ITP 2018 Final Report by Amalia Kakissis (British School at Athens, Greece)

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1 Amalia Kakissis (centre) with ITP 2018 Fellows, Rana Ramadan Mahmoud (Egypt), left, and Chantal Umuhoza (Rwanda), right. As the Archivist of the British School at Athens, a small research institute in Greece, I felt a bit daunted, at first, by participating in the ITP. Since I wasn t a museum curator and our institution is on the periphery of the museum/cultural heritage world in Greece, I was unsure what I could contribute and what I would be able to apply to my institution. My goals in participating in the ITP were to learn from the British Museum staff about managing and caring for both physical and digital collections, managing volunteers, and, especially, exhibition planning and display. I hoped to apply this knowledge to further develop good practices at my institution and help me grow both professionally and personally. Once I started my ITP journey all my anxieties dissolved as the programme far exceeded my expectations in all respects. I am very grateful for the hard work the incredible ITP Team (Claire Messenger, Rebecca Horton, Jessica Juckes and Senior ITP Fellow, Andrea Terrón) did to deliver a well-crafted programme sourcing expertise from the British Museum and ITP Partner Museums. The ITP has now opened up my professional network to corners of the world I hadn t anticipated and thanks to the friendliness and warmth of the ITP Team it has welcomed me into a family of cultural heritage enthusiasts. Of the many outstanding experiences during the ITP, I thoroughly enjoyed and reaped great benefits from the following sessions: Documentation with Tanya Szrajber, Archives with Francesca Hillier, Interpretation and Volunteers with Stuart Frost, Fundraising with Tadas Khazanavicius, Scientific Research with Carl Heron, Concept of the Universal Museum with Alice Stevenson, Security & Risk Management with David Bilson and, especially, the inspiring and well-structured 1

2 sessions on exhibitions with Miriam Lloyd-Evans, the tour and discussion of the temporary exhibition, Rodin and the art of ancient Greece with Ian Jenkins, the loans presentation by Rob Owen, and the presentations about interpretation and concept development by various team members of the I, Object, temporary exhibition. The additional aspect of the sessions which I found tremendously useful was the interactive/handson part, not only in practical terms, but also because of the resulting team spirit as we worked in smaller groups during which we each drew from our own expertise and brought that into the discussions and presentations. Feedback presentation about transport of loan objects for exhibitions. Hands-on session on pinning for exhibition displays. Choosing modern objects for storytelling/interpretation. Hands-on session about Collection Care. Additional highlights for me during the ITP were the Greek & Roman Department days, trips to cultural heritage sites, the Ashmolean Partner placement and the Object in Focus Project. 2

3 The days in the Greek & Roman Department were remarkable and we all wished they could have lasted longer. It was a privilege to see the material the staff worked with - from objects to archives - but also to have open and frank discussions on how they face the same challenges we all do with restricted funds, staff and storage space. At the William Morris Gallery during one of the Greek & Roman Department days with Dilek Karaaziz Şener (Turkey), Mustafa Okan Cinemre (Turkey), Ross Thomas (BM Curator), Ivan Radman-Livaja (Croatia). Mustafa Okan Cinemre (Turkey) and ITP Manager, Claire Messenger at Kingston Lacy, Dorset. Visiting cultural heritage sites outside of London was the opportunity of a lifetime! Not only to see these amazing properties personally but to also learn the challenges involved in managing them. Although all of the sites were amazing, the ones that stood out for me were Hever Castle & Gardens, Sutton Hoo, Kingston Lacy, Chastleton House (NT)& Gardens (Oxford) and the Mary Rose (Portsmouth). The ITP Partner placement at the Ashmolean was also very rewarding. Here we learned from curators and staff not only at the Ashmolean Museum but also the Griffith Institute, the Pitt-Rivers Museum, the Sackler and Bodleian Libraries. Our smaller sized group in Oxford made discussions more personal and informal. Sarah Abdolattif Elsheekh (Sudan) discussing display and Object in Focus with Liam McNamara and Paul Collins of the Ashmolean. Sarah Abdolattif Elsheekh (Sudan), Rana Ramadan Mahmoud (Egypt) and Amalia Kakissis (Greece) at Chastleton House (National Trust), Oxford. 3

