Buckinghamshire Culture on LinkedIn: Could you take a leading role at Amersham Museum?
Buckinghamshire Culture
The Trustees of Amersham Museum are looking for a new Chair

Amersham Museum is an award-winning, accredited, independent museum, sharing the stories of local…
https://static.licdn.com/aero-v1/sc/h/al2o9zrvru7aqj8e1x2rzsrca
"when it changes location within the building". I think it is very important point and it is related to Archives and Records Management practices as well. In Archives, every movement of file, or item" is documented. At least, it is correct when people follow the procedures. There are multiple entries that reflect the moving of file from location to location: File is in archival repository by defauld. File is signed out to researcher in the reading room - file is registered in " File requests out" - file is in " in reading room" - researcer signes on list of "file use" - file is back to repository - is marked as file back. Staff periodically review the book of files out and back in order to check what files are overdue. It is normal to put "file out" form in the box. However, all is correct when Archives have procedures and staff follow it. The same procedure is correct for internal work with file: file is signed out for cataloging, restoration, digitazation, exhibition, preparing responce FOI..... The process of trucking becomes much easier in case Archives have Barcodes practice.

At the risk of stating the obvious, most museum practitioners working today are not trained to invite and empower community members to be part of exhibition development processes. In fact, I see little recognition at administrative levels in museums that employee success in this area requires a specific set of skills that takes a lot of time, intention, and professional development to gain and that's in addition to whatever subject matter knowledge a position may require (a topic for another day). But I know from personal experience that good intentions coupled with poor training can cause harm. I love that Isabel Singer describes the inclusion of community voices as a continuum. The level at which a museum engages community voices ought to depend on the capacity they currently have to do the work as well as an honest conversation with community members about where they are on that continuum. But that should not be the end of the story. More training, more practice, more authentic relationship building over the long haul allows museums to grow, and the value and meaning it adds to our institutions is worth it.

My fellow art lovers: do you agree that the story of Sir Mark Jones, the former interim director of The British Museum, proposing paid entry to the museum for 'foreigners,' is just another case of the media trolling the public with outrageous ideas? Basically, in a recent interview (https://shorturl.at/5pAkB), 'Sir Mark' proposed a £20 entry fee for foreign visitors to the Museum (as well as to the National Gallery and Science Museum). The entry would still be free for Brits and for under 25 years old. The proposal was raised in the context of the discussion on the need to carry out a major refurbishment of the Museum, with estimated to cost between £400 - £500 million. The real kicker: this money would supposedly fund a partnership with Greece over the Parthenon Marbles! I have been pretty outraged by this morally reprehensible proposal. I admit I was fuming. First, many artefacts in the British Museum were acquired through colonial exploitation or looting - from the Marbles to the Benin Bronzes. Charging descendants of those cultures to view their own heritage is like charging someone to visit the storage unit where their stolen property is kept. It adds insult to injury. Also, no idea how would such a scheme be enforced. How would museum staff determine who's "foreign" and who's not? There is no national ID card in the UK and the country doesn't require people to carry an ID. It would create a huge scope for discrimination. But since the British Museum was not behind this idea, I started to wonder whether Sir Mark was just playing the media game. And that instead of a genuine attempt at solving the museum's finances, this was a calculated move to keep the British Museum in the public eye. The media love a good controversy, and what could be more controversial than charging foreigners to see artefacts that were stolen in the first place? The timing of the interview was suspiciously convenient too. With ongoing debates about the repatriation of artefacts and the museum's funding sources (hello, BP donation controversy!), this could be a clever distraction tactic. Get everyone arguing about entry fees, and suddenly the bigger issues fade into the background. Perhaps that is the problem, not the attention-grabbing proposal. It distracts from the real issues at hand - issues of ethics, education, inclusivity, and cultural responsibility. Instead of asking who should pay the entry fees, we should ask questions such as: how should a major cultural institution in the UK - such as the British Museum - evolve to meet the challenges of the 21st century? How can it address the colonial past while shaping a more equitable future? How can it truly serve as a "museum of the world and for the world," as it claims to be? These are the topics I would like the media to ask people like Sir Mark! Everything else is just noise. #UK #media #trolling #art #culture #artisticexpression #accesstoart #controversy #BritishMuseum #freespeech

The Mixed Museum is a digital museum and archive dedicated to preserving and sharing the history of racial mixing in Britain for future generations. Our mission is to widen knowledge about the multiracial history of Britain. Our focus is on those whose histories have not always been considered important enough to be recorded. Our story started when Drs Chamion Caballero and Peter Aspinall were exploring ways of making the findings of a small British Academy-funded research project on racial mixing in the early 20th century they conducted in 2008 available to the public. While the initial research findings inspired and formed the foundations of the 2011 BBC2 series Mixed Britannia, it was clear that a more permanent home was needed for this material. In 2012, Chamion and Peter received a small grant from the Arts and Humanities Research Council’s Digital Transformation Scheme, allowing them to collaborate with Bradley Lincoln, Founder of the social enterprise Mix-d, to create a pilot digital resource. The result was the Mix-d: Museum, an interactive online repository for wide-ranging material on racial and ethnic mixing in 20th century Britain. When the initial funding came to an end, the interest in and enthusiasm for the museum remained. In 2019, the museum entered a new phase when, renamed The Mixed Museum, we relaunched as a non-profit organisation. The original interactive online repository became our central collection, The Timeline, around which we create digital exhibitions with relevant partners to explore aspects of Britain's mixed race history in more depth. Since our move to an independent non-profit organisation, we have gone from strength to strength. We have created numerous digital exhibitions with academic and creative partners, hosted panel events, run creative workshops, collaborated with some of Britain's leading publishers, created an Artists in Residence programme, and hosted interns from University College London, Anglia Ruskin and Queen Mary University London, In 2021, our 'Brown Babies of WW2' exhibition won the Museums Association's award for best digital engagement in a shortlist that also contained the Jewish Museum London and the V&A Dundee. Our long-term goals? To become Britain's first accredited solely digital museum while bringing marginalised histories to a wider public, and improving diversity and equity in the heritage sector. Please join us along the way and let us know if you're interested in helping, as well as if we can help you!