Part 3 (1/2)

The Chambers Dictionary defines 'curator' as 'the person who has the charge of anything; a superintendent, especially of a museum; a person appointed by law as a guardian of something'.

The word curator comes from the Latin 'curare', meaning 'to care for, 'have charge of' or 'to cure', and the term curate curate, which has a similar derivation, means 'a member of the clergy in the Church of England who a.s.sists a rector or vicar and has the ”cure of souls”'.

The term 'cure' in this context is interesting: an archaic word that means 'healing'; a means of improving a situation; a course or method of preserving or arresting decomposition; a treatment by which a product is finished or made ready for use' and, of course, the term's extension to include 'the preservation of food, by drying, salting or finis.h.i.+ng by means of chemical change', which is relevant to our purposes here.

So, from this, it would seem that a curator is someone who: is appointed and given authority to look after something; then preserves it to the best of their ability to prevent further decay; can interpret, explain and permit appropriate access to whatever they are looking after in future.

Within the world of museums and galleries today, the responsibilities of curators.h.i.+p fall into two main areas: The care and research of a specific collection: understanding the collection and keeping up to date with new developments that might alter that understanding; writing about the collection; locating the whereabouts of new material that would augment the collection (or relate to its wider understanding); adding to the collection; preserving it for a new generation.

Its display and interpretation.

Both these responsibilities are fuelled by a strong understanding of the context the organisation being represented, its authority and reputation.

How this works in practice A curator forms the intellectual heart of a museum or gallery. In the 1970s there was much discussion about whether these inst.i.tutions should be run by professional administrators. The diaries of Sir. Roy Strong, former Director of the V&A, of that period hold this out as a long-term governmental ambition (and fear on his part), but today museums and galleries are still mostly run by curators. However, while management power tends to reside with those who can explain and interpret a collection, in the same way that pilots exercise power in the RAF, academics within universities and doctors within medicine, changes are afoot, more quickly in some organisations than others, and several examples can be highlighted where people who have followed a non-curatorial route are already part of the organisation's senior management team. There is a widening appreciation that the curatorial role is not all it used to be, and in the longer term, is not the only route to seniority.

In small organisations such as town museums, the curator may have sole responsibility for the acquisition and care of objects. It will be the curator who decides what to collect, looks after what is held, researches and writes about it and implements the policy about whether to lend it more widely. If the organisation is particularly small such as a local history society the curator may be the only paid member of staff, with one of their duties being the co-ordination of volunteer help.

Here is a job description for a curator's role within a smaller organisation, in this case a historic house.

The Museum and Heritage Service is looking for a committed and enthusiastic curator to lead on the day-to-day management and running of one of its historic houses. The post will be responsible for all aspects of service delivery including exhibitions, a wide range of activities and events working with partners and volunteers along with the active Friends group. You will also be part of the Museum and Heritage Team, helping to shape and develop services across the Borough.

Required skills: You will have the ability to work as part of a team and to communicate well with the whole community, particularly young people. You will have experience of running activities including cla.s.s visits. You will be required to work late nights, weekends and public holidays on a regular basis.

In larger organisations, the curator's role tends to evolve into that of subject specialist, who conducts research into what is held and provides guidance on what should be acquired or shared in future. Larger organisations have many curators, each specialising in a particular area, under the overall direction of a head curator. In such organisations, the actual physical care of the collection may be handled by conservators, while doc.u.mentation and administration is looked after by other specialists.

Here is a job advertis.e.m.e.nt for a curator within a major national art museum: As an experienced curator of modern international art, with particular experience in the period 19001965, you will contribute intellectual, art historical and curatorial expertise to the museum's programme. You will be responsible for researching, developing and curating large and medium scale exhibitions and projects, seeing them through from idea to realisation. This will encompa.s.s the entire process from initial concept and research for exhibitions and collection displays to managing substantial budgets, leading organisation-wide project teams, overseeing installation designs and acting as an advocate for the organisation. You will also contribute texts and editorial supervision to a range of publications in conjunction with the programme. You will have proven excellent research, scholarly and curatorial planning and project-management skills. While the emphasis is on curatorial work on the programme, you will also contribute your expertise to our acquisitions process.

