This post was contributed by Olivia Grochmal, graduate student in the History of Design and Curatorial Studies program offered jointly by the Parsons School of Design and the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum, and Elizabeth Broman, Reference Librarian, Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Library.
All incoming students in The New School Parsons History of Design and Curatorial Studies (MA) Masters’ Degree Program at the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum take an object and research-based class called Pro-Seminar. Students learn to conduct formal analyses of objects, write catalog entries, and prepare visual presentations that require students to incorporate primary and secondary source research. Students select one object from the museum collection to study during this class, that ”object” can be a book from the Cooper Hewitt Design Library presented by staff during curatorial orientations.
