I think it was the Nagoski sisters, in their book Burnout, who talked about the surprising realization that what mid-life crises look like for women tends to be very different from the masculine stereotype of sportscar-buying, younger-women-dating, burning-down-the-bridges. Instead, it comes as a questioning of what we’re prioritizing for ourselves and an examination of how we want to feel/how we’re not feeling that we can change.

If museums like this can be out there doing the good work and the next generation of professionals can be out there choosing to confront true histories, even—especially—when they’re ugly, then maybe there’s hope for this field, yet.

There was much local museum-going when I was growing up. I remember a lot of it, and I’m sure that early exposure fed into my art history degrees and my love of museums.