Museum of Sydney: Video Encounters

At Museum of Sydney on Friday 10 May delegates converged both physically and virtually for Video Encounters to witness some of the best videoconferencing experiences Australia has to offer in the one half day seminar.

Below, Karen Player and Ben Newsome introduce how video conferencing technology can be used.

Karen Player - Museum Outreach Coordinator - Australian Museum

Karen has a background in environmental science and education. She is committed to outreach programs throughout NSW and beyond. Karen has worked at the Australian Museum for the last 14 years in education and interpretive roles. Karen has been coordinating video conferencing programs for the last three years. Last year the Museum presented video conferencing events to 7,500 students from 200 schools across the state. Karen is the chair of Virtual Excursions Australia, a professional video conferencing network of over 30 educational content providers.

Ben Newsome - Director - Fizzics Education

Ben has run hundreds of video conferences for schools across Australia and around the world since 2010. He will discuss how free apps can link iPads, smart phones and desktop computers to traditional video conferencing equipment so you can video conference without the equipment. Additionally this session covers how Fizzics Education is using these apps to support science clubs in schools and libraries.

Note: this presentation is made up of the video grid below. In the left hand top corner is Ben presenting to the audience, while around him are various staff using traditional video conferencing technology (top right) and mobile technology in the videos below.

Meet Mini Marion!

Railway Coal Mine, Lithgow 1929. Courtesy of the Lithgow State Mine.

Marion is the brand new guide at the Lithgow State Mine and she's just arrived to tell to you about the night of the 1953 fire at the Mine. She’s a captivating guide; wife of one of the miners and she’s on show wearing the very latest ‘50s fashion. Marion tells you about the terrible events of the fire, the dreadful death of the horses and the impacts of the disaster on the miners and the people in Lithgow.

The other thing you need to know about Marion is she’s the latest in clever technology – Marion is a story telling device; she wanders around in her own 3D film perching on various display objects and leaning against the machinery in a Barbie-turns-serious kind of way. She’s engaging, novel and lovable!

The newly installed 3D film is a great showcase for what new technologies can do to bring your Museum alive―assisting people to relate to significant moments in history whether it’s of local or international significance. The team at Lithgow State Mine have an active Facebook page to support their museum and a virtual tour on their website which gives you a great sense of the energy and interest in the place.

So go and meet mini Marion, she’s there every weekend from midday to 4pm. Marion represents some of the benefits of rethinking your Museum interpretation and collection display providing access to personal perspectives, moving stories and a new way to interact with a collection.

Prime7 TV recently did a promotion on mini Marion – have a look at it here

Newcastle Museum set to open

The new Newcastle Museum will have its official opening this Thursday, 2 August. As a thank you to all those who've been part of this fantastic new development, the Museum held a "soft opening" yesterday evening. What a wonderful event! With a live broadcast from ABC radio Newcastle, the new museum was filled with people of all ages from new born babies to great grandparents. With smiles all round, the building was buzzing with happy laughter, no doubt helped along by generous glasses of bubbly and fizzy drinks for the kids.

The Museum is conveniently located adjacent to the Civic train station in the Honeysuckle precinct in a wonderfully gritty industrial building. The address (corner of Merewether St and Workshop Way) gives some hint to the former use of the building with references to its heritage continuing throughout the site. It's truly wonderful to feel the sense of the building's industrial past oozing through the edges of the very contemporary exhibition spaces. The exhibitions have been lightly placed over the industrial infrastructure and the staff and designers have clearly put a lot of thought into meshing the original use of the building with its new life as a 21st century museums.

The exhibition areas are divided into three main zones. The history of BHP in Newcastle is explored through an engaging exhibition that includes a light and sound performance involving an enormous smelting crucible and a great deal of smoke and noise! The exhibitions draw on a range of materials including life sized photographs of the smelting works by the likes of Max Dupain and Harold Cazneux, reconstructions of work spaces such as a chemistry lab and men's wash room and the personal belongings of people who worked with BHP.

