Part 2 (1/2)

Consider, too, what kind of role you would like to have. There are certain functions that every organisation must try to cover, so think about which ones appeal to you.

The functions that every museum or gallery must fulfil: collection ident.i.ty what is being held and what should be added or borrowed to supplement it; further research into the holding to improve understanding; collection care and management ensuring the collection remains in good condition; financial management and fundraising ensuring that agreed funding arrangements are complied with; negotiating to find new sources of money; fundraising through a variety of different mechanisms; education and learning teaching people of all ages (education is not confined to the young) who visit the collection, whether in person or online, about what is held; marketing and audience development ensuring information on the collection reaches new audiences as well as established ones, and that they use the information or visit the collection (this may be a condition of certain types of funding); establis.h.i.+ng methods of counting traffic and thus demonstrating effective management of resources; general management and human resources (HR) all the tasks that are common in any organisation: hiring and ensuring good working practice; keeping the building in good condition; people and health management; pay and pensions.

How these roles are allocated will obviously depend on the size and budget of the organisation. When recruiting, a large organisation will seek staff who have the relevant qualifications and/or experience for each role so someone applying for a retail position will need selling experience, marketers a marketing background, and those responsible for building maintenance will have the appropriate professional qualifications. Within a smaller organisation, these functions will usually be amalgamated (so the person who orders stock for the shop may also be responsible for marketing). As each role will have to be covered by somebody, staff must be flexible and not inclined to stick to strict demarcation zones of involvement, which means att.i.tude can be as important as experience.

Next, consider whether you would like to be a generalist, utilising a broad range of knowledge and skills, or if you would prefer your career to progress in a linear fas.h.i.+on, along a specific path of expertise. Having said that, if you plan to progress in this world you will need a working knowledge of all aspects of running a museum or gallery.

General staffing issues in museums and galleries There is a general shortage of staff with science or technology qualifications for related collections. It is possible to do an MA in curators.h.i.+p and technical preservation, and for this a science background would be required, with a strong interest in chemistry.

Museums and galleries are inundated with applications from people who want to work in curating or interpreting a collection, but have much greater difficulty attracting staff with a broader range of skills, such as experience of IT and finance in part at least because rates of pay tend to be low. So if you are seeking work experience and a first job, any provable experience of being good at managing money and doing accounts, database care and having an understanding of data protection would help improve your chances of success.

The compet.i.tion for entry at starter job level may be intense, but this puts a ceiling on the number of future colleagues you'll have, so compet.i.tion for the second job or midlife role can be much less stringent (which is why senior staff are sometimes recruited from allied professions with relevant expertise, such as academia or specialist publis.h.i.+ng).

As you explore the various roles and accompanying issues you will begin to appreciate that there are both conflicting and equally valid priorities within museums and galleries. For example, if an organisation has a shop (which may trade as a separate company for tax reasons), then its mission will be to enrich and develop the brand, but at the same time make money because most, if not all, of its profits will go back to the host organisation. The retail staff will be looking to charge for special items and services that enhance the experience of visiting and probably do this through a shop, restaurant or cafe, merchandise specific to particular exhibitions, such as catalogues and posters, and other selling opportunities. In some cases this may be helped by their initial charter (for example, the V&A, as a museum of commercial design, has a brief to improve industrial practice and so sells things closely linked to this), but in other organisations the s.p.a.ce allocated to a visitor restaurant or sales racks may be resented by staff mounting exhibitions for taking up too much s.p.a.ce, while staff on the reception desk who are trying to give visitors instructions on how to find what they need may find it diffi-cult to keep an eye on the stock of pencils and postcards at the same time.

While retail staff try to make money, their colleagues in Learning and Interpretation promote free free access at as many levels as possible and try to encourage footfall through the inst.i.tution, in particular to new groups and individuals who have not previously visited. The curatorial team, meanwhile, have specific knowledge about particular parts of the collection and may find both the money-making and the learning activities a distraction and a risk to the environment they seek to protect. access at as many levels as possible and try to encourage footfall through the inst.i.tution, in particular to new groups and individuals who have not previously visited. The curatorial team, meanwhile, have specific knowledge about particular parts of the collection and may find both the money-making and the learning activities a distraction and a risk to the environment they seek to protect.

