Great expectations

For many years, friends and colleagues have recommended a visit to the Pioneer Women’s Hut, so it was with great expectations that I finally got the opportunity to visit the museum, located seven kilometres from Tumbarumba on the Wagga Road.

The humble entrance to the museum conceals a delightful collection, which concentrates on the common, everyday objects that are usually discarded when worn out. However, here, they make do and mend ethic of earlier generations is celebrated, along with the female instinct to creatively decorate even the most prosaic of items. Themed displays relate to rural domestic history, revealing “the ingenuity of women in finding solutions to the challenges of looking after a family in early rural Australia.” http://www.pioneerwomenshut.com/home.aspx

Decorative utilitarian household items appear in many of the displays. “Coping with flies” (November 2012), features this eye-catching food cover and fly-swat.

Another personal favourite was the tea-cosy pictured below; the whimsical, tumbling flowers caught my eye. It was easy to imagine a group of women, sitting on a veranda after a hard day cleaning, cooking and mending, enjoying a cup of tea, and maybe a plate of scones with jam and cream, carefully protected from flies with a decorative food cover.

The theme of Making-do runs through every display; darned socks, sheets that have been patched many times, trivets made from covered bottle caps (pictured below), packing-case furniture, patchwork clothing and quilts.

The 75 quilts in the collection motivated staff to develop a new building dedicated to their storage and display. Opened in 2011, the Heritage Quilt room currently features the “Gift of Thrift”.

Glenroy Cottage Crafts is a little shop on the same site, selling locally made products, including jams and pickles, knitted wares, jewellery and the very amusing garden critters made from recycled materials.

So, expectations met and surpassed. This is one museum that I will revisit.

Tamara Lavrencic

Regospective opens in Tamworth

Recently I had the pleasure to be invited back to Tamworth to launch Reg Lynch’s Regospective exhibition at the Tamworth Regional Gallery as part of the 2013 Country Music Festival. Regospective is based on a selection of Lynch’s work produced over the past 35 years. It is Reg’s farewell after a long history curating Guitar Shaped World, a series of exhibitions to be presented in conjunction with the world renowned music festival.

On a particularly hot day in Tamworth (over 40 seems the new norm) it was pleasing to have a large turnout (in excess of 100) to enjoy the hospitality of staff and fine catering of the Friends.

As the official proceedings unfolded I was joined by ABC Radio presenter and art critic Henry Mulholland (a five times Archibald Prize finalist and Guitar Shaped World artist). Henry spoke in some detail about Reg’s work.  My role was to contextualise his contribution in helping cement the gallery’s relationship with the festival and all things country music.

When I was Director of the Tamworth Gallery (1989-97), Reg was engaged to curate Guitar Shaped World.  Selected artists were invited to produce ‘guitar shaped’ work and Reg’s particularly inclusive style saw many surprising and remarkable works shown. Of note was the year we engaged Wagga based performance artist Arthur Wicks to ‘perform’ on the back of a semi-trailer as part of the festival’s signature Saturday morning cavalcade, but that’s another story.

Reg Lynch graduated from Sydney College of the Arts in 1981 with a degree in Design/Visual Communications and is best known as a designer, illustrator and cartoonist, with work regularl published in Fairfax media.

See newspaper clippings from the opening below, or a slideshow of Regospective works here

Remembering the 2012 IMAGinE awards

Jennifer Colless from the Walgett and District Historical Association Inc passed on the following memories about last year's IMAGinE awards:

Once again Museums & Galleries have hosted a magnificent event on 23 November 2012,  in the most interesting setting, the White Rabbit Gallery at Chippendale.

This was a great evening and, to old and new members of museums, it was inspiring and awesome and a great showcase of the wonderful work being done by the museum development sector helping all areas of museum growth and progress.

It was pleasing to see the Barkers from Lightning Ridge being honoured after their years of preservation of the stories and artefacts of the Indigenous people and lovely to see the family still involved.  We wish them lots of success in the future.

We also congratulate all the Award winners, such a good job they have all done and the award a great reward of which they are justly proud.

Lovely to meet up with folk from other museums, some of whom we have met before, and to catch up on their efforts over the years.

The professionalism of the entries in the competition was good to see and we can all learn from that.