4 Our very gracious mentors, Liam McNamara and Paul Collins of the Ashmolean, in addition to giving us behind the scenes tours and presentations, also discussed our Object in Focus Projects with us and tried to address more specific questions and interests we had. I was very grateful that they made it possible for me to view some of the Arthur Evans Archive, a collection which links to material we house at the British School and has potential for a collaborative project in the future. The Object in Focus Project was a great opportunity put into practice what we had learned during the ITP. This year we were partnered up for the project and had to select an item that was not from either of our countries (in our case Greece & China). My partner Mao Lei (China) and I chose an intricately decorated coat from the Metis people of the Red River Settlement in Manitoba, Canada. The Metis were a separate group which developed from the mixing of Europeans and First Nation peoples in the 18 th to 19 th centuries. I learned a great deal through the different stages of this project from managing different aspects of an exhibition and how to overcome various challenges that developed along the way. Object in Focus Reception with project partner Mao Lei (China), far right, and BM AOA Department assistant and collection manager, centre. Discussing our Object in Focus with British Museum Director, Hartwig Fischer, during the Supporters Reception. Most importantly, though, it taught me how important team work ultimately is for the success of an exhibition, and so, I would like to extend by gratitude to all the curators and assistants of the Department of Asia Oceania and Americas (AOA) as well as the BM collection managers for their invaluable assistance throughout this project. The ITP has had a very positive impact on me and my work as I am in the midst of planning an exhibition on Byzantium and the Arts & Crafts Movement with one of our archive collections which will also include museum objects. I hope to draw from several of the ITP presentations on exhibitions in the next couple months as we try to formulate our exhibition proposal as well as initiate negotiations with potential repositories, like the William Morris Gallery which we visited on a Greek & Roman Department day, about objects they might loan. I also look forward to developing other ideas discussed with colleagues during the ITP such as a project about Sir William Gell (a 19 th century antiquarian and Grand Tour traveller) and collaborating with the various institutions that have his material, in particular the British Museum (Greek & Roman Department), the Bodleian Library in Oxford, the British School at Rome and 4

5 Bristol Library (Special Collections). To initiate this endeavor, I have extended an invitation to Celeste Farage of the BM Greek & Roman Department to come give the Archive Lecture at the British School at Athens this coming academic year so she can study our Gell material and we can continue discussions on how to develop this project. Longer term developments which I would like to make in my institution are: better management of our digital collections; more accessibility to our collections online via our website or through various events; broadening our outreach & engagement to various communities not only academic ones; and proper documentation and assessment of our historic buildings. These changes have been difficult to manage since we have a very small staff and restricted funds so it would be useful to be able to tap Celeste Farage shows us the William Gell collection during one of the Greek & Roman Department days into the ITP network for advice on how to take practical measures towards these changes as well as how to develop funding schemes. After the ITP I have a renewed sense of enthusiasm for my work and now feel I have a professional network to turn to for advice and discussions. It is a wonderful feeling to be part of this global network and to still be in contact with my ITP 2018 colleagues asking advice about work, sharing information about educational opportunities, musing on different ideas or just saying hello and seeing how life is treating them. I wish all my cultural heritage colleagues in Greece could experience and benefit from the ITP, as I did, and hope more are able to participate in the future. It would be very useful to gather the past ITPers from Greece and see how we can collaborate as a group within Greece, perhaps like the suggested global hubs which ITP Manager, Claire Messenger, shared with us on our last day. In closing I would like to extend my deep gratitude to Ian Jenkins of the BM Greek & Roman Department for suggesting me for the ITP, to the Philip and Irene Gage Toll Foundation for supporting my participation in the ITP and, again, to the ITP Team for making this a truly unforgettable experience. ITP Fellows 2018 at Hever Castle and Gardens 5