Culture

$15 million upgrade planned for historical section of Anchorage Museum

The Alaska Gallery, the historical display section on the second floor of the Anchorage Museum, will undergo a complete remodel starting next year.

The upgrade will cost $15 million and begin at the end of the summer tourist season in 2016. The 1,500 items currently on display will be removed and the space on the second floor of the museum gutted. The new gallery will occupy the same 12,000-square-foot location as the present gallery. It's expected to reopen in the fall of 2017, coinciding with the 150th anniversary of the acquisition of Alaska by the United States.

According to surveys of visitors, the Alaska Gallery is on par with the Smithsonian Arctic Studies Center as one of the most popular draws at the museum. It recounts Alaska's past from prehistory through the pipeline era with artifacts, antiques and life-size dioramas of living quarters of Native Alaskans, homesteaders and World War II soldiers. Its current configuration came about during a remodel of the museum in 1986 and it hasn't changed much since.

"Kids who come through on school tours today see the same thing I saw as a small child," said associate curator Aaron Leggett.

Lack of funding kept the gallery from being included in the massive museum expansion project completed in 2010, said Jim Barnett, president of the Cook Inlet Historical Society. As a result, the gallery hasn't kept up with changes in conservation technology during the past 30 years.

"One of the problems is the way objects are being displayed is damaging them," said senior curator Katie Ringsmuth. "The large dioramas, for example, are too large. They're actually harming the items they display."

Janet Asaro, the museum's Marketing and Public Relations Director, said about $5 million will go to a Montreal, Canada-based firm, gsmprjct°, formerly GMS Design, that specializes in museum projects. Their part of the job will include designing the layout and fabricating display mounts and cases. The remaining money will be used to research, develop and create the "concept" of the gallery, she said.

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The reworked gallery will be more accessible for large groups, involve moving images and recorded sound, improved signs, a better connection to the Smithsonian displays and, Ringsmuth hopes, technological tools such as audio tours conducted via headphones and available in various languages to accommodate foreign visitors.

Many, if not most, of the items now on display will be back when the gallery reopens. But some familiar artifacts or displays may not, Ringsmuth said. "We're still trying to determine what will go and what will stay," she said. "Chances are a lot will remain, but it will be reinterpreted."

In addition to addressing preservation concerns and the aging of the displays, a major reason for renovating the gallery is the opportunity to update and "reimagine" how it presents Alaska history, Ringsmuth said.

"Alaska's been described as 'Seward's Folly,' 'the end of the road,' 'the bridge to nowhere,' " she said. "The new gallery should let Alaskans themselves explain their history and identity."

Asaro said residents are being asked to participate in that process. The museum has held four public sessions focused on the idea of "telling our stories," she said, and additional public forums "will be coming up as we go along."

People with an interest in the remodel project can email museum@anchoragemuseum.org, Asaro said. The museum is also updating its website, anchoragemuseum.org, where ongoing information will be available at the Alaska Gallery site under the Exhibits and Events tab.

For his part, Leggett is hoping to see something like an interactive map showing Native place names for the Anchorage area. A member of the Denai'na tribe and lifelong Anchorage resident, Leggett was responsible for curating the impressive "The Dena'ina Way of Living" exhibit, the first exhibit ever dedicated to Anchorage's indigenous people, at the museum in 2013. That show included such a map.

"I'd like to see the gallery tell the Dena'ina story as it fits into Anchorage and Alaska," he said. "I'd like to convey the idea that we're still here as a people."

Mike Dunham

Mike Dunham was a longtime ADN reporter, mainly writing about culture, arts and Alaska history. He worked in radio for 20 years before switching to print. He retired from the ADN in 2017.

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