Ep.# 209, Claire Carter, curator at the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, on spies and art opening invite etiquette
Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art curator Claire Carter talks about: The demographic of Scottsdale, including a large number of retirees who Winter there, and make up a substantial presence in support of her museum; how she’s grown into her full-time “curator of contemporary” role from within, starting 10 years ago as a curatorial assistant; the show she curated borne out of a lunch talk she gave to a group of former spies; that show, Covert Operations: Investigating the Known Unknowns,’ particularly a piece by Bay Area artist David Gurman, whose piece was a 500-pound bell that hung in the middle of the gallery and was connected to a program that had it toll once for every violent civilian death (as culled from IraqBodyCount.org) every hour on the hour, and how affecting the piece became, for the staff, the visitors and especially Carter herself; how her role as curator sometimes include procuring a large, turn-of-the-century Paul Revere-style bell to replace the previously exhibited version which had been stolen; how deeply moved she was by that piece, something of a payoff for all the hard work and strings that got pulled amongst her co-workers to make it happen; the frank statistical information she shares with the art students she visits at Arizona State University about how many artists wind up in museums, and the ideal role between an artist and a curator; what her studio visits are like, and the size of the smallest studio she can recall visiting.