The ARLIS/Twin Cities chapter gathered at the Textile Center in Minneapolis for their spring meeting on Tuesday, March 21, 2006.  Pastries, coffee and juice were enjoyed as attendees gathered between 9:15 and 9:30 am.  Kathy Heuer, chapter chair, convened the meeting at 9:30 by welcoming everyone and introducing Leigh Gates, ARLIS/NA Midwest representative who had traveled from Chicago to attend the meeting.  A review of the last meeting’s minutes, which had taken place on Sept. 22, 2005 at the Walker Art Center were reviewed by chapter Secretary/Treasurer, Kay Streng, who also gave a brief financial update and requested payment of 2006 membership dues.

First item of new business:  Kathy called for volunteers to form a travel award committee, which will conduct research and formulate a policy for what is hoped to be an annual award given to a single chapter member to fund travel to the national conference.  The first award would be given for the 2007 conference, and initial thoughts are that it will be in the $200-$250 range.  Kay Streng and Jodie Waltz volunteered to serve on the committee with Kathy.

Second item of new business:  Items for a Minnesota-themed basket donated by the chapter were gathered and will be taken to Banff by Kristen Meyer.  The basket will be raffled and proceeds will go toward the costs of the conference.  Items donated include: a J.Stone-Nunnely print & loon socks by Kathy Heuer (CVA), Marvels of Minnesota dish cloth by Rebecca Moss (U of M), Minneapolis Institute of Arts baseball cap & mug by Janice Lurie & Sarah Quimby (MIA), & a Caldecott Honor Book: Song of the Water Boatman, written & illustrated by Minnesotans Joyce Sidman and Beckie Prange by the MCAD library.

Third item of new business: A motion was made to discuss donation of chapter funds to the national conference welcome party.  A chapter donation of $100 had last been made in 2004.  Rebecca Moss pointed out that to try to make both an annual conference donation and award a chapter travel stipend could quickly deplete chapter funds.  Kay Streng suggested donating to the national conference every other year so that travel award monies could afford to be given annually.  Amy Naughton suggested giving smaller amounts in each case to allow for both expenditures annually.  Leigh Gates commented that travel monies are important in that they benefit chapter members directly and that an amount of at least $200 for travel is necessary.  Rebecca suggested we wait and see where we stood financially at the beginning of next year.  Kathy concurred that we should reexamine this issue at the beginning of 2007 and decide if we could afford both at that time.  The motion to contribute $100 to the Banff welcome party was put forth and approved unanimously by the group.  The Secretary/Treasurer will send a check for the amount to Linda White, Treasurer of ARLIS/NA.

Leigh Gates informed the group that ARLIS/NA was in the process of reviewing and developing a new chapter success book and that any suggestions from chapter members regarding its content would be welcomed.  She also mentioned that ARLIS/NA is now affiliated with Craig Fleming, who is a member of a management company handling business issues.  Leigh also asked who in our chapter would be attending the Banff conference.  Those members are Deborah Ultan Boudewyns, Sarah Quimby, Suzanne Degler, and Kristen Meyer.

The rest of the meeting was spent discussing an item of old business – the possibility of hosting a national conference in the Twin Cities.  Deborah has written a letter of invitation that has been shared with chapter members.  Kathy has agreed to serve as chair of local arrangements and has been researching possible venues, and Janice Lurie has agreed to serve as chair of programming.  Before sending the letter to the national committee we needed to take into consideration that ARLIS/NA’s involvement in the 2008 conference in San Diego, which was to be a joint meeting held with the Visual Resources Association (VRA) has ended and is now looking for a new venue for 2008.  Deborah informed the group that the national committee would like to hold the rescheduled conference in Pasadena, Denver, or Minneapolis, and asked how we all felt about trying to host in 2008.  The group was very hesitant to even consider this.  Jodie Walz suggested that we stick with the 2010 proposal and added that it could also be a joint ARLIS/VRA conference.  Rebecca pointed out that Toronto is in the process of being finalized as the VRA’s site in 2010.  Kathy then suggested that Minneapolis could propose to host a joint ARLIS/VRA conference in 2011. (This information is wrong and will be corrected once the Chapter votes again with the updated information - RAM) The overall feeling was that to wait and host a combined conference would be a better option than scrambling to host in 2008.  Furthermore, Rebecca noted, that if Toronto fell through for 2010 the Twin Cities could be a fallback option for a combined conference site that year.

Kathy asked for a motion to consider sending a letter of invitation to host a conference in 2008.  There was no motion.  A motion to extend the invitation to hold a single or joint conference in the Twin Cities in 2011 was forwarded by Jodie.  All present voted for the motion to pass.

The last item on the agenda dealt with the venues for the next two meetings.  Kathy Heuer has offered to lead a walking architectural tour of the St. Paul Summit Hill neighborhood focusing on the abundance of buildings dating from the 1880s to the turn of the 20th century. The fall meeting will be a business meeting at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design followed by a tour of the new Minneapolis Institute of Arts’ Library.

Lastly, Kathy thanked Rebecca for her continued work on the ARLIS/TC website.  Rebecca stated that anyone who wants to revise it, or work on it with her should get in contact with her.
The meeting adjourned and was followed by a tour of the Textile Center given by Nancy Mambi.  The tour included the library which houses a collection of 10,000 books made up of 14 guild and individual collections (including that of the Textile Center).

Respectfully submitted,

Kay Kroeff Streng
3/22/06