The Grant funding has expanded one of our newer member’s outlook and she will pass on her enjoyment and what she has learned from the function.  Members need to take the opportunity of attending such functions to develop a broader outlook and new expansive ideas develop more readily.  It is good for all members to see what work other museums are doing, how they display, what they use, their space  (OH for the space in the White Rabbit – it made our mouths water).

We were delighted to have the opportunity of viewing the White Rabbit’s galleries.  I loved the open space, the (apparent) simplicity of some of the exhibits and the cleverness of many of the works, they appear to be something else (the honeycombed paper exhibit looked like a lazy serpent waiting for some unsuspecting animal to come within its reach, the military display and the fascinating door, motes of dust , the log and chains, painted bottles, life sized interview (fascinating), porcelain table & chairs, sunflower seeds and so many others. 

It was great, just goes to show what can be done.  Loved it!!

Celebrating museum Standards

The Standards 2012 program officially drew to a close with a wonderful Celebration event hosted by the Adelong Alive Museum. After a delicious lunch served in the adjacent Adelonia Theatre, Mayor Trina Thomson welcomed and commended the 9 museums from the Eastern Riverina that had taken part in the year long program of self-assessment. Her opening acknowledgement of country was heart-felt and set a warm and respectful tone for the rest of the proceeding.  She congratulated the museums for their achievements and acknowledged the valuable contribution that volunteers play in keeping, preserving and interpreting unique local stories. The Mayor presented each museum with a certificate of completion.

The museums that took part in the Standards 2012 Program include:

• Adelong Alive Museum
• Batlow Museum
• Greens Gunyah Museum (Lockhart)
• Museum of the Riverina (Wagga Wagga)
• Temora Rural Museum
• The Pioneer Women's Hut (Tumbarumba)
• Tumut Historical Society Museum
• The Up To Date Store (Coolamon)
• Wyalong Museum 

Feedback from the paid staff and volunteers who took part in the program indicated that while some may have felt daunted by the amount of work required at the start of the program, they found that the self-review surveys provided a welcome opportunity to have a close look at their strengths and weaknesses, to re-examine their policies and procedures and to reprioritise the use of their resources. The networking opportunities presented by the various workshops throughout the year were also greatly appreciated.

Museums & Galleries NSW takes this opportunity to congratulate the museums and the dedicated people who took part in the Standards Program. 

For more information on the Standards Program please visit the M&G NSW website. 

A story by Tamara Lavrencic.

Image 1: The 2012 Standards Program Participants outside Adelong Alive Museum.

Image 2: The team from the Tumut Museum receive their certificates and Final Reports from Mayor of Tumut Shire Trina Thomson.

Image 3: Lunch time was a great opportunity for networking and sharing experiences from the Standards Program.

Lithgow Museums’ Networking Group

Lithgow Museums’ Networking Group meeting at Simmo's Museum, Glen Davis.

The Lithgow area is a hidden gem of history and heritage. Visitors and locals alike can enjoy the history of one of the most fascinating areas in Australia through the many museums, historic sites and heritage organizations. From aboriginal history through to the history of the Small Arms Factory and from Hartley through to Glen Davis there are sites and museums to learn about aboriginal, convict, mining, social, railway and factory history.

In March 2012 a group of museum and heritage organization operators from the Lithgow LGA met at Eskbank House and Museum to have a chat about how they could help each other out. From this initial gathering the Lithgow Museums’ Networking Group was formed. The group meets monthly and our aims are: educating each other to improve the quality of our museums, networking to promote each other’s museums and share resources, co-operating to create a combined museum experience for visitors and sharing enthusiasm and to enjoy each other’s company as museum and heritage enthusiasts. It is exciting to be able to work together, take strength from each other and present a combined museums  experience to visitors and locals.

There are 12 organisations in the group, some able to attend regularly others coming when they can or contributing via email, etc. The groups include: Lithgow and District Family History Society (LDFHS), Lithgow Small Arms Factory Museum (LSAFM), Simmo’s Museum, Eskbank House and Museum, Lithgow Library Learning Centre (LLLC), Lithgow State Mine Heritage Park, Lithgow State Mine Railway Ltd, Hartley Historical Village, Portland History Group, Rydal Village Association, Delta Expo and Newnes Pub. Each organisation takes turns hosting the meetings and this has been an invaluable part of getting to know each other’s museums and being able to share resources and promote other museums to visitors.

The group has participated in several group activities aimed at increasing visitor numbers to museums and generally get the word out that Lithgow’s Heritage is amazing and worth a visit. 

