I’m pleased to announce that the Board of Directors of MCN has just appointed Erin Canning, Andy Cummins, Claire Pillsbury, Lisa Schermerhorn, nikhil trivedi, and Don Youngberg to serve on the Board for a 3-year term effective this November.
In addition, the Board appointed current board member Yvonne Lee to serve as Vice-President/President-Elect in 2021 to succeed Mitch Sava as President in 2022.
Lastly, join me in extending our gratitude to Matt Tarr (MCN’s outgoing President), Samantha Diamond, Susan Edwards, Desi Gonzalez, and Keir Winesmith who will be leaving the board in November. Thank you for the time, care and efforts, you each dedicated to making MCN a stronger organization over the past 3 years. Also thank you to Mara Kurlandsky who resigned earlier this summer.
Join me in congratulating Erin, Andy, Claire, Lisa, nikhil, and Don on their appointment. You will get a chance to meet them virtually during the MCN 2020 VIRTUAL conference in November.
Eric Longo
Executive Director
2020 Nominating Committee
- Matt Tarr, President
- Mitch Sava, VP/President-Elect
- Samantha Diamond, Director
- David Nuñez, Director
- Eric Longo, Executive Director
Erin Canning
Ontology Systems Analyst at LINCS | University of Guelph (Toronto)
Erin Canning is the Ontology Systems Analyst for LINCS, a 3-year project funded by the Canada Foundation for Innovation that seeks to convert large humanities datasets into an organized, interconnected, machine-processable set of resources for Canadian cultural research. In this role, they are responsible for defining the ontologies to be used by the project and overseeing the data processing and integration of datasets from over 50 researchers across Canada. Prior to joining LINCS, Erin held the position of Digital Platform Analyst at the Aga Khan Museum (Toronto, Canada).
Erin is interested in the possibilities that semantic data modelling offers for structuring cultural heritage knowledge and data in more holistic and inclusive ways, as well as feminist and queer approaches to museum data practices.
Erin holds Masters degrees in Information (MI) and Museum Studies (MMst) from the University of Toronto.
Andy Cummins
Director of Product Development | Cogapp (Brighton, UK)
Andy Cummins, Director of Product Development at Cogapp, has been working with museums, libraries and archives for around 15 years. Andy leads Cogapp’s efforts to create meaningful, long-lasting and exciting products that help cultural institutions connect with their audiences.
Most recently Andy has been developing Cogapp Refinery Services, thoughtful application of automated enrichment tools with a particular focus on digitised cultural collections; and Storiiies, a IIIF-powered digital storytelling platform.
Andy is a certified Scrum Master with a degree in Software Engineering from The University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne. He has expertise in various technologies and delivery practices for web, mobile apps and in-gallery interactives. He also acts as a mentor and line manager for developers at Cogapp, as well as running their recruitment programme.
Over the years, Andy has worked with dozens of clients including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, MoMA, Bibliothèque nationale de France, The UK National Archives and the Hammer Museum.
Andy has facilitated a meditative IIIF-based interactive experience for conference attendees at the MCN conference in Denver, Colorado as well as a mass-participation immersive experience in Museu Condes de Castro Guimarães as part of the Lumina Light Festival in Cascais, Portugal. He also has given talks at IIIF Consortium events, the Museums and the Web conference and MuseumNext, among others.
Claire Pillsbury
Program Director, Curator, Consultant (San Francisco)
Claire Pillsbury is an informal education practitioner with 20+ years experience in museums and leadership of interdisciplinary engagement, design, education projects and managing creative teams. She curates art-science, history, children’s, and science exhibitions. Her professional experience highlights include experimentation with educational technology, research in the interpretation of emerging science, interactive concept development, immersive exhibition design, writing, presenting, teaching, and science communication.
Pillsbury developed the program plan, won NSF award support, and ran the 2018 COMPASS conference held at the Exploratorium which explored how mobile context aware devices are used in museums and what are the upcoming opportunities. She has given conference presentations and has run workshops at ASTC, ECSITE, The World Congress, AAM, and ACM. She has supported programs by developing funding strategies, writing and winning grants up to 250K. She has also served as a peer reviewer of grant proposals for IMLS, NSF, and ACM.
Recent roles include serving as a Fulbright Specialist at Copernicus Science Center in Warsaw and Universcience in Paris. In addition to serving as Program Director at the Exploratorium, she was Programs Manager at Chabot, Director of Experience at Zeum, and an independent consultant for museums throughout the United States and abroad. Her accomplishments include concept planning, exhibit development and program collaborations with science centers in Sweden, Finland, Switzerland, Japan, Singapore, Brazil, and Israel, and children’s museums and history museums in the United States. She directed a multi-disciplinary Fellows program over a ten-year period and increased the representation of women and of POC by 50% for each compared to the previous demographics of the program. She enjoys regularly engaging in generative interdisciplinary collaborations with artists, scholars, technologists, designers, and scientists.
Lisa Schermerhorn
Deputy Director | Samuel H. Kress Foundation (New York)
Since 2008 L. W. Schermerhorn has served as the Deputy Director of the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, which supports the study and conservation of European Art through its fellowship and grant programs; she plays a strategic role in both operations and programs, especially those supporting digital art history and the development of art museum professionals. Prior to joining the Foundation, she was at the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation as a team member of the then nascent Artstor, tasked with turning the idea of an online platform for visual culture into a valuable educational resource. Schermerhorn is a graduate of the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, and the University of California, Berkeley.
nikhil trivedi
Director of Engineering | Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago)
nikhil trivedi is the Director of Engineering at the Art Institute of Chicago as well as a facilitator, educator, and community builder. His experience planning and executing complex web projects has also brought him to work with institutions to create concrete plans around the healing and accountability from historic traumas like colonialism, slavery, genocide, and war. He’s a regular contributor at The Incluseum and is a project advisor for MASS Action. His writing has been featured in the Journal for Museum Education, Fwd: Museums, and Model View Culture.
Don Youngberg
Community Organizer, Consultant (New York)
For 33 years Don has worked in the computer software industry serving the arts and cultural sectors – originally at ArtSoft/Tickets.com and most recently at the Tessitura Network. This includes working with 100+ museums and 500+ performing arts organizations around the globe. While serving in many roles, Don has most recently focused his time as Vice President of Community to fostering learning, knowledge sharing and collaboration between individuals and organizations.
For 16 years, Don has chaired the annual Tessitura Learning & Community Conference (TLCC) bringing nearly 2000 people from around the globe together for 5 days to share ideas, challenges, and insights. He has introduced many new and innovative discussion and networking formats to the Tessitura Community including Open Space Discussions, Neighborhood Networking, Speed Networking, TN Inspire! (which was inspired by Ignite MCN) and Lean Coffee.
Don strongly believes that groups can self-organize and harness the power of collaboration – resulting in highly focused and meaningful encounters. This is evident in his work with the TLCC Planning Committee made up of 200 volunteers from all sectors and regions of the world. In addition to his conference work, Don founded, championed, and helped organize over 40 Regional and Topical User Groups which meet both in-person and in virtual formats – holding over 100 events per year. Don has attended hundreds of industry conferences and tradeshows and has presented and/or moderated dozens of sessions at conferences such as MCN, AAM, PAMC/IAVM and INTIX.
Don holds a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) Degree in Technical Design & Production from Yale University/Yale School of Drama and a Bachelor of Arts (BA) Degree in Chemistry from Knox College. He lives in New Haven, CT with his wife and black lab, and enjoys choral music (listening and singing), attending theatre & museums, travel, and spending time around bodies of water.