The term curating originally meant the care of tangible things such as paintings, archaeological findings and machinery, but more recently new kinds of curating are evolving, such as the care of digital data objects, or biocurators (the accurate and comprehensive representation of biological knowledge). There is also a significant trend in that a curator may not necessarily look after a collection or objects at all, but rather engage with its cultural meaning and become an advocate for professional practice and the role of the creator Also under consideration is the value of the curator's objectivity. Traditionally, curators had specific expertise which enabled them to take discerning decisions; to use the funds at their disposal to preserve the best and then explain it on to visitors; they were people of enhanced judgement who had an eye on both history and the future.

'Curators must serve the past and the future as well as the present. And they must attempt to be fair to all comers and not succ.u.mb to prejudice or parti pris. They may wish to lead public taste but can only do so by selecting those artists who seem to bear the creative flame. Curators cannot simultaneously work in the public domain and collect privately, or work as artists: these roles could be fatal to the requirement that the curato aspires, like an independent critic, to objectivity, impartiality, and, in the end, justice.'

MARK HAWORTH-BOOTH, VICTORIA & ALBERT MUSEUM (V&A), LONDON1 Today there is discussion of the selection of objects as being in itself an art form with a 'curator-artist' at its centre.

'While the traditional curator maintains a collection of art, artifacts or curios by preserving, exhibiting and studying the objects therein, the contemporary curator need not work with a collection or objects at all, and instead engages with cultural meaning and production, often from a position of development that is shared with the artist.'

MELANIE O'BRIAN, ART SPEAKING: TOWARDS AN UNDERSTANDING OF THE LANGUAGE OF CURATING, BANFF, JULY 20052 'The role of curator has come to occupy a deliberately less academic stance, often embodying a more partic.i.p.atory or hands-on function. As such, curators are no longer limited to being critical observers but increasingly are understood as instigators, subjective partic.i.p.ants actively defining (or redefining) art and culture as-it-happens. ... The 'job' of curating becomes a sophisticated form of intellectual gameplay, which posits the curator in a position sometimes parallel to that of conceptual artist. The challenge is to continually negotiate a balance between the desire for critical and creative authors.h.i.+p, the needs of artists as a const.i.tuency, and the struggle to develop new avenues and audiences.'

IVAN JURAKIC, NAVIGATING THE CURATOR-AS-ARTIST DIVIDE, TORONTO, DECEMBER 20053 There is also the issue of representing the completeness of the collection by displaying different selections in turn, or pandering to the public appet.i.te by concentrating on the items that have popular appeal. In the process, the integrity of the whole may be compromised by the public's misunderstanding of an artist or work of art but that misunderstanding may be the key to getting people in. For example, do you include Van Gogh in an exhibition on the Impressionists, simply because so many of the public think he was part of this movement? Or do you include him because of this understanding and then seek to correct it perhaps by including a panel on 'Antecedents' or 'Why Van Gogh is not an Impressionist?'

In any case, today's consumer wants to interact and take part in decisions about purchasing and display rather than simply admire what has been selected for them to view. Stores such as IKEA and home makeover shows on television have raised the issue among the public of what to put on their walls at home and offer cheap solutions, so the public can vote with their feet, buying the images they prefer through posters and greetings cards rather than relying on gallery shops to sell them what scholarly opinion has decided is worth hanging on their walls. Along similar lines, should decisions on what should be bought for or displayed in public inst.i.tutions be made solely by those with public money to spend, or by those who want to come and see it? This is aptly ill.u.s.trated by the fact that there is still not a single painting by Jack Vettriano in a public collection in the UK, despite the huge popularity of his images (as shown through the sale of reproductions and related merchandise).

Becoming a curator If curating is your long-term career goal, you'll need academic pedigree (a really good university, an excellent degree), and for a post in a national museum or gallery, probably a PhD supervised by someone well connected and a track record of publication in academic journals. Your first job would usually be that of curatorial a.s.sistant.

