Located at the center of Niagara University campus is the Castellani Art Museum of Niagara University, a free admission university museum with a world-class collection of over 5,000 works, including paintings, sculptures, prints, drawings, and photographs. The collection encompasses a broad range of contemporary art movements from the 19^th century onwards; the most comprehensive collection of Niagara Falls prints in the world, including its oldest ever depiction; and works by local folk and traditional artists. 

In addition to permanent and temporary exhibitions, the museum also curates traveling exhibitions, including “Old/New Threads,” which will begin traveling in Spring 2025. We spoke with Edward Millar, Castellani Art Museum’s Curator of Folk Arts, to learn more about the museum's history and future of traveling exhibitions.

 Installation photo of "Old/New Threads". 2024. Courtesy Castellani Art Museum of Niagara University.

Why travel exhibitions?

Museums often develop traveling exhibitions to enhance their mission, outreach, and operational goals, as well as the ability to share their unique resources and collections. Partnering with another museum or organization to bring in a traveling exhibition, especially a high-profile exhibition, can increase attendance or attract a more diverse audience.

Before the pandemic, the Castellani Art Museum had a robust traveling exhibition program which toured exhibitions nationally and internationally, developed by Michael Beam, Curator of Exhibitions and Special Projects. “We predominantly created these traveling exhibitions from our collection, which worked for us as a mid-sized university art museum,” said Millar. “The exhibitions attracted a large audience and increased awareness for the museum…but then the pandemic happened.” Like many New York museums during the pandemic, the museum was forced to reduce staff, pausing current traveling exhibitions and their future development.

During the pandemic pause, the museum took it as an opportunity to reflect on and strategize its traveling exhibition program. “We wanted to better understand the traveling exhibition market. What kind of exhibitions are museums looking to host? Should we focus on thematic exhibitions or artist retrospectives? We want to create something museums will be interested in bringing into their communities and telling a story utilizing our collections while being conscious of the challenges of adapting exhibitions for travel and the need to build our museum capacity to achieve this.”

Now in 2024, the museum is back to capacity and rebuilding its traveling exhibition program, with its newest offering, “Old/New Threads”, ready for travel in Spring 2025.

Beginning of a tour of the "Old/New Threads" exhibition, with garlands made by Kaushila Biswa (originally from Bhutan) hanging over the entryway. 2024. Courtesy Castellani Art Museum of Niagara University.

Stitch Buffalo Partnership 

“Old/New Threads” is a collaboration between the museum and Stitch Buffalo, a textile art center in Buffalo committed to empowering refugee and immigrant women, environmental stewardship, and community education. The exhibition highlights the intersection of art, economy, and community and features over 14 local artists and 73 traditional and contemporary artworks—encompassing Afghan, Karen, Pakistani, Bhutanese Nepali, and other textile traditions.

Millar first connected with Stitch Buffalo in 2015, about a year after the group was founded. At the time, Stitch Buffalo was hosting monthly meet-ups at a local hall on the West Side of Buffalo, which was a well-known gathering space for Buffalo’s refugee community. Since then, Stitch Buffalo has grown into one of Buffalo’s major arts and cultural organizations, and recently relocated in Spring 2024 to a brand-new, expanded physical location (their second since 2017) that includes a storefront, community class space, work areas, textile donation room, and more.

For the Castellani Art Museum, grassroots organizations like Stitch Buffalo help fill an important gap in the support network for local refugee and immigrant women. “Stich Buffalo has been an important organization in Western New York [for years] but we never necessarily had [found] a project to work on together. When the pandemic happened, we started to think about the bigger picture in terms of what kind of stories we can help share that are maybe beyond one specific tradition. We connected with Dawne Hoeg (Founder and Executive Director of Stitch Buffalo) in 2020 about the possibility of developing an exhibition together.”

One of the exhibition's goals is to tell the story of Stitch Buffalo and its community of artists, and their impact on the fiber arts and refugee communities. “It’s been amazing to see Stitch Buffalo grow over the past decade. We want to share their story with a wider audience to not only help support what they do but help them grow by connecting them with new markets and people across New York and beyond through this traveling exhibition partnership.”

Hkwang Lung (l) and Munawara Sultana (r) at Stitch Buffalo. 2022. Courtesy Michael Mandolfo.

