Archive for October 2013
Jana here from Croydon Shire Council. Had my first day at the Workshops Rail Museum in Ipswich as a mentee with the M&GSQ sponsored program to provide training for small museum staff all over Queensland. Thank you to them.
The Museum/s I work with as the Cultural Heritage Coordinator for Croydon Shire Council variously range from a State of the Art visitor centre with small object displays, didactic 4 sided columns of information, a small theatre with a fantastic audio- visual of Croydon’s history from gold to now with a hologram Town Crier and two screen visuals. It has an air conned, humidity controlled archive room and an air conned storage room for documents awaiting preparation for archiving, objects and tourist brochures and miscellany. It has gardens at the back with two antique Bedfords (which get prepped to run in the annual Croydon Poddy Dodgers Parade and driven proudly by generational locals), more machinery and Hans Pehl sculptures (say no more).
The four State heritage registered civic buildings all in their original locations, restored and freely open to the public have displays from modern to old style and of course, some humorous. Croydon Shire has 15 State Registered Heritage places. Read the rest of this entry »
On the blog of the Museum Development Officers this week, is a really instructive account of stage two of disaster recovery at Gayndah. What to do after you have put all those muddy items into the freezer to deal with later is explained beautifully here with lots of pictures of the work in progress. M&GSQ congratulates all the MDOS and the volunteers at Gayndah for this incredible effort towards disaster recovery from the January floods. To see their blog post go to http://qmmdo.com.au/2013/10/28/gayndah-flood-recovery-phase-two/
Lynda Griffin, Caloundra Regional Gallery blogs from her mentorship at Grafton Regional Gallery
Posted on: 29 October 2013
WEEK 1 Reflections: 20 October – 26 October 2013
What a week to arrive in Grafton, with the famous purple Jacarandas in full bloom and the Jacaranda Festival in full swing. “You’ve come at the right time of year!” is the general consensus amongst everyone that I’m introduced to.
The Clarence Valley community is passionate about their Jacarandas, but also about their visual arts, their local artists, and their regional art gallery, which was officially opened in 1988, having commenced in 1985 as a gallery run by the Jacaranda Art Society to house the impressive and ever-increasing Jacaranda Art Prize Collection. (Read more about the Gallery’s history here)
This passion and connection to the community were significant in selecting to complete my mentorship at the Grafton Regional Gallery, in addition to it being a larger scale regional gallery that would present a variety of learning opportunities and ideas to take away that could still be realistically translated to the Caloundra Regional Gallery upon my return. Read the rest of this entry »
Jenny Black, Archivist The Glennie School, blogs from her mentorship at Mercy Heritage Centre
Posted on: 29 October 2013
What an interesting and informative weekend. Speakers encouraging us to think outside the square, museum staff and volunteers sharing and exchanging ideas as well as rediscovering some of Brisbane, Queensland and Australia’s national treasures.
Attendance at the 2013 SEQ Small Museum’s Conference, run this year by the Brisbane Living Heritage Network, enabled me to meet, interact and attend a presentation given by my Mentor, Peter Connell, Director of the Mercy Heritage Centre, before taking up my two week MAGSQ Mentorship placement this week.
The Workshop, ‘ Exhibition Communication: Practical Tips for Writing Text Panels’ presented by Peter Connell was of particular interest to me, providing basic tips and standards developed for producing text panels and labels for exhibitions.
I’m very much looking forward to commencing my placement in the beautifully restored museum. http://www.mercyheritage.com/
M&GSQ’s 2013 Mentorship, Exchange and Fellowship Program is funded by Arts Queensland through the Regional Arts Development Fund (RADF). RADF is a joint Queensland Government and Local Government partnership to support local arts and culture.
See M&GSQ’s website, www.magsq.com.au for more information about the Mentorship, Exchange and Fellowship Program.
Labassa Mansion
Riding Jacket, National Trust (Victoria) Costume Collection
The second week of my mentorship at the National Trust (Victoria) took of where I left it – in amongst archive boxes and garment racks filled with historic undergarments at the home of the Trust’s Costume Collection, Labassa Mansion.
My mentor, Lizzie Anya-Petrivna and I had been in contact since my last week discussing the real possibility of this mentorship (and the research undertaken) becoming an exhibition. This meant that we were really focused on getting a shortlist together of garments that would fit a series of curatorial themes that we had been playing with via email since July. Day one and day two was all about sorting collection items into these themes and pulling items into ‘yes, no, maybe’ groups. This process also evidenced the extent undergarments in the Trust’s collection, something that we had thought may be one of the largest in the country.
Museums & Galleries Qld 