Madison Munro 2020 May 28

Wow. I'm so glad this was the oral history I finished with because it was by far my favorite. I think every art student should listen to this. These men speak so well about creation and our responsibility and place in the world. I particularly liked one of the final moments of the interview where Barry says "I think in some of the worst moments, you realize that it's only because somebody who loves somebody loves you that you're able to work that that's moving through you"

Madison Munro 2020 May 27

They both talked about the responsibility of storytellers and elders. How today's young artists have been told to focus on themselves and their ideals but Barry Lopez offers this for young people to think on before creating, "You've been told your individual artistic vision comes first well maybe what comes first is a social responsibility. You have to be thinking about, is this going to take care of people? Or will this cause harm? Or does it cause damage?" I thought that was a really wonderful thing to keep in mind. I have about fifteen minutes left so I should finish up tomorrow I'm already missing this job!

Madison Munro 2020 May 26

Rick continued talking about how he's having to relearn things after his stroke and journey he's been on since. I'm confident I can finish this by the end of the week!

Madison Munro 2020 May 21

Most of the audio today was Rick talking about the stroke he had and how he's working toward recovery. He seems to have a resilient attitude despite the limitations he's facing with speech and memory. He continued to produce great work through recovery.

Madison Munro 2020 May 20

These men were speaking really beautifully about human imagination and when the birth of human imagination was. They have both shared stories of whale watching, and the bubbles that whales make while hunting for food. And Barry Lopez shares his experiences with the Inupiaq people, and his experiences with wildlife in the tundra. He remarks that it's necessary that we do not exclude animals, because it is unethical and they have taken care of us and given humans everything long before humans had imagination. 

Madison Munro 2020 May 19

I'm excited to work through this interview, so far it's very interesting! Rick has talked about the beginning of human imagination. I really enjoy hearing Rick's perspective on art and the process of artists.

Madison Munro 2020 May 18

Finished the Jim Shull oral history! They made it through the whole collection of Jack's which I'd be very interested in seeing when school begins again. With the last twenty minutes of my shift I was able to begin to look at the Rick and Barry at the Froelick gallery interview I'm excited to have a video to go with it this time!

Madison Munro 2020 May 14

So close to finishing! I have about ten minutes left in the oral history so I should wrap it up on Monday and then I'll start on the Rick Bartow and Barry Lopez at Froelick Gallery. 

Madison Munro 2020 May 13

Made more progress on the oral history today! They're still going through Jack's extensive collection. Stephanie was able to send me multiple links on James Castle which were super interesting and fun to go through, thanks Stephanie!

Madison Munro 2020 May 12

I found out that Jim has a book on pin hole photography which I'd love to get my hands on if it's in the Willamette library. I have about thirty minutes left so if all goes well I should be close to done by the end of the week.

Madison Munro 2020 May 11

I continued through the Jack Eyerly Collection recording today and they came upon work from artists named James Castle, Jack McLarty, and Sid White who all have a connection to Jack Eyerly in some way that I haven't quite come to yet. I have also never heard of these artists before although I've seen Jack McLarty's name in the online collection gallery. I hope tomorrow's work will give me more details about what kind of artists these people were and what their connection to Jack is. Although I may have to do my own investigating. 

Madison Munro 2020 May 7

In the collection they found some of Jim Shull's prints which I then found more of on the Portland Art Museum online collections. His work is very expressive and interesting to look at. 

Madison Munro 2020 May 6

I had a bad headache yesterday but I'm back to work today and the gang went through more of Jack's collection. They came across some Henk Pander paintings which excited me to hear a familiar name! Apparently at one point Jack and Henk were neighbors, which is how there came to be a Henk Pander show at Mount Angel college. I like to think Henk and Jack threw some rocking block parties. 

Madison Munro 2020 May 4

This section of audio was more about the other artists in the Jack Eyerly collection one of which I haven't been able to find on the internet yet his name is Tony Malara. They keep mentioning how Jack kept everything and never threw anything away, I find that's pretty typical among artists. Although it's interesting to me that the majority of the "Jack Eyerly Collection" is mostly fully of work from other people.

p.s. May the 4th be with everyone on this rainy Oregon day!

Madison Munro 2020 April 30

Today I learned that Jack Eyerly worked for the Statesmen Journal on top of everything else he did. And that his wife Polly Illo worked for the Portland Art Museum which sounds like a dream.

Madison Munro 2020 April 29

Just kept working through the recording today. They mentioned how Jack's collection was a good look at the art history of Oregon which is a very interesting concept. Dr. Hull mentioned the controversy surrounding contemporary art and traditional art during the State Fair in the 1960s it would be so fascinating to hear more about that especially with the Oregon specific lens.

