Reproduce: Mommy, where do Jacques come from?

Throughout the creative process the location of where our Jacque was being created was quite ambiguous. Most of us had heard horror stories about reproduction paintings being out sourced to China where the artists are treated as...let's just say "starving artists," literally. When we received a biography of our Ocean's Bridge artist we learned that he was from China, leading us to imagine our hand painted masterpiece being conceived in China under sweatshop-like conditions.

However, on the Ocean's Bridge website there is a whole section dedicated to showing the prospective customer "the studio." According to their Web site their studio is "Located at the foot of a mountain yet just 200 yards from the beach, we've 20,000 square feet of studio space spread over three different European-style buildings." The description is supplemented by photographs of lush landscape and beautiful buildings.

I am by no means saying that Ocean's Bridge is one of the reproduction painting sweatshops mentioned above, but when our Jacque arrived this week the return address (Hong Kong, China) did make us question the journey of our Jacque.

Remember: Day one of Filming

Day one of filming was a success. Five hours of tape, one Kleenex box, and countless memories later, Grace and I managed to wrap filming three of our six interviews for the project.

Marti and Sue, two of our interviewees, were already waiting, snapping photos of themselves in front of the Jinks Room murals in various poses mimicking the figures in the murals. Both brought folders, documents, Anoakia memorabilia, and photographs to share. They each told their respective stories, shared memories and reminisced about different wild things they did together years ago– both on and off the record.

Both told stories about sneaking back into Anoakia after its closure in the 1990s, and both regretted not having a grand sleepover at the mansion, which was believed to have been the home of several legendary ghosts! The interview was an emotional process for both of them – both Marti and Sue shed tears for their nostalgia for Anoakia, and explained how important the school was to them and how they hoped it would carry on in the future through our memories. Both women were wonderful to work with and provided a ton of new information about Anoakia.

Bede, our third interviewee, was a student at Anoakia from the 3rd to the 5th grade. He provided interesting perspective into how his experience of the murals had changed from when he was a child to his current experience as an adult. He was kind and very thoughtful, and we’re also thankful for his help.
By the end of the day, we had a ton of new material to work with and a pretty sound idea of the direction in which to take our film. We’re excited for day two, and will give more updates in the near future. That’s all for now!

Retrieve: Pre-Installation, Pre-Retrieval

After several weeks of planning the display of storage and searching for the necessary materials, the concept really seems to be coming together. Today, the Quinn Wing is still a white cube; chairs and other materials are taking temporary residence here before we begin installing. Tomorrow should begin the physical intervention...

Attempting to reveal what's inside storage along with the room itself will involve two main things: re-creating faux metal racks on the walls and constructing a partition to shorten the wing. Working with Fisher's Chief Preparator Richard, we were able to find a lightweight barrier fencing to mimic the metal racks on which stored paintings hang. This bright-orange will soon get some much-needed paint treatment!

To shorten the space, we found fabric to serve as a temporary backwall; the plan is to hang some paintings here after it has been put up and reinforced from behind. Hopefully there is enough material...

I'm still working on visualizing the entire layout -- though the first steps will involve these details of construction, soon will come the time for physical retrieval. Along with picking up ordered materials and ensuring the gathering of other supplies, this week has included visiting storage to hand-measure each framed work (everything must fit in the "new" space!). Next up -planning the hanging of paintings!

But before departing to this next stage, I will say that finding the materials initially was not easy -- the fencing in particular was hard to find, and it seemed that waiting on out-of-state shipping might pose unneeded setbacks. Yet, after a little searching, we found everything locally downtown...Just another reminder that L.A. really is our laboratory.

--Raylene Galarze

Reconstruct: Filling in the Missing Pieces

The Jinks Room mural segments in the Fisher Museum’s collection are only six of the original nine that made up the cycle. The three other segments have remained with the family that donated the segments to USC. Lucky for me some of those mural segments are still in the area.

I was put in touch with Mrs. Mary Regis, the daughter of Lowry B. McCaslin the original donor of the Jinks Room murals to the Fisher Museum. Mrs. Regis is conveniently located in Pasadena, just a short trip north from USC. Never having visited a museum donor before, I was feeling nervous about making a good impression on her. It turns out there was no reason to be nervous; Mrs. Regis invited me very warmly into her home and spoke with me enthusiastically about Anoakia and the Jinks Room.