The logistics team, responsible for maintenance of the building, installing bathrooms, dealing with visitor movements, and so on, may want to improve signage or flow of movement around the building and find themselves thwarted by regulations and patterns of usage that seem illogical. It can be really hard to explain the rationale of why things are (or more commonly are not) possible, and this can lead to frustration. Hence, what the in-house team considers obvious, and takes for granted, is often overlooked or insufficiently explained to outside contractors, until late in the process. For them, it may seem obvious that signage must fit the style of the building rather than being 'airport style' and visible from 100 metres; their external partners, without the background or explanation, may find this surprising (and odd that they were not warned earlier).

There may be similar restrictions arising from the conditions under which donations were made, and there needs to be discussion about whether these can be lifted or worked around. Planning takes a long time; you can't just do do things. And you need to think clearly about whether you are a good fit for this environment; whether you are struck by its charm or just its frustrations. things. And you need to think clearly about whether you are a good fit for this environment; whether you are struck by its charm or just its frustrations.

In general, you will find that museums and galleries are poorly resourced and funded, the work is seldom well paid and is not (as is often imagined) particularly relaxing. People who want to work in this world often imagine it's a gentle place where you can do the job you are accustomed to, but at 75 per cent of your capacity so 'marketing light'1 but this is not true. but this is not true.

There are of course many compensations. Working in a museum or gallery is pleasant because you tend to be surrounded by interesting people and objects. Museums and galleries tend to attract an engaging and eclectic mix of people, all sharing a common purpose of supporting something that matters. At an annual party of a large inst.i.tution you might find yourself talking to a variety of people an expert on something highly specific, one of the guards and the person who runs the shop. This is a civilised place to work in the true meaning of the term. You are part of an environment that is bigger than you are, with a lovely ambience, doing something for the good of society and leaving a lasting legacy. It is the ant.i.thesis to corporate, where the need to remunerate the shareholders can seem rather hollow by comparison.

What is the difference between museums and galleries?

It's difficult to come up with a precise definition of the current role of each inst.i.tution that highlights the differences between the two as, in practice, there are many working departures from the original stated principles. To complicate matters further, the terms 'museum' and 'gallery' are regionally specific, so in the US most art galleries are called museums.

The Chambers Dictionary describes a museum museum as 'a place of study; a resort of the learned; an inst.i.tution or repository for the collection, exhibition and study of objects of artistic, scientific, historic or educational interest; a collection of curiosity.' The International Council of Museums (ICOM) defines a museum as a 'non profit-making, permanent inst.i.tution in the service of society and its development, and open to the public, which acquires, conserves, researches, communicates and exhibits, for purposes of study, education and enjoyment, material evidence of people and their environment.' as 'a place of study; a resort of the learned; an inst.i.tution or repository for the collection, exhibition and study of objects of artistic, scientific, historic or educational interest; a collection of curiosity.' The International Council of Museums (ICOM) defines a museum as a 'non profit-making, permanent inst.i.tution in the service of society and its development, and open to the public, which acquires, conserves, researches, communicates and exhibits, for purposes of study, education and enjoyment, material evidence of people and their environment.'2 Generally, museums are involved in equipping visitors with information. The type of information can vary immensely it could be anything from social history to machine making but the emphasis is on the 'how' and 'why' of what is displayed in the museum.

The word gallery gallery comes from the Italian comes from the Italian galleria galleria, and originally meant a covered walk, long balcony, upper or long, covered room and from this came the meaning of a room or building for the exhibition of works of art.

In the main, galleries are more concerned with the whole experience of what is displayed and how items relate to each other within the s.p.a.ce. Although information on what is on display and how it came to be there may be available (either in printed form, on wall panels, or through guides standing by) an important part of the gallery experience is allowing people to make up their own minds about what they have seen and in the process to grasp their own appreciation of how items relate to each other. This general impression was rather neatly summed up by a 13-year-old boy, who recently visited a 20th century arts centre/gallery: 'When I arrived, the entrance hall was quite dull and I was not sure where to go. There wasn't much on the walls to tell you what to do. Once we got into the gallery the explanations next to the pictures did not really explain what we were looking at, for example tell us the story. It only told us the size and the media used.'