Our first activity was an Open Day for many of the museums in the group on International Museums Day 2012. International Museums Day is in May and is celebrated by over 30 000 museums throughout the world.  With a short time to organize and limited advertising most museums still saw an increase in visitation on the day of over 500 %. The group has more plans for International Museums Day 2013 and also celebrating other international days like Volunteers Day 2012 with an afternoon tea for the wonderful volunteers in all our organizations.

The next group activity was a combined stall at Daffodils at Rydal. Photos from the different organizations were displayed and pamphlets and postcards were handed out along with our first Lithgow Heritage Newsletter outlining heritage events happening in September and October in the region. The most rewarding part of the day was talking to people about the museums and history and hearing their stories of the area. Perhaps this is infact the most rewarding part of running a museum in general.

Our next event was another stall at the Back to Hartley Celebrations on Sunday 28 October 2012. This time we included a “What is it?” table with a variety of mysterious objects for people to ponder, a “Who is it?” display of historic photos of Lithgow Citizens with room for people to comment, displays from the museums and projected historical images of the Lithgow area. Of course the most interesting part of our stall was talking heritage and history and spending time with other museum enthusiasts.

Our Christmas party will be a well earned reward for all the hard work, much of it voluntary, that all the organization participants put in to operating their museums and preserving and presenting to the public the wonderful history that is Lithgow. 

Jan Saundercock

Lithgow and District Family History Society

A Night to Celebrate: The 2012 IMAGinE Awards

All photography by Mimi Kelly.

By all accounts the 2012 IMAGinE Awards presentation was a huge success. With a 20% increase in the number of nominations, a revised presentation format and bubbly enthusiasm expressed by over 100 guests, who enjoyed the hospitality of White Rabbit Gallery – it was certainly a night to remember.

The evening commenced with an Award that recognised Uncle Roy and Aunty June Barker’s Liftetime Volunteer Contribution, having devoted their lives to the preservation and sharing of Aboriginal history and cultural knowledge. The award was accepted by members of their family following a moving tribute given by Steve Miller, M&G NSW’s Manager of Aboriginal Programs.  Queanbeyan and District Historical Museum Society were then announced as winners of the Volunteer Collection Management Category, closely followed by an Award given to the Corrective Services Museum, Cooma, in the Collection Management Category for 1-4 paid staff.

Western Plains Cultural Centre’s recently completed de-accessioning project saw some 1000 items removed from the collection. Such was the manner in which this project was undertaken and given the sustainable advantages it bestowed to ongoing WPCC programs, our judges had no hesitation in giving the Collection Management (5-20 staff) Award to Dubbo.

The exemplary programs developed by Port of Yamba Historical Society were acknowledged by giving the volunteer run Exhibitions & Public Engagement Award to their World War II at Home exhibition. Goulburn Regional Gallery won the same category for 1-4 staff and Sydney University’s The Nicholson Museum won the 5-20 staff award category.

The 21+ staff award for Exhibitions and Public Engagement was hotly contested. Following detailed consideration the judges settled on awarding it to The Australian Maritime Museum for their hugely popular Nawi – exploring Australia’s Indigenous watercraft exhibition.

Category 3, for Education and Audience Development 1-4 paid staff, was given to Grafton Regional Gallery for their Towards the Stratosphere drawing project. It involved six local schools in the production of a 25 square metre drawing that reflected known and unknown aspects of the environment. The 4-20 paid staff award in this category went to Lake Macquarie City Art Gallery and the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, won the 20+ staff category for their Bella Room project.

The individual achievement categories were also hotly contested with the paid staff category being shared between Dr Nick Lomb, from Sydney Observatory and Elizabeth Ann Macgregor OBE, Director Museum of Contemporary Art Australia. The volunteer award for Individual Achievement proved hugely popular for its recognition of the work of Ken Smith, Past President and Secretary of the Parramatta and District Historical Society.

The evening ended with hearty congratulations to all winners and a renewed enthusiasm for the way museums and galleries involve and support their communities throughout the state. 

From all of us at M&G a big thank you goes to all nominations for the way in which programs and projects are conceived and undertaken. 

Michael Rolfe
CEO

IMAGinE awards nominees finale

Museums & Galleries NSW are pleased to announce that we have received the most nominations to date for the IMAGinE awards. We are glad so many of you want to celebrate your museum, gallery or keeping place's achievements with us.