People with such a profile are often scholarly and self-effacing, but if they are going to progress to running the inst.i.tution they are part of, they will need to have good communication and diplomatic skills, persuasiveness and to be well connected. The role of curator involves negotiating for funds, building links with those who control the purse strings and making a case for funding in compet.i.tion with other organisations, all the while keeping a weather eye on prevailing public opinion (which may not be on your side). Currently, for example, most funding in Britain is directed towards the 2012 Olympics, so cultural inst.i.tutions need to state the case for their own funding pragmatically, by emphasising the long-term benefits to the current population and the wider interests of society in future.

National museums and galleries in England are currently funded by the DCMS, so curators must know the government minister4, their priorities, build relations.h.i.+ps with them and have a sound grasp of finance. There are many different financial models for the running of inst.i.tutions and, increasingly, any public funding has to be matched by self-funding initiatives such as members.h.i.+p schemes and income from exhibitions. For example, the Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met) in New York is privately funded with a strong tradition of endowment and donations. The Royal Academy and Historic Royal Palaces in the UK receives no DCMS funding and therefore must raise revenue through events and entrance money and without the benefit of the prevailing US culture of donating to public collections. Curators with responsibility for these major inst.i.tutions may be experts in specific areas of their own interest, but must also become masters of more general management techniques.

At all times, curators have to look out for the collection's interests. They must work with the trustees and think carefully about whom to appoint in these roles (how well connected are they, do they bring any added value in terms of expertise or the support of particular groups?) and how to train them to best serve the organisation's interests. Once appointed, trustees have a term to serve, and spotting those who have a private agenda can be difficult as the MP Barbara Follett allegedly once commented: 'The more radical your ideas, the more conservatively you need to dress.'5 If you are running a local collection, you should be well grounded in local issues, with a knowledge of local history, and understand how what you have to preserve fits the wider environment how it can be promoted further afield to draw significance to it. There will be local partners who can work with you on this such as regional development boards, estate agents and business community, all of whom benefit but maintaining the collection's integrity and ensuring that its support survives changes of government, can be a difficult tightrope to walk.

Where to start your curatorial career in a gallery or museum or in a university?

If you are serious about wanting a major curatorial role within a significant collection, there are two princ.i.p.al routes: either by entering the museum and gallery world after acquiring an honours degree (perhaps having taken a course in museum studies first) or by taking the next stage in academic qualification, usually a PhD. Both routes would be considerably eased by taking unpaid work experience in appropriate organisations.

The advantages and disadvantages of going straight into the world of museums and galleries Advantages You show initial commitment to your chosen world and gain relevant experience that can go straight on to your CV. This arguably makes you more marketable in future.

You gain an appreciation of whether or not this world really is for you.

You acquire a representative role in the inst.i.tution you work for and, if you do your job well, you have the chance to exercise this at professional and training fora internationally.

You have the opportunity to build up patronage from those in charge of your own inst.i.tution, and to listen to and possibly meet people who are significant within this world as a whole.

You are well placed to hear about vacancies that arise within museums and galleries.

You can cultivate your expertise in a particular area, as jobs come up. Your skills as a generalist, as you emerge directly from an undergraduate or MA university course, are more malleable for presentation in support of a range of job applications and, ultimately, this can lead to a decision on what to make your special area of study.

Disadvantages You may be seeking closer proximity to objects, but not to people who decide on the allocation of the arts and leisure budget (and who do not think museums and galleries are a priority).

If you are serious about a career in curating, you will need to build up a publications profile through scholarly articles published and contributions to academic books and these publications will have to be produced largely in your own time. Many people have no idea how much time is taken up maintaining the public face of an inst.i.tution: answering queries from members of the public; giving talks to societies who ask for one; delivering lunchtime lectures and other contributions to the (increasingly monitored) 'outreach' of the organisation, and this means that you may have little time to concentrate on research and publication during the working day. Similarly, sustained time off to concentrate on this along the lines of the academic sabbatical is difficult. If you are the expert in a particular field, your inst.i.tution needs you to be available to answer questions and maintain its public position amid a swathe of political initiatives, funding opportunities and working parties that require partic.i.p.ation. A junior member of staff, even if well informed, would not have the same clout.

