New Exhibit

If this article sounds a bit strange “time-wise” that’s because I wrote it as an article for the Lea County Tribune for the December 2009 issue. Rather than changing the wording I’m just putting this little disclaimer with the article to follow. Shortly I will follow-up with how the exhibit opening went and what’s to come with the exhibit.

Rather than focusing on one artifact or a group of artifacts for this article I am going to take you through some of the process of planning/putting together an exhibit, specifically the exhibit that will display items from the Virgil and Thelma Linam Collection. By the time this article is published, the exhibit should be up and open to the public but as I’m writing this we are still in the planning stages.

Why set up a new exhibit?

One of the common denominators in all museums is the fact that they present/interpret/exhibit information and/or objects. Many museums use a combination of temporary and permanent exhibits. Temporary exhibits are exactly that: they are only up for a short period of time, usually a few months to a few years. Our most recent in-house temporary exhibit was “Cowgirls: Ranchers, Ropers, and Rodeo Queens” and was up for about 3 months. Permanent exhibits are on display for longer periods of time, though not necessarily “permanently”. The exhibit of Virgil and Thelma Linam Collection objects is meant to be a permanent exhibit in the South Gallery. The concept of the exhibit will be permanent but the objects within the exhibit will rotate giving us a chance to present a greater number of objects. Rotating the objects will also help keep them safe, limiting their exposure to light, contaminants, and other agents of deterioration. This new exhibit will highlight Thelma Webber, her family, her museum, and her contribution to the community. The collection, mostly family objects, is directly related to the southeastern area of New Mexico and early life in the region. New exhibits keep visitors coming back and we are really proud to feature the Virgil and Thelma Linam Collection in our newest permanent exhibit.

Where will the exhibit be and what will it look like?

We have a limited amount of space to choose from here at the Museum and most of that space is already allotted to different exhibits. Because of the reconstructed windmill out in the front of the building we decided to deconstruct the replica windmill in the South Gallery and assign that space of about 120 sq ft to the Virgil and Thelma Linam Collection exhibit. While not a lot of space, rotating the artifacts will allow us to use the space more efficiently. Determining what an exhibit will look like all depends on the theme or topic that will be presented. In this case since it will focus on the Virgil and Thelma Linam collection, our executive director, Calvin Smith, decided it would be best to recreate the look of Thelma’s museum allowing us to present the objects in a similar context to what she had. For this, Calvin, with some help, will construct rock walls simulating the building known as the Linam Ranch Museum.

What will be presented in the exhibit?

With over 5,000 artifacts in the Virgil and Thelma Linam Collection, choosing what artifacts go on display can be a daunting task. A major factor determining what goes on display is time. It takes time to accession, catalog, and prepare artifacts for display and only artifacts that have been properly prepared should go on display. Each object needs to be cleaned in order to achieve the proper look for the exhibit and to ensure the safety of the staff, patrons, the objects, as well as the other objects in the Museum. Now there is a difference between preservation, conservation, preventive conservation, and restoration which I do not have time to go into here but suffice it to say that by cleaning and properly storing and/or exhibiting the objects we are using preventive conservation to preserve them. Another major factor is space. There are wonderful farming tools in the collection but at the moment we do not have the room for them in the gallery. Eventually we will make room but for now we need to focus on other pieces. Calvin Smith looked at Thelma’s book and found that she mentioned a few artifacts that were placed in the museum. I would like to include those pieces that really grabbed your attention when you walked into her museum. Combining those ideas and adding others, the exhibit at first will be an all-around representation of her museum. Later on we will focus on specific themes like music, prehistoric artifacts, or education. With so many artifacts we have a great opportunity to be creative and present information in different ways.

I hope this has given you an inside look into just a few of the questions that go into putting an exhibit together. There are many more questions that we have to ask ourselves before and during construction like how will this construction affect the other items and exhibits in the gallery, how often will the artifacts rotate, how will the artifacts be displayed, and more. After careful planning and construction exhibits eventually come together and hopefully offer a visually appealing and educational experience for visitors. Come out to the Western Heritage Museum Complex and Lea County Cowboy Hall of Fame to see the completed Virgil and Thelma Linam collection exhibit in the South Gallery and don’t forget to come back again later to see what’s new!