 

M&G NSW are counting down the weeks (1.5 weeks!) until the winners are announced on Friday 23 November at White Rabbit Gallery, Chippendale. Register now to be part of the excitement. Each fortnight we will be introducing you to the nominees and their exciting stories.

 

CATEGORY 1: COLLECTION MANAGEMENT 

LEVEL A: VOLUNTEER RUN 

Canowindra Historical Society & Museum 

This project assessed the significance and of the Museum’s lucerne farming collection. Lucerne is an important crop to Canowindra’s development. Although farmed in many locations, its history is not well documented.

Before embarking on the project, objects were scattered through the Museum in order of acquisition and generally the only recorded information was the donor’s name. Volunteers conducted research, oral histories, significance assessments, cataloguing, relocating objects and creating descriptive labels revealing many significant objects and information. For example, members traced a farmer who used a Mudgee press (horse powered baler), who provided an oral history, photographs and other related objects.

The collection is now accessible to the public and object conditions can be monitored.

Old Courthouse Museum 

Appreciating the need to adopt new standards in museum practice, the Historical Society participated in the 2011 M&G NSW Standards Program. As a result, they adopted the collection management system, MOSAiC.

With thousands of uncatalogued objects, the database team donated their time to learn the system and visit other museums with MOSAiC to gain experience. Based on this research, the team designed new object forms based on the screen layout and implemented an object photographing process. The team has become familiar with website research tools, enhancing exhibitions as a by-product.

Port Macquarie Historical Society & Museum 

Port Macquarie undertook a Preservation Needs Assessment as recommended by a Collection Significance Assessment, both funded by Community Heritage Grants.

Spending time with the consultant during the assessment was a great learning experience for volunteers. They discussed best practices for pest control, object handling, adjusting lighting and reducing dust, implementing them before receiving the report.

Recommendations have been incorporated into the Strategic Plan and Exhibition & Display Program Plan. They have modified the way they handle objects and have implemented a regular display and cleaning schedule. Information from the report has assisted the Museum by supporting grant applications, budgeting for storage materials and completing a Disaster Preparedness Plan.

Queanbeyan and District Historical Museum Society 

Over the last few years the Society in partnership with Queanbeyan City Council has implemented the recommendations from their 2008 Preservation Assessment Survey. At that time the collection was wrapped in newspaper and stored in different shaped boxes throughout the Museum.

Since 2008 the collection has been catalogued into Mosaic and rehoused according to recommended standards in a secure purpose designed store. The Society works on the collection by assessing significance and priorities. Data entry is done by a cataloguer and trained Society members.

Society members are now embarking on de-accessioning material that doesn’t fit collection guidelines.

These processes have taken much hard work over the last few years but the Queanbeyan and District Historical Museum Society is very proud of their achievements.

CATEGORY 1: COLLECTION MANAGEMENT 
LEVEL B: 1-4 PAID STAFF 

Broken Hill City Council Broken Hill Regional Art Gallery 

 

The Broken Hill Regional Art Gallery collection was housed in less than ideal conditions with outmoded climate control and poor protection from the elements. The previous off-site arrangements made it hard to fully utilise the collection and extreme weather made it difficult to plan the transportation of works.

By building an extension to the existing building that included environmental controls, loading dock, crate store, office area, an area dedicated to the storage of works on paper, and sliding racks for paintings the new storage space now meets the Gallery’s requirements. Staff have daily access to the collection, are able to research its history, manage conservation issues, develop new curated exhibitions and make it available to researchers and educators.

Corrective Services NSW
Corrective Services Museum, Cooma 

The Museum is the guardian of many significant documents, images and recordings, including execution warrants for well-known bushrangers and personal letters by the last woman hanged in NSW.

In August 2011 the need for an immense digitisation project gained momentum. After extensive research, installation of the necessary technology and staff training, the State-wide Manager and assistant undertook the mammoth task of digitising the Museum’s collection. The intense process demanded a “non-stop” approach of unbroken operation.

Whilst the digitisation project remains an ongoing commitment, the bulk of items were digitised in the first half of 2012. Much of the collection is delicate and fragile and may eventually perish. Through digitising they will survive for generations, at the touch of a button. 

 

Grafton Regional Gallery 

In 2004 the Cullen family gifted 37 photographs by John William Lindt (1845 - 1926), including 34 of Aboriginal people. The question of their identity was pursued by the Lindt Research Group, with the support of Aboriginal Elders whose lands lie within the Clarence Valley.