The advantages and disadvantages of studying for a PhD first Advantages Time. As an academic you will have more free time to work on your own research interests; your contract will be divided between teaching, research and administration. All academics complain about the increasing administrative burden, although it is not as great as that in galleries and museums and much more predictable (limited to your student body and wider professional contacts), whereas in a public inst.i.tution, you have to answer questions from anyone who may roll in off the street. You get long summer vacations and, once you are established, you may get the chance to take research leave through a sabbatical (it's relatively straightforward to get someone else to do your teaching and marking). As your inst.i.tution will benefit from the prestige of your publications, they will be actively supportive.

Remuneration. You may struggle financially when studying for a PhD although you can usually supplement your income with some teaching or part-time work. The pay for a starter academic position is generally better than for an ordinary starter job in a museum or gallery.

You may be able to form part of a university bidding for AHRC6 funding, and thus be able to earn money for your inst.i.tution by sharing information at the same time as doing your PhD. These days, universities place a high priority on the transfer of knowledge and there are substantial funding opportunities. A track record in such initiatives will also impress managers of galleries and museums they too are increasingly required to seek wider public funding rather than rely on central or local government support alone. funding, and thus be able to earn money for your inst.i.tution by sharing information at the same time as doing your PhD. These days, universities place a high priority on the transfer of knowledge and there are substantial funding opportunities. A track record in such initiatives will also impress managers of galleries and museums they too are increasingly required to seek wider public funding rather than rely on central or local government support alone.

Disadvantages You commit yourself to your specialist subject. If a job comes up in applied arts and crafts and you are just finis.h.i.+ng off a PhD on the work of Vermeer, it will be hard to explain your real drive for the job.

You are not building up hands-on experience in museum management, which is becoming an increasing priority for publicly funded inst.i.tutions that have to justify their share of the public purse through widening engagement and increasing access. Although you can take a stance on all these things, you will lack first-hand experience of managing them.

Ultimately, whichever route you choose, the number of applicants for jobs in this world far outstrips the number of positions available and often it's a question of being in the right place at the right time; of having the right bit of experience that convinces the interviewing panel on the right day. And of course there are so many variables. You cannot predict who will be on the panel, the chemistry (and tensions) between the different members, their unstated objectives, and what they will have just heard on the grapevine that shapes their understanding or appreciation of what you offer in comparison with other candidates.

Grasping the language and culture of curating Whether you opt for the museum or the academic route, one thing you will have to grasp quickly is the appropriate language and tone of voice, in order to be heard. Most professions have a particular way of talking to each other, and an accompanying set of initials and acronyms, and curating is no exception. As a generalisation, curators (as perhaps do academics in general) tend to talk in quiet and respectful tones, using long words, lots of clauses, and extended sentences. Art historians speak in a language that is uniquely complicated. My own theory (based on a degree that was half history, half history of art) is that as a relatively new subject, art history had to establish a complicated vocabulary in order to both distinguish itself and fully inhabit the new field it was staking out, and this has stuck; older disciplines such as history and English use a vocabulary that is far easier to understand. It is significant that the famous art historian Ernst Gombrich, who, in addition to his scholarly output of books and monographs, opened up this world by writing an accessible book on the subject, The Story of Art The Story of Art (16 editions during his lifetime, translated into 30 languages and millions sold) was viewed within art history circles as having rather let the side down by widening access. There was a similar feeling towards historian A. J. P. Taylor, whose television lectures in the 1960s reached vast numbers of people in their living rooms, but attracted unremitting negativity from his academic peers. Writer Alain de Botton wrote recently of the: (16 editions during his lifetime, translated into 30 languages and millions sold) was viewed within art history circles as having rather let the side down by widening access. There was a similar feeling towards historian A. J. P. Taylor, whose television lectures in the 1960s reached vast numbers of people in their living rooms, but attracted unremitting negativity from his academic peers. Writer Alain de Botton wrote recently of the: '...hostility to anyone attempting to communicate ideas to a broader public is a staple of academic life. You can either fight for academic status or you can address the world at large. But in the current British climate it's very difficult to succeed in both fields.'7 Perhaps this is changing. The elevation of Carol Ann Duffy to the role of Poet Laureate in May 2009 was accompanied by an appreciation that her work has both academic approval and popular appeal her inclusion on the GCSE syllabus has given many pupils the important experience of realising that they both like and can understand poetry; a tremendous endowment for their future.

