An Explorer’s Legacy: The Journey of the John Rae Collection

As part of ongoing work on the University’s historic loans, Collections Registrar, Morven Rodger, investigates the history and provenance of the University’s John Rae collection.

In July 1926, the University Court agreed to lend the “John Rae Collection of Arctic and Other Relics” to the Royal Museum of Scotland. Almost a century later, The Royal Museum is now the National Museum of Scotland, and John Rae’s items remain on loan, but how and why did the University come to have these items in the first place?

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Managing Collections: Edinburgh College of Art

One of our largest and most complex collections is that of the Edinburgh College of Art (hereafter named ECA). Transferred to Heritage Collections in 2012 following the merger of the College and University in 2011, the collection spans artwork, objects and paper archives. The paper archives alone total around 200 metres in volume, or well over 1,000 boxes and folders of material.

As a result, it has become one of the largest that requires rehousing and appraising. It is so large that Jasmine and I have had to undertake processing the collection in stages. To read more about appraisal and what it entails, check out last year’s blog by clicking this link.

Colour photograph within a strongroom. The floor, shelving and ceiling are white, and the lighting is fluorescent. The shelving rows run down the left and right of the image, and on the shelves are cardboard boxes, lever arch files, loose papers and assorted documents.

Two of the five rows that hold the Edinburgh College of Art archives.

 

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Art Collection Audit Spotlight: Edinburgh College of Art Works on Paper

In this week’s blog our Art Collection Documentation Assistant Gaby Cortes discusses the work she has been undertaking for the first phase of a campus-wide audit of the Art Collection, highlighting our student artworks on paper from the Edinburgh College of Art.

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Conserving calligraphy: preparing Esther Inglis’ manuscripts for digitisation

In this post book conservator Amy Baldwin talks about the conservation work undertaken on volumes appearing in the upcoming online exhibition “Rewriting the script: the works and words of Esther Inglis”.

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Reflections on a Journey in Conservation: My Time as a Collections Care Assistant

Back in March we welcomed our new Student Collections Care Assistants; Abigail Miskin, Ella Joyce and Isabela Tapia Hernandez. Four months on and it is time to say goodbye and thank you to the first, Abigail, who has been offered an amazing opportunity to shadow a team of conservators in Italy, learning Paintings Conservation and develop on the skills she has learned here with us.

The Collections Care Assistant role was created for our students to explore the cultural heritage sector through employment and support their career aspirations post-graduation. This inaugural year involved collaborative efforts to optimise the role for students, collections, and service. Abigail, Ella and Isabela exhibited exceptional communication, maturity, flexibility, and a willingness to learn, making the role’s first year highly successful. These qualities also allowed the established team members to learn and improve the role, which we aim to continue offering in 2024-25 and beyond.

This is the first of three blog posts detailing their time with us!

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It’s audit time!

Anyone who has attended a meeting, had a conversation in the corridor, or bumped into me in one of our stores, knows that one of my main talking points for at least the past 5 years has been my ambition to undertake a campus-wide audit of the Art Collection. Obviously, there have been a few major world events that have hindered this, but it’s finally happening!

With over 8000 works in the collection, and at least 31% of them on display around campus (1845 works over 415 separate locations!), it’s not a straightforward job. We will have to gain access to office spaces, lecture halls, corridors, and seminar rooms, as well as taking a deep dive into the artworks held in storage.

Woman at the top of a red ladder placing a framed artwork on picture racking

Anna checking artworks in store

As usual, we rely on a spreadsheet to keep us in check. Although the most important detail is updating the location, we are also looking at the condition of the artworks, whether they need to be photographed, and what fixings are installed on the back. All of this will make it easier for us to provide access (online, for exhibition, teaching, or loan) or identify artworks that need further work to make them available. This information will be uploaded to our Collections Management Database (Vernon CMS) to enable greater location control and improve overall information on each of the artworks.

Lots of framed artworks of different sizes hanging on art racking

Artworks in store

The audit has begun in earnest, with 2313 works in storage listed and locations updated as of the beginning of this month. Alongside this work, our Documentation Assistant Gaby is also running trials on the use of barcodes on artworks for location control, which I’m sure you’ll be able to read about in a future blog post! We’ll be out and about on campus for the next year, so please say hello if you spot us.

Anna Hawkins
Museum Collections Manager

Sustainable Exhibition Making: Recyclable Book Cradles

In this post, our Technician, Robyn Rogers, discusses the recyclable book cradles she has developed as part of the conservation team’s ongoing work to make exhibitions at the University of Edinburgh more sustainable.

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