The Gallery employed historian Nola Mackey to research and her report launched the Search for Identity project alongside an exhibition of the photographs.

A call to the community resulted in identifying three of the Aboriginal people and the descendants of one. This motivated Dreaming the Past: the Lindt Story, a 70 page full colour catalogue.

This project developed the significance of the photographs, provided exhibition development, community involvement and created the outline for a future publication.

Orange City Council
Sustainable Collections Project 

The Sustainable Collections Project (SCP) is an annual regional museum program spanning the Central West Region of NSW, involving 16 museums. SCP supports volunteers conserving their heritage through museums, collections, exhibitions, and programs by delivering training, resource materials, marketing products, a web presence and assistance with collection management and curatorial work.

The drivers of the project emanate from the museum plan which describes the community driven need for a range of local projects.

Outcomes have included three major regional exhibitions researched, developed and showcased in Orange Regional Gallery; interpretative panels researched, designed, fabricated and installed for six museums; development of the migration heritage trail, a partnership project with The NSW Migration Heritage Centre and interpretation of the Wentworth Mine site at Lucknow.

Newcastle Maritime Museum 

Beginning in 2007, this project involved moving and cataloguing the Newcastle Maritime Museum collection. Many objects had no accession number or documentation and faulty records indicated there were only 2,000 objects in the collection. With the project close to completion, 6,500 items are now recorded and all objects have an accession number and their location recorded.

Ten people were trained in cataloguing including preventative conservation, photography and numbering objects. Two volunteers have become proficient at dealing with rust and caring for organic materials.

Newcastle Maritime Museum wishes to recognise the work and passion of their volunteers, in particular three who have died in the past six months. 

 

Shoalhaven City Arts Centre 

Shoalhaven City Arts Centre constructed an industry standard, climate controlled art storage facility. This was vital for valuable historic items including photographs and watercolours by both Samual Elyard and Jon Edward.

Because of this new facility, collection items can now be condition assessed, reviewed for exhibitions and easily accessed by researching educators. There also is now room to process and store safely incoming and outgoing exhibitions. Items are consistently photographed, updated in the database, digitised and made available on the Art Centre’s website.

The new facility was operational when a valuation of the collection was undertaken, assisting in a positive report from the valuer. 

 

CATEGORY 1: COLLECTION MANAGEMENT 
LEVEL C: 5-20 PAID STAFF 

Albury LibraryMuseum 

Any person working in a regional cultural facility has to wear many hats. As demanding as this is, the team at Albury LibraryMuseum have adopted a strategy for exhibition development and collection management. These are not exclusive; in fact, the more they tie together the greater the benefits for the collection and community.

An example is the Bonegilla Collection, which is of national significance. The process of the collection's exhibition development provided many collection benefits, including increased documentation, better care, digitisation advancements, new acquisitions, greater understanding of staff and improved access.

This process is not new, however this project demonstrates that cataloguing collections through to curating exhibitions are intrinsically interlinked. 

 

Mosman Art Gallery 

In 2010 Neil Balnaves AO pledged to donate a million dollars worth of paintings from his private collection to the Gallery. This has been realised through a donation of 16 Australian Impressionist and early twentieth century works significant to the Mosman area.

The Balnaves Gift includes works by Arthur Streeton, Conrad Martens, Will Ashton, Henry Fullwood, Elioth Gruner, George Halstead, James Ranalph Jackson, Matthew Charles Meere, Adelaide Elizabeth Perry, Sydney Long, Ethel Carrick Fox and Margaret Preston. They form a substantial historical addition to the collection and have particular value for education.

In preparation for the launch, all works were assessed and received conservation treatment by specialist conservators. To adequately house these works, a new gallery space was created. 

 

Western Plains Cultural Centre 

WPCC’s deacession project saw 1000 objects deaccessioned beginning with a significance assessment of the Dubbo Regional Museum collection. In addition, WPCC had duplicates and gaps in thematic areas because of the collection's beginnings - commited amateurs with large sheds. 

As part of the project WPCC created a new collection policy which allowed deaccessioning, offered objects to donors and other museums, identified objects for programs and conducted an auction, selling all but two of the objects that providing proceeds that went to collection care.

Images of the various education programs, exhibitions and other activities of museums and galleries in NSW are courtesy of the 2012 IMAGinE nominees.