claim in New York City, Epcoc Center of Walt Disney World, 

 and Detroit, Mich. "Beyond Category" will continue to travel 

 through mid-1996. SITES is also working with the American 

 Library Association to produce a small-format version of "Be- 

 yond Caregory," which will travel to public libraries begin- 

 ning in 1995. 



The second exhibition in "America's Jazz Heritage," organ- 

 ized by the Queens Museum of Art (Queens, N.Y.) and 

 SITES, is titled "Louis Armstrong: A Cultural Legacy," and 

 opened in fall 1994 at the Queens Museum of Art. This exhibi- 

 tion, which combines art and music to illuminate the life and 

 countless contributions of the man who defined the modern 

 voice of jazz, will travel nationally to seven cities through 

 mid-1996. The exhibition is the result of an especially fruitful 

 relationship involving the museum, SITES, curator Marc 

 Miller and the Louis Armstrong Archives at Queens College. 



In addition to jazz exhibitions in development or currently 

 traveling the country, SITES worked with the Smithsonian As- 

 sociates and the National Museum of American History's Pro- 

 gram in African American Culture to present a special 

 musical program in June for area school children featuring 

 popular jazz musician Wynton Marsalis. This program, 

 funded by "America's Jazz Heritage," featured a free lecture 

 and performance by Marsalis. This was the first in a proposed 

 series of special programs sponsored by the Smithsonian Insti- 

 tution in collaboration with the musician. 



September 1994 also marked the opening of "Mexico: A 

 Landscape Revisited," an exhibition of some fifty paintings 

 chronicling the landscape painting tradition in Mexico over 

 the past two hundred years SITES is committed to establish- 

 ing new relationships with museums in Mexico and organized 

 this exhibition in association with the Mexican Cultural Insti- 

 tute, located in Washington, D.C., with the support of the 

 Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the National Council 

 for Culture and the Arts in Mexico City. North American 

 manufacturing and distribution company Vitro, S.A., located 

 in Monterrey, Mexico, provided generous financial support. 

 "Mexico: A Landscape Revisited" will travel to five cities in 

 the U.S. and Mexico through early 1996. 



SITES continues its work with numerous museums and cul- 

 tural organizations outside the Smithsonian, as well These 

 partnerships enabled SITES to meet more fully the program 

 needs and interests of the Institution's diverse national audi- 

 ence. Of these, "More Than Meets the Eye," was originally cre- 

 ated by the Musee de la Civilisation in Quebec, Canada, and 

 was developed for a United States tour by SITES with the as- 

 sistance of an advisory panel of blind, visually impaired and 

 sighted advisors. "More Than Meets the Eye" investigates the 

 sense of sight and provides hands-on activities to show visi- 

 tors how people adapt to vision impairment and blindness. In 

 this exhibition all videos are captioned, all exhibition text is 

 presented in both Braille and large type, and all audio record- 

 ings are complemented by text. Following on the Americans 

 with Disabilities Act (ADA), "More Than Meets the Eye" un- 

 derscores the fact that modes of communication and mobility 



abound and that accommodations made for people with dis- 

 abilities make public programs of all kinds more accessible to 

 everyone. SITES was honored with a special accessibility 

 award for "More Than Meets the Eye" at the Smithsonian's 

 Second Annual Exhibition Awards in 1994 for its commit- 

 ment to issues of exhibition accessibility. "More Than Meets 

 the Eye" opened in March at the Maryland Science Center in 

 Baltimore, Md., and will travel through August 1997. 



Another example of SITES'-ongoing collaborations and 

 commitment to working with museums outside Washington, 

 D.C., is the exhibition "Before Freedom Came: African Ameri- 

 can Life in the Antebellum South." It was adapted from an ex- 

 hibition organized by the Museum of Confederacy in 

 Richmond, Va., and is the most comprehensive exhibition 

 ever to treat the sub|ect of African American life before the 

 Civl War. The exhibition opened in December at the 

 Smithsonian's Anacostia Museum and is now traveling the 

 country through 1997. 



In addition to the partnerships that SITES has forged in the 

 past with private foundations such as the Lila Wallace- 

 Reader's Digest Fund and corporations such as Time Warner 

 Inc., SITES has this year begun working with Nissan Motor 

 Corporation, USA. Nissan is supporting "Earth 2U," a ma|or 

 geography exhibition organized by SITES and the National 

 Geographic Society. This exhibition, which follows on the 

 heels of the release of new national geographic standards, is 

 geared toward children and their families. The exhibition is 

 expected to make a significant contribution to geographic lit- 

 eracy in the United States. 



SITES exhibitions are oftentimes accompanied by hands- 

 come and informative publications. Over the past year, SITES 

 was the recipient of several awards for excellence in the publi- 

 cations arena. The American Association of Museums (AAM), 

 in its annual publications awards contest, presented SITES 

 with Second Prize for the "Earth 2U" fundraising brochure, 

 and the poster for "Beyond Category: The Musical Genius of 

 Duke Ellington." The AAM also awarded Honorable Men- 

 tions to the press kit folder for "Beyond Category" and the fall 

 issue of "Siteline," SITES' newsletter. In addition, the Art 

 Director's Club of Washington, D.C., presented SITES (and 

 local Washington, D.C., designer Chris Noel) with awards for 

 the poster and press kit folder for "Beyond Category: The Mu- 

 sical Genius of Duke Ellington." 



Over the past year, SITES also took the lead in offering a va- 

 riety of training opportunities to its staff in the areas of equal 

 opportunity employment and accessibility issues. SITES man- 

 agers attended a course which served to familiarize them with 

 current EEO requirements, new interpretations of supervisor)' 

 responsibilities, new definitions of discrimination, and new 

 guidelines and direction for affirmative employment. And, be- 

 ginning in May 1994, SITES staff-at-large attended a four- 

 part course focusing on current accessibility issues as they 

 pertain to museums and exhibitions. These sessions were de- 

 veloped by members of the SITES staff and the Institution's 

 newly created Accessibility Network. 



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