Newcastle's story is shown through the main gallery which includes an audiovisual wall with faces from the Newcastle community including panels that change every few minutes. Many of the images have been given by local people and it is the museum's intention to continue to add to the wall. The more environmentally sensitive objects are displayed within two rooms created within the larger industrial space. These rooms are more intimate than the main exhibition areas providing visitors with a change of pace. Themes such as immigration, Newcastle's role during times of war and the local surfing culture are included.

One of the great delights of the Newcastle Museum is the SuperNova exhibition. Part of the original Newcastle Museum, SuperNova is an interactive science centre providing children and adults alike with a range of hands on science experiences. A giant blue globe of the world greats visitors as they enter the space. A series of science work stations are scattered throughout the space. Each station sits on a colourfully lit up base and explores a different scientific issue. A softplay area for toddlers is also located within this space.

Museums & Galleries NSW is holding an event at the Newcastle Museum on Tuesday 30 August to give participants an opportunity to hear more about what's involved in developing this and other new cultural facilities, for more information go to Bricks and Mortar

To learn more about the Newcastle Museum go to the Newcastle City Council website or visit the Newcastle Museum facebook page

You can also hear Acting Deputy Director Julie Baird being interviewed on ABC radio Newcastle

There's a War On! Website Launch

On Tuesday 1 March, M&GNSW launched our new wiki website There's a War On! at Chifley Home Education Centre, Bathurst. The website has been developed as a follow on to the earlier thematic studies on collections and sites associated with World War I and World War II activities in NSW which led to the travelling exhibition There's a War On!

Launching the wiki website at Chifley Home Education Centre, gave people the added opportunity of viewing the exhibition There's a war On! and visiting Chifley Home. Ben Chifley's significant contribution to the Australian community during World War II, first as Treasurer, then as Minister for Post War Reconstruction and finally as Prime Minister following Curtin's untimely death in July 1945.

The website provides an opportunity for users to look at sites and collections associated with the homefront during WWI and WWII across NSW. Utilising google map technology, the sites and collections are mapped out on a map of NSW with the capacity to zoom into particular locations and view the map in either satellite or map mode. Each entry has a "pin" on the map, clicking on the "pin" takes the user to a page for that particular object or site. These pages provides information about the object or site which can include description, location, history and an image.

It is hoped that the information on the site will expand over time as users are invited not simply to visit the site but to become contributors adding information about their own collections or sites associated with World War I and World War II in NSW. The site also invites contributors to include their memories of particlar sites or object. We hope that this will allow people to share their thoughts about sites such as air training bases, POW camps or Women's Land Army Hostels.

Thank you to Bathurst Regional Council for hosting the event, in particular Sam Malloy, Grant Weatherstone and the other Chifley Home Staff. Thanks also to Carah's Bakery for the marvelous catering. It was also great to have Ian Rufus, heritage re-enactor from Lithgow, reveal the inner secrets of the .303 rifle and its dispersed production in feeder factories across the central west of NSW during World War II.

Summerlee, Museum of Scottish Industrial Life

Last week I met with Clare Weir and Lu McNair from Summerlee, Museum of Scottish Industrial Life. Summerlee is an industrial museum focusing on coal mining and ironworks based in Coatbridge, North Lanarkshire between Edinburgh and Glasgow. The Museum is another recognised collection and highlights the success of the recognition scheme in supporting the further development of collections across Scotland.

Summerlee opened as an ironworks and associated mine in 1836. Whilst the furnaces of the ironworks ceased operation in the 1920s, the site continued as an industrial operation until the 1980s at which time it was operating as the Hydrocon Crane company. The initial museum opened on the site in 1987 as a Trust or volunteer managed operation. The museum is located on a 22 acre site with a heritage tram delivering people around the site.

Today the site is operated by North Lanarkshire council and has been recently redeveloped following an investment of GBP 10 from a range of sources including the Heritage Lottery Fund, Museums Galleries Scotland, the European Regional Development Fund, North Lanarkshire Council, charitable Trusts and individuals. The site provides wonderful opportunities for engagement through interactives such as the mock up blast furnace that leads to a pig iron casting.

