Taller Puertorriqueño Internship

First Day at Taller!

I'll be posting what I am up to for the rest of the summer, as well as my daily internship journal entries about my time Taller Puertorriqeño, for Moore, on this blog in bold. (They are a tiny bit formal, and re-dated so that I can easily copy them out later for my hard-copy journal to turn in.) I'll try to include links to everything and keep you as in the loop as I can.

Just so all of you guys know, "Taller" means "workshop," in Spanish, and it's pronounced "tal-yerr." Not "taller" as in "Shaq is taller than you..."

Taller homepage:
http://www.tallerpr.org/
Link to current Lorenzo Homar Exhibition:
http://www.tallerpr.org/A/Lorenzo-Homar-Gallery/Current-Exhibits.aspx

Happy 4th of July! I have the day off, so I'm just finishing this up this morning :)

Introduction:
Taller Puertorriqeño is, according to its mission statement, "a community based cultural organization whose primary purpose is to preserve, develop and promote Puerto Rican arts and culture. Grounded in the conviction that embracing one's cultural heritage is empowering, Taller is also committed to the representation and support of other Latino cultural expressions and our common roots." 

My internship host is Rafael Damast and his title at Taller is Special Events Coordinator & Visual Arts Program Manager. I will be working directly under him, and he has told me that he will be turning large responsibilities over to me with full confidence, just as he has been with Cassandra (another Moore intern who has been here for some time already.) He has assured both of us that we will absolutely not be filing folders and fetching coffee for him.  

My placement is going to specifically deal with curatorial problems and responsibilities, so it is a perfect fit. I will be working with the following major projects:

• Upcoming Claiming Places Cycle (Claiming Places: Unity, Ownership, and Hogar)
• NEA Proposal for TAKEN: using Latino Iconography and Lexicons in Contemporary Art (for 2013-2014 cycle)
• Taller's art inventory (organizing and managing in Excel)
• Mounting of children's show in August (I am not sure of the title yet, if there is one) 

I will most likely be working 40hr work weeks, and possibly come in on Saturdays.


July 3, 2012:  
Today started with introductions to the friendly staff and an in-depth tour of the building, especially concentrating on the Lorenzo Homar Gallery, which as I mentioned, we are largely responsible for.

My first day at Taller was also Rafael's first day back, so it was the first time both of us had seen the Marta Sánchez Arte Bendito/Arte Filantrópico (Blessed Art/Philantropic Art) show. He asked both Cassandra and me to take a close look at it, and make adjustments as needed to help improve it in clarity and function. He encouraged me to be critical and he was open to any insights I might have.

Seeing as this show is to raise money for three different causes, clarity as to which cause is benefited by sales of which installations is key. We edited wording and placement of text panels, and moved parts of the exhibition around so that everything functioned better and made more sense. Lighting was adjusted as well as placement of a small T.V. monitor that was showing a looped film.

We had a brief meeting about upcoming projects, what will be involved, and scheduling. These meetings are to be held weekly. 

Rafael introduced me to various online tools like Dropbox and Mailchimp. I was given accounts to both and we are also using Skype, in addition to Dropbox for file sharing.  

Upon editing a draft of a newsletter to be sent out for Marta Sánchez's exhibition, I spotted some discrepancies between information from labels, wall text, and the newsletter, and cleared it up with Sra. Sanchez about it in a quick conference call Rafael made. The exhibition will also be extended a week so that we can make as many profits towards theses important causes as possible.