The Exhibition 

“Old/New Threads” explores how textile arts can be a medium for artistic expression, economic empowerment, and community building through the artists and story of Stitch. “Interpretive content for the exhibition came from interviewing the artists at Stitch Buffalo,” said Millar. “From talking about their work and how they’ve created additional income for their families and a community of women with shared interests but different cultural backgrounds. It’s a space where they can participate and share what’s going on in their lives and their art.” 

To develop the exhibition, the Castellani Art Museum was awarded an Inspire! Grant for Small Museums from the Institute of Museum and Library Services, and a Mid Atlantic Arts Folk and Traditional Arts Community Projects Grant. The museum also receives support from the New York State Council on the Arts.

The exhibition is organized into three main areas reflecting its major themes: artistic expression, economic empowerment, and community building. By exploring artworks like a Karen woven shirt or a knit cap with shisha embroidery, viewers can learn about how traditional and contemporary fiber art can express cultural heritage. Through interpretive paneling about Stitch Buffalo as an organization, visitors can learn about how the sale of artwork is a form of economic empowerment for community members. Direct quotes from artists and artist profiles demonstrate how textiles bring together members of a multitude of refugee communities in the area into a shared community—or, as artist Munawara Sultana put it—a “family…a second home”. 

Stitched Stories, like this new one made by Hkwang Lung in 2024, were one of the earliest initiatives of Stitch Buffalo, providing an opportunity for refugee women to create works that express and share memories of home. 2024. Courtesy Castellani Art Museum of Niagara University.

Exhibition Specifications

The traveling exhibition recommends 100 feet of running wall space, salon-style, although 150 feet is preferred. There are ten 24” x 36” interpretive panels, ten 11” x 17” panels, and two 24” x 17” panels on Sintra board. Digital copies of interpretive materials are provided as part of the exhibition rental, and 50 physical copies of a 6-page trifold, full-color brochure are also provided (in addition to a QR code link to the digital copy of the catalog). Host sites must provide a certificate of insurance. The exhibition period is 12 to 20 weeks, with the first opening in Spring 2025.

“It’s great that the material items in this traveling exhibition are textiles, which makes it a bit easier because they can ship flat,” said Millar. Another consideration for the panels was to decide on what type of corners, sharp edges or rounded. “We ended up getting them rounded for use and longevity. There’s a lot to consider when designing an exhibition that will travel [in this case] even with displaying the prayer pouches. Early on, we reviewed a lot of different suggestions but ended up going with embroidery hoops, which fit the exhibition theme and is also portable.”

The rental fee is a sliding scale, based on the organizational budget size of the host site to accommodate institutions of varying resources. The weekly rental fee for an organization with an annual budget of less than $500,000 will be $200. Organizations with a budget size between $500,001 to $2,000,000 is $300 per week, and $2,000,001 and higher is $400 per week. The museum hopes to travel this exhibition throughout at three or four host sites annually.

“What we hope to accomplish with “Old/New Threads” is to spread the word about Stitch Buffalo and the type of support they’ve been able to provide for their community over the years,” said Millar. “We want to highlight their massive impact and encourage people to pick up a skill they may have seen their parents or grandparents do regarding sewing or creating things and thinking that artistry is not necessarily just paintings. [Traditional] textile and fiber arts are sometimes seen only as crafts or functional items. Those who make traditional clothing might not be seen as an artist. However, a big part of this exhibition is recognizing that a lot of artistry is involved with [traditional] textile and fiber arts, and…it’s an art that you often learn to make based on your culture or from your family.”

The museum wants this exhibition to spark interest where it travels, in either supporting or developing grassroots initiatives like Stitch Buffalo who have had such a positive impact on their community’s quality of life. “We want to encourage them to see how an organization like Stitch Buffalo grows into a larger organization and how it provides more opportunities for members in its community,” said Millar. “And if there isn’t a local organization in your community like Stitch Buffalo, what would it look like to create one? That’s something we would love to see… having institutions reach out and work with their communities.” Millar also wants host sites to encourage members of their community to interpret the textile art, or include their own textile art and traditions in supplement to the traveling exhibition.

“Ultimately, we hope that this traveling exhibition can help support these women in their community and organization, and give them a platform where others can recognize their work and dedication to creating each work.”

 

Learn more about “Old/New Threads” and View its Travel Prospectus & Fee Schedule: https://castellaniartmuseum.org/exhibitions/oldnew-threads