ELLIOT LAMBLE In a more contemporary context, 'museum' is often a.s.sociated with a permanent collection and the ident.i.ty and care of the same, whereas 'gallery' is more usually a venue focusing on temporary exhibitions, where the items exhibited may be for sale. The lines between the two types of inst.i.tution are increasingly blurred. Today, many museums also house a gallery with a changing exhibition and items for sale, and galleries describe themselves as museums in order to attract a more serious engagement e.g. the Design Museum in London (panying panel or in the showcase).

2. Private collections Private collections There are collections that are the result of substantial donations, but which also rely on endowments and other private sources of finance. Some may come about through the gift of just one patron, as in the case of Glasgow's Burrell Collection (), and there may be a.s.sociated conditions of display. Similarly, Dulwich Picture Gallery (), which depicts the history of consumer culture, displays a small percentage of the fascinating range of product packaging and advertising memorabilia from the personal collection of Robert Opie, author of books on British consumerism.

Gyles Brandreth ama.s.sed a unique collection of teddy bears such as Paddington Bear and bears donated by celebrities in the Teddy Bear Museum, which was open to the public in Stratford-upon-Avon for many years and has now relocated to the Polka Theatre in Wimbledon, south London ().

Glover House in Aberdeen was the former home of Thomas Blake Glover, 'The Scottish Samurai', who was one of the founders of Mitsubis.h.i.+ Heavy Industries Ltd in Nagasaki, j.a.pan in the 1880s. The house was gifted by Mitsubis.h.i.+ to the Grampian j.a.pan Trust in 1997.

3. Regionally funded museums Regionally funded museums Most cities and many towns have their own museum, sometimes with a gallery attached. Kingston upon Thames has the Kingston Museum (mercial galleries, such those in London's Cork Street, which is famous in the British art world, and others with a reputation for specialising in contemporary art such as Victoria Miro () and Haunch of Venison (). Some specialise in regional art such as the Eakin Gallery in Belfast () and through temporary exhibitions and venues that are available over the short term.

You may think of these organisations as purely commercial ventures, but in addition to cultivating a list of clients who visit and make purchases at regular intervals, many have education programmes and see their role very much in terms of nurturing artists.

5. University museums University museums In general, these are government funded but the funding comes via a different route from local authority and national museums. University museums also tend to have a slightly different culture from other organisations, with a strong cultural affinity to the university they are part of and incorporating the intentions of the princ.i.p.al founder (and often bearing their name). They were usually the brainchild of an enthusiastic member of staff, who obtained basic funding and then developed something which they persuaded the university they could not manage without. For example, the university museum at St Andrews (e much more proactive in setting up displays in empty shops, buildings and other s.p.a.ce that is temporarily available. For example, The Centre of Attention, curated by Pierre Coinde and Gary O'Dwyer, offers an experimental approach stemming from an ongoing enquiry into the phenomenon of art production, presentation, consumption and heritage-isation (see ) is described as a 'creative-business incubator' for designer-makers, where 165 resident designer-makers can grow their businesses, and hundreds more benefit from a programme of a.s.sociated professional development through courses and workshops.

Ceramicist and potter Tim Andrews (e a permanent requirement. So, supplying a relevant service on an ad hoc basis could eventually lead to a full-time role that becomes an integral part of the inst.i.tution. An obvious example of this is museum website creation, which began as an after-hours freelance activity funded on a very fragmentary basis and is now a full-time function at the very core of how such organisations deliver their mission. Other examples of support services might include the digital photography of objects (for online dissemination), copywriters who can prepare effective messages (and experience in writing bids for funding or proposals for collaboration would be particularly useful) and designers who understand the organisational brand and can produce appropriate promotional materials.

2. Working in 'heritage' Working in 'heritage'

'Heritage' is a growing sector offering a number of (mostly) publicly funded jobs that are designed to promote engagement with different audiences and encourage wider partic.i.p.ation amongst the public. This may be through conservation and preservation of historic buildings and parks, but the scope for involvement is much wider. There may be the opportunity to create awareness of more modern or unorthodox examples of buildings, landscape and activities which need to be cherished, recorded and maintained or else forever lost. Some of these roles are in the public sector, but there are also a lot of self employed options: as interpretation/heritage consultants, interpretative designers and script writers as well as a body of design agencies that focus on heritage interpretation, and public bodies that buy in these skills and services when needed.

