5 Mini Art Museum Shows I Would Love to Curate

Hello everyone. I’m Andrew Leo Stansbury, one of the wonderful MINI ART MUSEUM (MAM) summer interns. I’m currently a third-year MFA candidate at the University of Massachusetts – Dartmouth (not the fancy Ivy League Dartmouth, but shhh…). My concentration is in Artisanry, and I’m a weird ceramic-object-based performance artist. I could define myself as a mixed-media artist to make it easier to say, but where’s the fun in that?

The summer has been a whirlwind of making art, dog-sitting and interning at MAM. The experience of working with Gabriela Santiago and Mary Elizabeth Cantu has been wonderful, my fellow intern Olivia Hinojosa can do absolutely anything, and with their direction and help we all managed to pull together the wonderful show “Do I Remember the Alamo?” curated by Richard Teitz.

One of the interview questions Cantu asked me at the start of the summer was how I envisioned MINI ART MUSEUM expanding. I started to create a short-list of shows I would to curate and how I would display them. One idea not listed below that would be awesome: The new MAM board member Joseph Lopez and I fantasized about a Virtual Reality show/experience that someone could explore.

5 MINI ART MUSEUM Shows I Would Love to Curate

• Mini Performances: Short Moments of Disruption
  60 second performances by local, national and international audiences to push the boundaries of performance and video art. The short-list of people I would love to invite: Iamamiwhoami, Rachel Maclean, Carrie Gates, Ben Aqua, Jennifer Ling Datchuk, Margaret Meehan, Hiraki Sawa, Ben Peterson, Alfonso Espronceda, Mohan Modisakeng, Casey Jane Ellison and Libby Rowe (disclaimer: a collaborator of mine). This MAM show would be ultra-portable, fitting in a large backpack that has rechargeable battery packs in the back. Three affordable budget tablets would be attached to black zipper binders that have black matte board roofs to create mini dark viewing spaces (perfect for any lighting situation), and come with headphones.
• Mosaic: Traveling Home
  The dream for this one would be created in collaboration with Blue Star Contemporary’s MOSAIC program with high school students. The challenge would be to create a 4″ x” 4 mini mosaic that explores the themes of home and ownership, how permanent or how fickle that can be with an upcoming generation that is less likely to ever own a home.
• Enlarge: Wee Got Bigger: Large Mini Objects
  This one would change the idea of what MINI ART MUSEUM represents. Pairing with a gallery or a local school, the exhibition would take the artists’ precious tiny objects (i.e. a rusted Coca-Cola bottle cap) and enlarge them into large paintings, drawings or sculptures. In order to fulfill MAM’s mission to bring the art to the community, the artists will loan or donate the objects that inspired their artwork, shown with photos of the finished pieces next to the objects.
• Pride: Mementos of Identity
  For PRIDE month in June, the show would invite LGBTQI artists and writers to create a book and corresponding gallery that explore the themes of identity and how they define their own.
• Fiesta Medals: Viva el Mini!
  To celebrate Fiesta month in April, I would curate limited edition medals designed by local artists. This would also act as a fundraiser to help Spare Parts and the MINI ART MUSEUM find a permanent space.

-Andrew Stansbury