Madison Munro 2020 April 28

I'm officially over the one hour mark! Gives me a sense of accomplishment. On today's audio they all looked through more of Jack's collection. It sounds like it's mostly photographs which I would love to look at someday.

Madison Munro 2020 April 27

The section of audio for today was much harder to get through than previous. Mostly because they were diving into Jack's collection of work, and there was a lot of curatorial excitement that made everyone talk over each other. I learned that Jack designed sets for Pentacle theater and screen printed all the show posters in his basement! I had no idea the Pentacle theatre was that old.

Madison Munro 2020 April 23

I'll have to conduct my own research on the murder mystery as the interviewers have become distracted with art. Typical. (I'm still delighted to hear about art obviously). It sounds like they have been looking at various prints which excites me and makes me miss my etching class even more. There has been a lot of mention about Clifford Gleason who I'll have to look into.

Madison Munro 2020 April 22

I haven't yet heard an oral history told by someone other than the subject of the oral history. It's fascinating to get a perspective from someone who knew the artist instead of the artist themselves. I wonder what Jack would say about his work were he giving the interview. I haven't heard much about his art, but Jim has talked about his need to help others and his personal life. I'm looking forward to learning more and looking up some of Jack's work late. 

Madison Munro 2020 April 21

Today I got farther into the Jim Shull oral history talking about Jack Eyerly. He was beginning to talk about the suspected murder of artist Brian Kazlov which I'm very interested to hear the rest of as a true crime fanatic. 

Madison Munro 2020 April 20

I started on the Jim Shull oral history today. I didn't get very far with transcriptions because it took me awhile to find Jack Eyerly on google. Both out of curiosity and because the translation software couldn't figure out "Eyerly" so I needed to find the proper spelling. It was shockingly hard to find him but once I did things went a lot faster. Excited to learn more about Jack and Jim as I get further into the interview!

Madison Munro 2020 April 16

I was able to finish the Henk Pander oral history today. The last bit he talked about the portraits he painted of his late partner Delores. He also mentioned that he has school groups at his house to look in his studio and he talks to them about his work. Sounds like the field trip of a lifetime! Next week I'll start on another oral history, I love learning about these Pacific Northwest artists!

Madison Munro 2020 April 15

Nearly done with this oral history of Henk Pander but I have about ten more minutes to go. I changed all of the 'speaker 1' labels to Mary McRobinson. I should be finished with this audio tomorrow.

Madison Munro 2020 April 14

I'm nearly done with the Henk Pander interview, so I should be finishing it tomorrow. He spoke about his scavenging in the desert for props for paintings. At one point he said he "put a word out in the desert for animal skeletons" I found it so whimsical that he could just 'put a word out' in the Oregon desert. He also talked about the education model in Holland, where education is free and they would give students a stipend and they would work for twelve hours a day. I wish we would adopt that model in the U.S.  

Madison Munro 2020 April 9

Continuing with the Henk Pander interview he spoke more about portraits and even some self portraits he's done. I keep thinking this would make a good novel or indie film.

Madison Munro 2020 April 8

I continued to work through the audio of Henk Pander's interview. The part that stuck out to me today was when he discussed the portraits he's painted. He said he always tries to paint an honest painting and not only get their likeness but a portion of personality. Citing that to paint a fellow human being is a powerful thing. I've never attempted portraits myself, but it made me think of my fellow art major and friend who paints wonderful and large scale portraits. I'd be interested to see her response to this portion of the interview. It also brought to mind a new movie called 'Portrait of a Lady on Fire' that was cinematic genius in my opinion that was all about portraiture and I could see similar sentiments from what Henk said he thinks about in portrait making.

Madison Munro 2020 April 7

Continuing with the Henk Pander transcription, today he talked about when he would bring his sketchbook on police ride alongs and just became to go into this crazy story that I'm looking forward to hearing the rest of tomorrow while working. Henk has quite a sense of humor and once museums are back open I'm going to look for his work at the Portland Art Museum and Hallie Ford.

Madison Munro 2020 April 6

Today I worked more on transcribing the Henk Pander interview. It is very interesting so far, he is talking about his sketchbook.

Madison Munro 2020 April 2

Today I started on the Henk Pander interview. I spent some time googling him and his art work is so striking I enjoy it immensely and I'm excited to hear more about his life and practice. Being from the Netherlands, his accent has been a bit of a learning curve especially if he talks quickly and quietly. It's hard to get the most accurate transcription but hopefully that will get easier as I go and with slowing down the audio. I also don't know who the interviewer is and so sometimes when I untag Henk it will either say speaker 1 or speaker 2 but they're the same person.