Along similar lines, working for a heritage charity can be an attractive option, offering a variety of roles such as administrative, fundraising, publicity and so on. Possible outlets include The Art Fund, The National Trust, English Heritage or NADFAS (National a.s.sociation of Decorative & Fine Arts Societies). See Appendix for contact details.

3. Academic involvement in your specific subject area Academic involvement in your specific subject area This is a common route for people considering a curatorial role in the longer term. For more details, see Chapter 4 Chapter 4 on 'Curating'. on 'Curating'.

4. Working in heritage or art publis.h.i.+ng Working in heritage or art publis.h.i.+ng If you enjoy books, this can be a rewarding option, particularly if you are producing works about artists you admire. It requires close liaison with museums and galleries, the exhibitions they put on and an awareness of the retail opportunities for selling merchandise. You can gain particular satisfaction from selling a product that represents an organisation or artist, but at a fraction of the price of the artwork on sale and therefore accessible to a wider market. (See the interview with Andrew Hansen, Managing Director of Prestel Publis.h.i.+ng Ltd, on page 141.) 5. Working for an interpretation consultancy Working for an interpretation consultancy Museums and organisations who want to display their archives, but don't know how to go about it, may use an interpretation consultancy to design and put together a display or exhibition. The interview with Dr Lorna Ewan, Head of Interpretation for Historic Scotland, on page 51, gives an insight into what might be involved in such a role.

6. Becoming a live-in warden at a historic house Becoming a live-in warden at a historic house You may see advertis.e.m.e.nts in the local press or on the websites of relevant heritage/management organisations; duties will probably include upkeep, maintenance and cleaning as well as researching and maintaining the collection.

7. In-house heritage manager for an organisation In-house heritage manager for an organisation In this role you can become the (sometimes unofficial) custodian of interesting information about a collection and the organisation it belongs to. An unusual example of this is the librarian on board the liner Queen Mary 2 who has, largely through her own interest and initiative, become the on-board repository of information about the history of liners and their heritage. Other such roles often start off within libraries and resource centres and grow from there and there is much discussion now about how to capture the information that individuals hold and ensure it is recorded for the organisation to use in future.5 8. Working in a.s.sociated professional a.s.sociations Working in a.s.sociated professional a.s.sociations Examples include the Museums a.s.sociation, the Museums, Libraries and Archives (MLA) or any other organisation listed in the Appendix. Most now offer training and consultancy to their members.

The perfect employee We have already discussed the issues that must excite you in order to pursue a career in museums and galleries. Here is an ideal person specification for someone who wants to work in this world. Obviously, some of these skills and personal qualities will be more relevant than others, depending on the job you are applying for.

About you personally. Are you: Intellectually and emotionally satisfied by close proximity to objects?

Determined and resilient? You will need to take yourself suffi-ciently seriously to keep going in your search for a job. And, when you find it, you will have to defend both your specialist area of work and your profession in general to others who are less convinced of its value.

Satisfied by creative, often open-ended processes? This requires a combination of patience with systems that must be worked through (the a.s.sociated bureaucracy can be agonisingly slow) and long-term determination to get there in the end.

Curious? It's essential to be able to get involved both emotionally and intellectually with the contents of the collection/exhibition/ project you are working on, whatever it might be, and to be well informed about its relevance to the local region and population as well as to wider trends in society Enthusiastic about pa.s.sing this information on? Interpretation and communication are becoming increasingly linked to public funding.

A good communicator? You will need to be able to translate your understanding, or that of your colleagues, to other markets and maintain their attention as you do so. For example you may be called on to explain 'Hoch Kunst'6 to those who haven't a clue, and be a mediator for all levels of interpretation in between. And it helps enormously if you can find satisfaction in enabling these disparate groups to communicate with each other rather than seeing it as a necessary ch.o.r.e. to those who haven't a clue, and be a mediator for all levels of interpretation in between. And it helps enormously if you can find satisfaction in enabling these disparate groups to communicate with each other rather than seeing it as a necessary ch.o.r.e.

Your method of working and organising yourself. Do you have: A logical mind for data collation, review and synopsis?

An ability to express yourself clearly, on paper and in meetings?