Te Ara 33 (1-2) November 2009

The new issue is online and viewable as html, the downloadable PDFs are being prepared and will be available soon.

Editorial

Issue 33 (1-2)
Jane Legget talks about the events of the past year.
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Articles

Pleasing everyone – or not – museums and civic responsibility

As a self-confessed semi-professional transient in the museum world, Ian Wedde reminds us of the need for honest questioning about museums’ purpose, reflecting on his own early cross-cultural encounters in the Stephen Weil Memorial Lecture in Rotorua.
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Serving Southland’s museums – three months in Waikaia

Johannah Massey adopts a regional approach to collection care in the Far South with a special concern for the small volunteer-run museums, and describes her winter stint at Waikaia Museum to show how it is working.
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A fraction too much friction – heritage dissonance and the Whiteley memorial

Paulette Wallace teases out the issues that surfaced in an instance of contested heritage in Taranaki, offering us an object lesson in the value of openness to multiple perspectives and inclusive discussion.
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Cultural Memory – a history of the Whangarei Art Collection 1921-2008

Scott Pothan and Ashley Remer trace the complex genesis of Northland’s leading public art museum and its collection, illustrating the shifting fortunes and struggles of culture in provincial politics.
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The ‘reflexive museum’ – opening the door to behind the scenes

In the course of his doctoral research, Philipp Schorch has been thinking deeply about how exhibitions are generated. To highlight his conceptualisation of exhibitions as ‘processes’, here he considers examples from German museums, which deliberately aim to advance the public understanding of scholarly research.
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Museum development

New home in an old haven

Terry Manson and Dave Pearson are both involved in the redevelopment of the Navy Museum. Here they provide an account of the historic origins of its very appropriate new location
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Caring for New Lynn’s crown jewels

Ian Molyneux has been shouldering royal responsibilities acting as registrar on a project to catalogue and care for a comprehensive collection of Crown Lynn ceramics worthy of its own museum.
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Museums practice

Deaccessioning 101

Vicky Spalding shows how tackling the thorny issue of deaccessioning items from museum collections can bring positive benefits.
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Opinion

Resistance in the ranks

Bridget Wellwood has a soft spot for our ‘micro’ museums. Urging those in the better-resourced museums to take them seriously, she argues for greater co-operation from museum ‘professionals’ to allay her worries about their futures.
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Museum events

Why does your museum matter?

Speakers at the recent 21st Century Arts conference addressed this central question, which in turn caused Kathryn Mitchell to address her own thinking about the fundamentals of our sector and the relevance of what we do.
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Exhibiting international collegiality in Wellington

Linda Wigley made new friends at the annual conference of the International Committee for Exhibitions & Exchange held in Wellington.
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Musing about museums, tourism and the visitor experience

Ian Day is still absorbing all he learnt in Rotorua among international colleagues attending the Intercom 2008 conference. Here he picks out some personal highlights.
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Museum people – the human collection

Himself a feature of the human collection, Chris Rapley reports on the 2008 Museums Aotearoa annual conference held in Dunedin.
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Cultural centres – the way of the future?

Frances Martin attended a special conference on ‘Preserving Māori culture and built heritage: emerging tribal cultural centres’ in Rotorua in March, 2008. Here she shares her impressions of this event.
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Overseas Experience

Delighting in the detail – the Attingham experience 2008

Eight weeks’ exposure to architectural gems of the English country house and some urban equivalents left Priscilla Pitts with much to reflect on when considering the presentation and conservation of historic properties in New Zealand.
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Obituaries

Seddon Bennington 1947 -2009

Conal McCarthy pays tribute to Te Papa’s second Chief Executive.
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Trevor Bayliss 1913 - 2009

Justine Olsen acknowledges the many debts owed by the New Zealand museum community to the pioneering contributions of Trevor Bayliss in the applied arts, museum display and museum management.
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Exhibition Reviews

Fiona Hall – Force Field

Jeremy Booth felt the force, finding much to admire at the City Gallery’s showing of these works by Australia’s Fiona Hall in the windy city.
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Amazing Lace – a tale in two parts

Meryl Richards finds a harmonious blend of old and new at an adventurous exhibition of lace shown at Pataka Museum of Arts and Cultures in Porirua.
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