Live Coverage Follow-Up: Whitney Community Day

Whitney Community Day graphic. Image courtesy of content.standardculture.com.

Whitney Community Day graphic. Image courtesy of content.standardculture.com.

On Saturday, May 21, I worked with Ashley Welch and Laura Ratliff in covering the Whitney Museum of American Art’s Community Day. It was celebrating the groundbreaking of the Whitney’s new site (though the literal one happens Tuesday, May 24).

Laura and I were out covering the event in the Meatpacking District (where the new site was located), and Ashley was producing at school.

The main site was set up inside a tent, and Laura took a video introduction on her iPhone. Since I only had a Blackberry, I concentrated on live-tweeting the event, using the hashtag #whitney.

I tweeted facts about the future Whitney building, and asked patrons their thoughts on the museum moving to the new location in 2015. I also interviewed the Whitney project manager on the new building while Laura filmed it.

Overall, it went very well, and I learned some things that may be useful in the future.

It was definitely helpful working in a team of three. Laura and I were able to coordinate on who would do what, and got more coverage in than if it had been just one of us out in the field.

Ashley was great at directing us. She told us when we were live, and made suggestions about things to do. For example, she asked that I talk to someone there about what they thought about the Whitney moving locations.

It was also fun to see the interaction the CoverItLive site. (I checked it after the event.) I was surprised that we had people following and responding to our videos and live-tweets.

About Sarah Ewald

Grad student at CUNY J-school. I'm interested in writing, new media and entertainment (among many other things).
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