Madison Munro 2020 April 1

Today I finished the Bartow interview! It was fairly heavy at the end where he really dove deep into his wife's death and the effects of that. I'll start on another transcription tomorrow.

Madison Munro 2020 March 31

I got through another half hour of audio today and have about a half hour left so I'm hoping to finish up this interview tomorrow. I like being able to work with my cat on my lap but I definitely miss the scanners and the library! I went on Rick's wikipedia page to see if I could find the spelling of a name he mentioned, and the page is sorely lacking in good detail and a full range of information. Maybe Rick would prefer it that way, but I think there could be more about his life and the amazing work he did.

Madison Munro 2020 March 30

Coming back from spring break I was excited to get back into transcribing Rick Bartow's interview with Rebecca Dobkins. I got through about a half hours worth of audio. He spoke about his friend and mentor William who died due to complications with AIDS. Rick speaks of him very well, he seemed like a wonderfully intelligent and artistic thinker.  

Madison Munro 2020 March 19

Continuing on with the Rick Bartow interview, finally reached the two hour mark! This chunk of the interview was quite somber as he talked about his good friend that died of AIDS.

Madison Munro 2020 March 17

This morning I made more progress in transcribing the Rick Bartow interview. He spoke more about what he learned in his travels and more about why he loves paper so much. So interesting!

Madison Munro 2020 March 16

Under new social distancing rules and regulations I transcribed from my dorm today. Rick spoke a lot about the artists that he admires and the ways they have helped him in his own practice. He spoke a lot of all the art books he enjoys reading and his deep love of paper and all the different varieties. It reminded me a lot of the themes I've explored in my intro drawing class last semester.

Madison Munro 2020 March 12

I continued to work on transcribing the Rick Bartow interview. I had to do a lot of google searches today because Rick mentioned a lot of Native American artists and their tribes which the otter did not want to translate. However I learned more this way so it was worth the extra time.

Madison Munro 2020 March 11

I continued to transcribe the Rick Bartow interview and it is so interesting to listen to him talk about his work and process especially his views on other artists. The otter transcriber has made it super helpful although it missed a lot of names of people and places so I go in and correct those. I'm not making as much progress as I'd like, as this is a bit tedious and requires a lot more focus on my part but it's still quite enjoyable. I'm looking forward to hearing more about Rick's process and inspiration for his work.

Madison Munro 2020 March 10

I spent all day transcribing an interview of Rick Bartow and it is so interesting! So far he has talked about growing up in the Washington Oregon area and about his family. I've just begun to get into his career as an artist. Can't wait to keep going!

Madison Munro 2020 March 9

I was able to finish processed the Jason PDF's and there was a ton of fascinating photography to look through. While processing I scanned a page from a program for Roger Hull. The program had a painting on the last page done by Clifford Gleason who I don't know much about but now feel compelled to do a google search. I'm getting to move on to transcribing an interview of Rick Bartow which should be very interesting to hear about his life in his own words instead of on Wikipedia. 

Madison Munro 2020 March 5

I was able to scan all of the slides from the Rick Bartow series which were so fascinating and now I need to google him and find out more! I couldn't believe I had never heard of him before and I'm looking forward to seeing more of his work and doing my own investigation. After doing the slides I was able to start to process the Jason PDFs although I only got through one I should be able to finish next week.

Madison Munro 2020 March 4

Today I was able to finish fixing the two bulletins so in theory I should be done with those woo! The two just needed the front covers scanned and processed. There was another row in the spreadsheet that was highlighted that had a a note saying it couldn't be found. When I was up in the archives yesterday Stephanie and I couldn't find it either. Another mystery! I also finished processing the Chrysalis PDFs. I'm not entirely sure what all needs to go in that spreadsheet so that's my first task to figure out tomorrow. I'm much looking forward to scanning the slides! I started to look through them and they all appear to be artwork so I'm very excited to start scanning those.

Madison Munro 2020 March 3

I continued to process the PDFs of the Chrysalis I made it all the way to 2008 so I made good progress! In the processing down time I also began to look at the Willamette bulletins. 

Madison Munro - 2020 March 2

I finished updating/fixing the commencement programs, though there's a single program that still needs to be measured which I will do tomorrow. I started to process the PDFs of Chrysalis's which have been super interesting to read and look through as I process the images. They seem to be similar to the Jason books but I found these a bit more interesting to read than the Jason books.