There on the wall of Mrs. Regis’s sitting room were two Jinks Room segments. One had a single figure of a sinister-looking jester. The other had a jester, a leprechaun and a fairy. This segment was fascinating because the cover for the lightswitches of the room was still attached to it—a reminder that these mural segments were once in a functional room of an estate. And low and behold along with the switch cover, Mrs. Regis also had original light fixtures from the Jinks Room, which were displayed alongside the mural segments.

It turns out that Maynard Dixon not only painted the murals in the Jinks Room (as well as a mural cycle feature Native Americans now in the California State Library), but also designed light fixtures for this room and throughout the entire Anoakia estate! Mrs. Regis even had a book of Dixon’s original designs for the fixtures with directions for fabricated by Tiffany and Co. Mrs. Regis said Dixon even designed doorknobs for the Jinks Room that had little jester heads on them!


Something that Mrs. Regis did not have in her house was the last mural segment. This segment is with Mrs. Regis’s sister. Luckily the museum had photos of this last segment on file so that we could develop a silhouette of this segment.

Going through the museum’s files on the Jinks Room I found an archive photograph of the last mural segment in its original setting. The lone figure of a jester was situated between a doorway and a large craftsman style fireplace. Now I have images of all the mural segments and can begin to reconstruct the Jinks Room.

Next week’s update will be on the creation of the silhouettes, which will be featured in the Reconstruct portion of the intervention.

- Francisco Rosas

Selma in Christian Science Monitor

Selma Holo, one of the professors behind this blog and "intervention" project, was quoted today in the Christian Science Monitor about Los Angeles museums such as LACMA planning exhibits to honor the bicentennial of Mexico's independence and the centennial of its revolution: "This kind of comprehensive look gives Mexico the respect of having a civilizational series of curves, not just a modern history but one that goes way back and really represents a huge cultural moment in the history of the world," Holo said. Holo is director of the Fisher Museum and the International Museum Institute at USC.

Remember: Exploring the Jinks Room's past

The intervention entitled “remember” explores the relationship between artwork and viewer, as well as the ways in which the changing interpretation of an artwork throughout time manifests the evolution of an individual and of a generation. For this intervention, I explored the history of the Jinks Room murals as told through the eyes of the viewers that have been a part of that history. Six interviews with alumni and faculty of the Anoakia School tell the story through a short video documentary (filmed by Grace Talice Lee). 

Before arriving at the USC Fisher Museum of Art, Maynard Dixon’s Jinks Room was housed at the Anoakia Mansion in Arcadia, California (pictured below).  The mansion once served as a lush pad for Anita Baldwin and her entourage, but was later converted into an all-girls boarding school and then a co-ed day school in the latter half of the 20^th century.  Our interviewees are all associated with Anoakia, whether they themselves are alumni whom attended music lessons in the Jinks room, school librarians and staff members searching for an escape from their daily routine, or a young boy encountering the murals for his first time.

The meaning and reception of artworks evolve over the course of time and with changing contexts of display. To fully understand a work of art, it is important to realize that its original location, maker, and viewers cannot tell the entire story. Rather, we must research other places, other people, and other rooms to truly understand a work’s history, significance, and long-term impact upon our society.  More to come on days one and two of filming in the near future – stay posted!

Retrieve: Inside the "Icebox"

Presumably, the average museum visitor gives less thought to what it means for a museum to have a “permanent collection” than to the actual art on view. To be brief, what isn’t shown is stored--a much larger percentage of the collection of works remains normally unviewed. And if what’s in storage is “unseen,” then more so is the room itself; USC Fisher Museum’s storage room is a very small space concealed slyly within the USC Roski School of Fine Arts, an ordinary doorway un-announcing to the everyday student-passersby.

Behind these double-doors are a variety of artworks resting within a climate-controlled environment. All along the walls hang paintings, drawings, prints and mixed media works, while framed photographs are shelved on what appears as a tall, black bookcase at the back of the room. Older/larger paintings/works take their residence on sliding metal racks. Pulling out a single rack without knowledge of the collection is as if to uncover a treasure; you’ll find a painted portrait of Lincoln on one, a Warhol screenprint on another.