To my fellow AIC members:
You may, or may not know that I am a board member of the College Art Association, a role Joyce Hill Stoner held before me. In fact I currently serve as Vice President for External Relations; that means I’m a conduit for feedback from membership (which I welcome) as well as responsible for raising funds for the association.
I’d like you to consider joining CAA (which can be done at https://services.collegeart.or…e.aspx?Webcode=JOINCAA. I realize you likely have memberships in several professional associations, but CAA is the only one which serves the entire community of visual arts professionals. AIC is a CAA Affiliate which means there should be significant numbers of AIC members who are also CAA members. But it is more that an obligation; I think that when art topics are discussed it is important that conservators’ and conservation scientists’ voices be heard. I can be said to represent conservators on the board and I am known as an art historian who’s a “friend of conservators” (as Ann Hoenigswald introduced me at an IIC meeting some years ago); but more conservators need to be involved.
In 2002 I initiated a series of workshops at the CAA annual meeting under the auspices of AIC and Rebecca Rushfield is continuing them. Held in museum galleries in front of actual objects (at a conference otherwise using only slides and Powerpoint images), art historians, curators, conservators and artists discuss questions of mutual interest, each bringing different points of view and expertise. Occasions such as these are significant ways for conservators to demonstrate the importance of their contributions beyond their work in the labs.
I am one of the very few art historians who is an AIC member (assuming a role that Charles Rhyne held, and splendidly, for many years), so I strongly believe in involvement across disciplines. I do hope you’ll consider joining me and 14,000 others, as members of CAA.
Andrea Kirsh