Madison Munro 2020 February 27

Today I was able scan the rest of the missing pages from commencement programs from box 17 and got those pages processed too. I also cropped the Jason II 1985 pages that had some over hang. I'm excited to get into box 48 next week!

Madison Munro 2020 February 26

I spent most of today processing images that I added to the program files and also got to scan and process commencement programs up to 1976. Making progress! I wasn't able to get to editing the Jason II 1985 images but it is first on my list for tomorrow. 

Madison Munro 2020 February 25

I was finally able to process the Jason II 1985 book and the two commencement programs that needed to be processed. Turns out I was just in the wrong program which is why it wasn't working, my bad! Other than that I continued to scan missing pages from the commencement program box. Only about half way through box 17 but I'm making progress!

Madison Munro 2020 February 24

Today I attempted to process the Jason II book and some commencement programs that haven't been processed yet but the program was being very slow and didn't want to process things today. I restarted the computer and will try again tomorrow. While that was happening I was able to make my way through some more commencement booklets and learned how to use the epson scanner which is a lot of fun. Many of the programs were missing pages or had some pages that were crooked so that's mostly what I did.

Madison Munro 2020 February 20

Today I worked on the commencement programs and fixing and scanning what the spreadsheet indicates. I got done with all the folders that needed fixing from box 16 but still have box 17 and 48 to work through. When investigating Jason II 1985, it seems that about 50 pages were not scanned, and folder for this book doesn't seem to be in the Jason files. The first 50 pages appear to be processed from the link on the spreadsheet so I scanned the second half of the book and put them in a file called JasonII1985.

Madison Munro 2020 February 19

Forgot to post yesterday! Yesterday I finished transcribing "Stories My Grandma Told" and created individual text files for all the pages of transcriptions. 

Madison Munro - 2020 February 18

I continued transcribing "Stories My Grandmother Told" and it just gets more interesting. As someone who has lived in Oregon most of my life, it is super interesting hearing what it was like back then. There were many accounts of Native Americans on the mission and most of them are very troubling and uses outdated terminology. Though what I do appreciate about these accounts is that the author is sure to distinguish between "first white person born in Oregon" as opposed to the inaccurate "first person born in Oregon" which would be a form of erasure. I'm very excited to continue reading and transcribing!

Madison Munro - 2020 February 17

I got to learn how to change the camera arms which was quite the process but overall successful (thank you Sara for the help!). After changed out camera lenses and arms I was able to photograph a rare book that Doreen found called "Stories My Grandmother Told" which has many hand written entries about the Willamette Mission. It is so interesting to read and transcribe!

Madison Munro - 2020 February 13

Today I was able to begin looking at the spreadsheets with commencement programs and catalogs and bulletins metadata. There were several on the commencement programs sheet that just needed the page number changed, I did that then un-highlighted them and marked them ready ready to mount. I didn't have access to the documents so I wasn't able to begin right away. I wasn't able to get the materials needed to be scanned either so I will begin that process on Monday hopefully. 

Madison Munro - 2020 February 12

Finished processing all the Jason tifs and also processed the Mill 2017. Crazy how there weren't any art submissions to the Mill and almost half of all the Jason periodicals were comprised of student artwork. I wonder what contributed to that. I also got to look at what my tasks for tomorrow look like and the list is long but I'm excited to dive in! I'll be looking at commencement programs which should be super interesting. Having known a few Willamette graduates it should be interesting to see if I come across any of their names. 

Madison Munro - 2020 February 11

Today I continued to process the Jason tifs and made it through years 1970-1974. Still plugging away! It's been nice to look back through at all the pages of these books, and I got to see a final product which was super neat!

Madison Munro - 2020 February 10

Having finished scanning all the Jason books I have now moved on to processing the tif files. There was a bit of a learning curve with that today, but I think I've gotten the hang of it for now. I have processed Jason 1970, 1969,1968, and 1967 with many more to go! The process is a bit tedious however that is allowing me to catch up podcasts so I'm not complaining. Though it is tedious I enjoy seeing the process of how these files get to the point of being shared and viewed by a wide range of audiences. 

Madison Munro - 2020 February 5

I finished scanning all of the Jason books today! The 80s were and interesting time at Willamette based on the works in the Jason. Many long exposed photographs and poems about alcohol. I feel very accomplished to be done and excited to move on to the next project.

