Good afternoon everyone! I hope everyone had a relaxing Fourth! Since I don't work on Thursdays and Fridays I figured I would take some time to update everyone on this week's happenings at HMOM.  The gallery is really starting to take shape.  We ended last week with script going on the wall.  This week we took installation one massive step forward and began to install artifacts, pictures, and text panels.


One of the first things we did was to install signs that would hang from the ceilings.  I helped to make the suspensions last week on what we dubbed a "Thor" themed day because there was a lot of action happening that involved a hammer and metal.   

Next we began to install the comic books into their cases and mount them to the walls. We have more than 150 comic books.  In this particular room we were also able to install one display case of some recent valuable comic books.  Be sure to visit the exhibit when it opens October 20th to see which comic books these are!

The next project was to install text panels and graphics. For many of these we want them to "float" away from the walls.  In order to do this we pre-drill holes into wood, then attach the wood to the wall and attach the text panel or graphic over that.  Below I am doing the pre-drilling for one of our final text panels.  

Another assignment I had was to arrange the entrance wall.  You can see it mid-install below.  This was a very exciting assignment for me because I love puzzles, and pre-decided design was in place.  I looked at many elements when designing this wall: the color of the comic books used, which comic book correlates to which theme, what themes a visitor may be more or less familiar with, and then the length of each theme and space provided.  We wanted a good mix, and I think that is what we achieved.  Comic books and themes visitors may not be overly familiar with are sprinkled in among the more recognizable ones such as Superman or The Hulk comics.  Also, there are no groupings of colors - all reds, blacks, and blues are spread fairly evenly throughout the design.  I also thought of age and height of the visitors.  I tried to put some comic book covers that may be more appealing to the younger visitors lower, where as some of the classics are placed higher up for the enjoyment of us older folk (note I put myself at 25 in that category).

In all the gallery is really shaping up!!

Now, I mentioned earlier I don't work on Thursdays and Fridays. So what do I do with my time?  Well, I study. To give you a little insight into graduate school, we have what are called Comprehensive Exams.  Typically, in your last or next to last semester of school and classes you take these - it varies program to program.  If you do not pass the exams you cannot move onto writing a thesis/dissertation, or graduate. The CU history department prefers us to take our exams upon completion of coursework.  I finished my last class in May, so am now studying for my exam.  My list consists of 103 books (not articles) and I am almost done!  Once I have these read I will divide them into categories and start writing essays on the different themes I found.  Hopefully by the end of September my professors will give me the go-ahead to take the four-hour written exam.  And then I will start the whole process over again for my second masters in Museum and Field Studies.  Thankfully my advisor in history sits on both Comps Committees so the second list won't be entirely new.(whew!) If all goes well I will be completely done by May of 2013!

Picture of my work station for the day.

I hope everyone has a great weekend! And tune in next week for more exciting updates on the Up, Up, & Away exhibit!

-Christina