It's an undeniable trend too that the world today is less influenced by scholarly detachment than by ready-made opinion, preferably expressed in everyday language. There is a search for the interpreter, the opinion-holder so we tune into chat show hosts who earn a fortune because they serve up an interesting cross section of current experience and ask the right questions on behalf of us all and think of the right retort straight away, rather than several hours later. Over his career, Richard Littlejohn has scuttled back and forth between the Sun Sun and the and the Daily Mail Daily Mail, and is one of the highest paid journalists, because the owners of the papers he writes for know that his opinion-packed columns are the only things some readers look at. Arts festivals have guest directors whose tastes match that of the audience (e.g. the Cheltenham Literature Festival has author and philosopher A. C. Grayling, and the Edinburgh International Festival Richard Hollo-way, former Bishop of the city), and in bookshops, we like to see the individual selections of authors put forward (at the time of writing, Nick Hornby's favourite books are laid out as a special section within Waterstone's). As a society, we look for strong opinions to adopt to save the trouble of thinking of our own.

So what is the role of the museum and, by default, its curatorial team in this new development? Should an inst.i.tution be reaching out into the local community and, in the same way as theatre companies, put on performances in shopping centres and parks? Should content be dictated by what people are familiar with or what they ought to know about? Should an inst.i.tution housing treasures that belong to all of us try to draw us in to understand the collection in more detail, using the familiar as an enticement, or should it just be the repository of all that is valuable, the collective spare room of the nation, with the long-term aim of keeping stuff safe to sell on in future because each time material is displayed it is further dilapidated?

In part, the answer is being given by politicians: inst.i.tutions in receipt of public funds must demonstrate that they are offering value and widening partic.i.p.ation. Today's government culture requires constant measurement of targets, proving that what has been set up is an effective use of resources. Journalists are fond of comparing the costs of a museum or gallery purchase with that of a new hospital or school.

As public inst.i.tutions, museums and galleries certainly need to demonstrate the value they are delivering, but rather than just responding to the criteria set by politicians, arguably they must play a part in trying to establish the measures by which their aspirations and effectiveness will be judged. This will involve communicating a vision, using language that others relate to, spreading enthusiasm, justifying it to popular opinion and hence influencing how it is perceived. For example, the local press was resoundingly negative about the installation of Antony Gormley's 'Angel of the North' sculpture, but the local council (Gateshead) and artist were undeterred. The aims of the various groups involved will have been different (artistic values/example of public art/civic pride) but they united to support and maintain a shared ambition and there is now a strong sense of regional satisfaction, with those who were initially hostile referring to the pride their children and grandchildren take in 'our angel'.

In any case, who are 'the public' that need to be considered and counted? Is the organisation appealing to those who walk past and appreciate the posters but never go in; those who use the cafe, shop or bathrooms, but seldom visit the accompanying exhibition; those who find it a romantic place to walk around but don't notice what they are seeing; those who drop in occasionally to find out if they have treasure in their their attics or those whose children go there on school trips which cost less than trips further afield because there is no entrance price to pay? The role of the cultural repository in breaking down cla.s.s and educational barriers is also significant, and curators will have to discuss how much of their attention should be directed at existing audiences, and how much at potential new ones and how much funding/fundraising should follow these decisions. attics or those whose children go there on school trips which cost less than trips further afield because there is no entrance price to pay? The role of the cultural repository in breaking down cla.s.s and educational barriers is also significant, and curators will have to discuss how much of their attention should be directed at existing audiences, and how much at potential new ones and how much funding/fundraising should follow these decisions.

'I view curating as something I do with and for others. It is in this spirit that I aim to create exhibitions and public programs that investigate the social aspects of cultural production in ways that encourage alternative modes of thinking, foster new relations.h.i.+ps, and inspire increased owners.h.i.+p in the development and articulation of culture. I believe strongly in the capacity for the arts to affect positive change by expanding perceptions of day-to-day experience, and I am enthusiastic about the role artists play in the building of sustainable and equitable communities.'