Madison Munro - 2020 February 4

I have finished box 6 of Jason and started on box 7! Moving through the 80s I'm noticing a prevailing theme of fantastical narratives or illusions both in the poetry and art. Almost as if D&D was growing in popularity during this time? I was also listening to a podcast about the Chernobyl nuclear disaster while scanning and thinking about the influences of the cold war and the perceived looming threat of Russian that was felt in the 80s. Needless to say, the whole thing gave me major Stranger Things vibes. Excited to keep learning!

Madison Munro - 2020 February 3

I cleaned up the files today and created labeled folders for the tif images and the jpeg images and it made the Jason files look much cleaner! I have officially broken through to the 80s now and noticing an exciting move toward pop art and more flashy comic book styles. One publication allowed the contributors to add a short biography at the back of the book. My personal favorite was: "Margaret Binnis is a mystery." Many of the artworks opposite the poetry contained themes relating to one another, making me wonder if these were collaborative processes and to what extent one provided inspiration for the other.

Madison Munro - 2020 January 30

Today I was able to get access to the MOH file where all the Jason books are suppose to live permanently. It took a bit of time for all of the files to transfer from the drobo, but they're there now. I scanned three of the Jason texts today, and found an increase in photography throughout the books. The photographs were often of places around Salem and on Willamette's campus. Other works of art included etchings, prints, and graphite sketches. I noticed a recurring theme of the female body in many of the art pieces. Not many of them had titles or the names of the artist, but I would be interested to see if it were primarily men or women submitting these images. Many of them were bodies without faces, which makes me question the nature of the study. There was one mosaic piece from the 1973 book that looked a lot like Charles Manson. It was a man with shoulder length dark hair and those wild eyes. He would have been in jail by then so I wonder if that could have been the inspiration for the mosaic. There was a poem about Vietnam urging the reader to stop reading because people are dying and don't you care? Needless to say many fascinating finds today.   

Madison Munro - 2020 January 29

I have finished box 5 of the Jason periodicals. I went from earliest to latest when scanning and found that the earlier additions had much more student art contributions than 1968, 1969, and 1970. Could have just been a question of interest but I'll have a better picture once I move onto the next box. The art that was included seemed to primarily be dry point etchings and prints which fascinated me as a studio art major who happens to be taking an etching class. I took it as the fates reminding me I need to work on my own dry point etching assignment that sits idle on my desk. Additionally, earlier works seemed to have integrated the art and poetry in a more cohesive way. And to my delight the earlier images actually had captions! Every art historian's dream!!  Also fascinating were the contributor's names and hometowns at the end of the books. Fascinating to see that even in the 60s and 70s there was a major Californian population at Willamette. No doubt they too were offended by the rain.

Madison Munro - 2020 January 28

This morning I was able to scan three books from the Jason box #5. Jason 1970, 1969, and 1968. Form what I have been able to gather, The Jason served at the student poetry and art work book published among Willamette students. There was a bit of a hold up on where to store these files. For now they are in the drobo file under "Temp". I was most intrigued by the 1968 publication which had a hard cover and tall rectangular bright yellow pages containing mostly poetry and a few illustrated pages. I got lost reading this publication. The first page describes the book as "Willamette's poetry-art magazine has been re-titled this year -- no longer The Jason (worthy  as that symbol may be), but Jason's (Lee) Phantasty." This confirmed my suspicions that these were named after Jason Lee for who Lee house is named after. The title page continues robustly, "We are young; we are at Willamette university; we have out futuristic phantasies. forgive us if we satirize the now successful phantasy that Jason Lee had one hundred twenty six years ago." The boom of an introduction inspires me to further investigate Jason Lee who I know little about.

Madison Munro - 2020 January 27

Hello! Being my first day of work, I think it went well and that I'm really going to enjoy working here. I only had to ask Sara a couple of questions which is a personal triumph. I finished scanning The Mill 2017 which was full of student work particularly poetry with some graphic images, seeming to be mixed media or collage. These were rather fascinating to leaf through as I was scanning, as poetry and art are two of my interests. The system of saving information was a bit challenging but I  got the hang of it after a few tries. After completing The Mill scanning, I got to visit the archives to retrieve the Jason box #5. I was quite curious to see what would be in a box labeled "Jason", my true-crime-obsessed- brain immediately thought of evidence boxes. Rationally, I realized it was unlikely that someone would donate incriminating evidence to their Alma mater, but who knows. Having gone through the first of the Jason books, I see that they are also pages of poetry and artistic rendering. I find it interesting that the Willamette poets of the 1970s utilized the space of the page much more than the 2017 poets. The lines were often broken up and spaced out spanning the whole of the page. I'm excited to dive further into this box and the ones following it.