10/06/2025
Thanks for the shout out Matheson History Museum!
How do we choose exhibition topics?
Exhibit topics are usually chosen collaboratively by museum staff based on what's available in our collection, other recent exhibitions, public interests, current events, and sometimes an inspired guest curator. Since 2023, most of the exhibits on display were chosen because of relevant anniversaries. "Weaving a Community" celebrated the museum's 30th anniversary. "The Alachua Phenomenon" was inspired by the 200th anniversary of Alachua County's founding.
What is the process for creating the exhibition?
To illuminate the curatorial process, let's look at the development of "The Alachua Phenomenon." Willett, our Curator of Exhibitions, was told, in more or less words, to make an exhibit about the history of Alachua County for the 200th anniversary of the county's founding. Willett started his research by reading the various published histories of Alachua County. From there, he followed leads from the histories and examined archived newspapers, websites, government documents, personal writings, oral histories, academic articles, and more to compile as much of the history as was feasible in detailed notes. Once there was a decent volume of information collected, Willett had to decide what the exhibit's narrative structure was going to be.
Almost by default, most history exhibits are chronologically organized. This makes sense when you're telling a tight, concise history as events naturally follow one another. However, for this exhibit, the curator had to account for a wide breadth of information. Theoretically, this exhibit could contain all of the events, names, and places that were relevant in the last 200 years, but a good exhibit needs to present information in a way that is digestible and engaging. While organizing his notes, Willett noticed overlapping themes - the county's growth and development, from a quiet frontier to a bustling modern city. It only made sense to group the various repeating throughlines into contributing factors for growth (commerce, infrastructure, etc.).
From there Willett used his notes and sources to begin drafting the text for the exhibit. Simultaneously, he worked with Chloe, our Curator of Collections, to compile photos and other media relevant to the identified topics. From there, he asked the museum staff to review the first draft of the text for mistakes, grammar, style, and readability. After reviewing the staff's suggestions and corrections, Willett finalized the text.
The next step, for "The Alachua Phenomenon" and the other recent exhibits, involved working with a freelance graphic designer. We've been lucky enough to work with Rick Kilby from Kilby Creative. Rick is a Gainesville native, Florida historian, and general polymath, and brings a keen eye for design, a collaborative spirit, and a love of history. Willett works with him to determine the exhibit's layout, fonts, and arrangement of images.
Willett periodically checked in with Rick until the design was finalized. The exhibit files were sent to local print shops. Once the prints were done, all that was left was installation. Over the course of about two weeks museum staff and volunteers worked with Rick and freelance preparator Bryan Yeagar to get the gallery changed over. Walls were painted, lighting adjusted, vinyl prints applied to the walls, and foam core panels were hung in place. After filling display cases and typing up descriptions for the artifacts, the exhibit was complete. The next day the museum hosted a grand opening to give the public their first look at the new exhibit.
http://www.mathesonmuseum.org/current-exhibitions
