Cornwall Without Borders

Becoming a city of culture

A Musical Club showing composer and musician Joseph Emidy of Truro (1775-1835). Courtesy of the Royal Institution of Cornwall

I’ve been working in recent months on the value and role of museums and similar organisations in place making–the new way of describing what has developed from early millennium debates on creating a sense of place.

What makes places unique isn’t cutting it anymore. Like…

Citizen Curators programme launched

Street art in Santiago de Chile, one of the many important topics for the modern curator

Last Thursday at Cornwall Museums Partnership’s annual Share and Learn day in Helston, I launched the Citizen Curators Programme and introduced its prospective pilot at Royal Cornwall Museum.

Citizen Curators is basically museum studies in the workplace and takes the place between attending one-off training…

Curator’s Advent. Day 23. The learning officer

The invention of the curator, not the learning officer

Just want to get something straight. The learning officer isn’t always ‘the fun one’ in the museum.

Curator’s Advent. Day 22. Conservation supplies

In need of conservation supplies. Serious condensation inside a showcase

Purchasing conservation supplies is retail therapy for the curator.

Solander boxes. Unbleached cotton tape. Melanex sleeves. Acid free tissue. Goat hair brush. Distilled water. Tyvek. Humidity control cassettes. Nitrile gloves (S, M, L, XL). Solid brass paperclips. Book sofa. Light meter. Thermohygrometer. Plastazote.

Museum…

Curator’s Advent. Day 21. Art hang

Nothing is straight

Simple, yet fiendish, the art hang requires a different set of skills to the mounting of objects in showcases or for open display. What happens when:

The ceiling isn’t straight

The tops of the walls aren’t straight

The floor slopes

The frames aren’t straight

Throw out the spirit level and trust thine eyes.

Curator’s Advent. Day 19. The exhibition

Fossils on show in gorgeous gallery at Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter.

“Lights, levels, labels… and action!”

The museum exhibition is the curator’s own art form. Stand aside.

Curator’s Advent. Day 18. Archives

Photographic postcards displayed as museum objects in the Isles of Scilly Museum.

Is an archive (series of documents) just another type of museum collection? No it is not. Archival and documentary collections are organised differently and the information they contain is (mostly) read rather than gleaned through observation, measurements and other forms of object research. However, sometimes…

Curator’s Advent. Day 17. Digitisation

Digital photograph of me wearing neon glasses.

Converting information into a digital format and preserving the data. That is all it is. Seriously.

Curator’s Advent. Day 16. Slow death by copyright

Nothing to see here

The curator who wants to share collections freely and openly is saddened by the imperialistic appropriation of out of copyright works by virtue of creating a new slavish copy. The curator who wants to share collections freely and openly is saddened by the government licensing scheme for orphan works. The curator who wants to share collections freely and openly is saddened by…

Curator’s Advent. Day 15. Loan out

Loan out: Be Against Trampled.

Any curator should get excited at receiving a loan request. Traditionally addressed to “The Director,” s/he will ceremonially pass on the request to us in the know to seamlessly deal with the transaction. The particular breed of curator that usually deals with loans out (and in) are the wonderful registrars. Facilities reports all OK; insurance certificate received;…

Curator’s Advent. Day 14. Loan in

Doll called “Miss Cornwall” allegedly wearing traditional Celtic clothes, 1960s.

It’s good to share, isn’t it? Borrowing objects from other museums and private collections helps complete stories. Lending is the foundation of the museum economy. Let’s do more of it.

Curator’s Advent. Day 13. The troublesome donor

Scotch egg without runny yolk

The problem donor is like a fancy Scotch egg. Promises loads on the outside, all slammed up garnishes, yet when you cut into the business end of the egg you are met with a rather rubbery egg with a hard yolk.

Donors who never give something for nothing, for example, like a named gallery, a particular series of exhibitions (that s/he guest curates) or a plaque, or a…

Curator’s Advent. Day 10. Relative humidity

Relative humidity on a warm sunny day with a light breeze is just about right for humans but can be iffy for some objects

Mould, corrosion, warping, splitting, delamination, vinegar syndrome, desiccation, off-gassing are all symptoms of poor control of relative humidity and fluctuations in the moisture of the air surrounding a museum object remain the biggest threat to their long-term health and…