Thoughts on small museums

[McKissick Museum]

The traveling exhibitions program at my museum has taken an
interesting turn. The majority of our traveling exhibitions are
around 2000 square feet and cost anywhere between $2000 and $7000 for
rental. Unfortunately, it has been difficult to market this
exhibitions in this economic climate. Ironically, the smaller
exhibtions (mostly panel shows and with rental fees around $500) are
flying out of the building! It seems a number of small museums and
libraries have been highly interested in obtaining these exhibitions.

So what I have done is travel nearly ALL of our exhibitions in both a
"Full" and "Panel" version. Panel versions are rented for a flat rate
of $500 and come without objects. The cons of this are that larger
versions of our exhibitions are not getting out on the road as much or
traveling as far. Plus, we are not bringing in the revenue we would
like from them. The pros are that more and more smaller institutions
are interested in the panel versions of our traveling exhibitions.
While we would certainly rather have our larger exhibitions get out
there, $500 per venue for our exhibitions is starting to add up.
Granted, we are not reaching distant museums. In fact, most of these
smaller exhibitions have traveled to North Carolina, South Carolina
and Georgia. But it is getting our name out there in the region, and
it is allowing us to work more with other types of institutions such
as libraries.

So I ask you, how are things going with your traveling exhibitions
program? For those of you who rent out traveling exhibitions, what
has the market been like for you?

Please send your responses here on the SETEG page or the LinkedIn
page!

Nathan Stalvey
McKissick Museum