Museo de Historia, Antropología y Arte - Melanie Torres Crespo, Week 3

 

Museo de Historia, Antropología y Arte

Melanie Torres Crespo - Week 3

Hi! Welcome to my third week at the Museum of History, Anthropology, and Art. This week was short, nonetheless it was very fun and full of new things!

Unfortunately, throughout this whole week, the museum was closed to the public because of some reparations happening in the university campus. But, at least I was able to attend and complete tasks that become harder to do when the museum is open and frequently conducting activities. 

This past Monday, I started my day by doing a deep cleaning of the interactive section of the exhibition. More specifically, I cleaned the wood pieces utilized to do engravings. As time passes, they get a lot of crayon wax stuck in the wood, thus it was nice to have the opportunity to clean and restore them. 

Moreover, it was nice to learn more about the ways the staff preserves the pieces in the exhibition, in the archives, and even those objects meant to be used by the public! It is a lot of work and consideration to maintain everyday, it is incredible. 

In the afternoon, we decided to give proper maintenance and care to the huerto. Some of the tasks this involved was spraying organic sprays to promote the plants' health and cutting dry leaves. When working on this, I found a very big cucumber! It was hidden within other plants, so it would not have been found otherwise. We tasted it later in the week in a salad made by some of the staff, and to my surprise, it was very sweet and of course, very delicious.

Tuesday was a day that was dedicated more towards the organization and categorization of documents, books, and catalogues. I organized various storage units in order to maximize space and have the ability to put other things, such as the museum shirts. 

Definitely, this allowed me to learn even more about the vast variety of information and knowledge this museum possesses. And, everything that is available for visitors to buy or request to investigate...

I also updated and organized camera equipment, and started sorting the museum's hard drive. 

Hopefully, next week I will finish organizing all document and picture files by each fiscal year. I believe it goes as back as 2004/2005, so it is taking me longer than I initially expected.

Sadly, Wednesday and Thursday, I had to work from home, due to the museum being closed for both the public and the staff due to the repairs happening in the university. Therefore, during these two days, I focused on completing digital tasks. For instance, I created excel charts for statistics reports, updated information for museum pamphlets, and kept working on my investigation.

Even though I was not able to interact with visitors during this week, I found very nice having the opportunity to work and keep learning of what it entails to work at the museum. All tasks are so varied that makes every day to feel like a new adventure... Nonetheless, I am looking forward to finalize the preparations of the upcoming activities and orientations. I cannot believe that I only have about two weeks left, it is so sad :( . That is why I will keep making the most out of my days and enjoy every moment!!

Thank you for reaching up to this point and reading all my thoughts about this week!

PD: During the week, we planted plantain plants and we plan to put some plastic chairs to recreate music artist Bad Bunny's album cover in our courtyard. Right now, he is having one of the longest residential concert stays in the island. And since it is happening quite near the museum, the staff wants to take advantage of this and create diverse activities and promotional material that attracts more visitors (and tourists) to the exhibition. It is a work in progress, but enjoy a picture of how it is looking as of now! 

See you next Friday!