on April 3-6, 2019. I enjoyed the inspirational plenary by Viranel Clerard, creator of The Detroit Museum of Public Art, a robust project that grew from a tumblr page to a major documentation of Detroit’s public art and architecture. His vision and perseverance serve as a reminder that when necessary, great memory work can be done with a minimum of resources.

I identified with many of the speakers at the panel on impostor syndrome, particularly my Chicago Area Archivists colleagues Amber Dushman, Jennifer Ho, Beth Loch, Rebekah McFarland, and Danielle Nowak. See their upcoming presentation on this topic at SAA in Austin and read follow-up discussion here.

Other highlights included Lori Donovan’s panel on using Archive-It for the preservation of websites by public libraries, which is very important for the local history contained in online news articles and obituaries. I also was blown away by a panel on community oral history projects with Lindsay Hiltunen, Lindsay Mattock, Aiden M. Bettine, and Camron Amin. One note I took in that session says: “The archival impulse has to come from within the community. Community should have full control and ownership regarding preservation, etc.”

Before the conference, four of us visited John King Books, where I found a book that relates directly to a local history project of mine. My hometown, La Grange, Illinois, was founded in the 1870s by a former slaveholder from La Grange, Tennessee, who came north during the Civil War. The book was Slavery’s End in Tennessee, 1861-1865 by John Cimprich. I was grateful for the contextual information it gives my research, and because in the Amazon era, we rarely experience the thrill of serendipitous discoveries in used bookstores. If you’re ever in Detroit, don’t miss John King.

John K. King Books in Detroit. Photo by Jerice Barrios.

Code4Lib Chicago announces their spring meeting and a call for talks and breakout sessions! Registration is free, and slots for 7-15 minute talks or breakout sessions are now open. Links and more information below:

Registration is now open for the 2019 Spring Code4Lib Chicago meeting. The meeting will take place on Tuesday, May 21st at the University of Illinois at Chicago, Richard J. Daley Library in Room 1-470 from 9 AM - 4:30 PM. You can register for the conference here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/code4lib-chicago-spring-2019-tickets-60312416060

Submission for talks at the 2019 Code4Lib Chicago spring meeting is also now open. Talks are encouraged around a wide variety of topics related to library technology. Just gone through an ILS migration? Has your Special Collections department received a large donation of born digital materials that you suddenly had to figure out how to accession? Have you created a script to automate a thorny regular task? Past talks at Code4Lib Chicago have included topics such as metadata evaluation tools and workflows, Tableau, Omeka and Docker. You can find more information about past Code4Lib Chicago meetings here: https://wiki.code4lib.org/Code4Lib_Chicago

Slots for talks are open in 10 minute intervals. You can pick one slot to do a 7 minute talk with 3 minutes for questions or pick two slots for a 15 minute talk with 5 minutes for questions. 

Breakout sessions are times to discuss a topic with a group of your peers that you may know a bit about but would like to dig into more. Past topics for breakout sessions have included UX/Design Thinking, Vue.js and Institutional Repositories. There are currently five spaces booked for breakout sessions but can book more depending on interest.

There is no formal review process, simply fill in your name and the topic for your talk or breakout session in the schedule document, which you will find here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XfDZvAdAEWytWKlOFnxcB3g9CtSmnBCN1rfLQrvI8Kc/edit?usp=sharing