There has been a conscious effort to incorporate social history onto the site alongside the large technological pieces. This was reinforced by the local community who were closely involved in the redevelopment. Older people within the community wanted to be able to take grandchildren and show them something of the way they lived, hence the addition of areas focusing on dances, banners from marches and the local movie theatre.

The museum also contains a series of row houses set up to reflect changing lifestyles of the area. The first three houses depict the nineteenth and early twentieth century, where families rented one roomed attached homes in rows. The 1940s and 1960s homes showed a continued accumulation of belongings and the extension of the homes into the backyard and roof. The museum has also developed backyards for some of the cottages, showing the changing use of gardens from a source of food to a place of leisure, over time.

With the changing economic climate, the museum is looking at how they will operate in the future. They may have less funds to develop new exhibitions but are hoping that this will provide more time for continued involvement of the community in the development of their exhibitions. They are exploring ways of expanding opportunities for volunteers, including guiding through the museum. There has been a program of involving long term unemployed people in placements at the museum which may also expand over time, perhaps leading to traineeships or apprenticeships.

MA Conference 2010 wrap up

We're now from the conference. As usual was a jam packed affair combining stimulating sessions with numerous opportunities to catch up with old friends and colleagues and meet new people. With such a range of great sessions running simultaneously, it was difficult to decide which to attend. Some of the highlights for me were:

• Professor Richard Sandell, Leicester University, who showed us some examples of galleries getting involved in human rights issues and using visual arts to engage communities in controversial discussions
• Professor Stephen Heppell who discussed the way children interact with both technology and museums. Stephen challenged us to invite children to be part of the evaluation of our exhibitions and services and brought to our attention that the way children use technology can be different to our own approach
• Kylie Winkworth who reminded us of the resource divide between the large federal and state funded institutions and the plethora of small mostly regionally based organisations. She suggested that the way forward may be to reduce the size and number of collections to ensure their sustainability into the future
• Professor Morris Vogel, East Side Tenement Museum gave a lively presentation on this wonderful museum that uses the building as a backdrop for visitors to enter the lives of six different families who lived in the building over 100 years. The flexibility of the museum’s approach and its willingness to shift focus as the country’s perception of itself changes provides a dynamic approach to museum interpretation
• Vicki Warden, a Museum Development Officer from Queensland presented on behalf of the MDOs outlining a wonderful project that has been undertaken across Queensland documenting the recent history of a series of festivals. The project has resulted in local exhibitions and a website documenting the very lively history of a range of local festivals as well as increased skills and knowledge about contemporary collecting, digitisation and web management
• Lynda Kelly, Australian Museum, gave a fascinating talk that drew on a range of historic perspectives about how museums engage with visitors, as well as drawing on her current experience at the Australian Museum
• Joanne Orr, Museums Galleries Scotland, highlighted ways that museums engage in broader community issues that are often the focus of government (such as social inclusion and developing social capital).
• Jason Eades, Koorie Heritage Trust, gave a lively presentation on their projects that are focused on engaging with young Aboriginal people through contemporary culture (including a project designing hoodies that ended in a fashion parade)

Suzanne Bravery (General Manager Programs and Services) nominated the two sessions below as highlights for her:

• Workshop: A unique collaboration: The Canning Stock Route project as an unusual and successful partnership case study for how a museum, an arts organisation and Aboriginal communities can work together.
• Lyn Hicks’ presentation on ‘New ways of contextualising volunteerism in the museums sector’.

Several people have commented during and after the conference about the way that technology has permeated the event both in terms of content and a means of communication. An iphone application Layar was provided that allowed delegates to locate each session in real time either on a map or through a list of session times and content with images of the buildings. A twitter account was created for the conference and many delegates happily twittered their way from one session to the next. At least one session I attended opened out into a discussion about the value of tweeting during sessions, was this building interactivity or exclusivity? Perhaps a Q&A style Twitter stream (as I saw at a National Library event earlier this year) would resolve this issue?