Museums & Galleries of NSW would like to congratulate the 2019 Fellowship, Mentorship and Volunteer Placement Program recipients.

The Program provides professional development opportunities to museum and gallery staff, and museum volunteers in NSW. The Fellowships are designed for senior professionals to undertake a two-week placement within an international institution, while the Mentorships placements are available for early to mid-career staff with an Australian host organisation for two-weeks. The Volunteer Placements allow for volunteers from small or volunteer managed museum to also be placed within an Australian cultural institution.

The Fellowship, Mentorship and Volunteer Placement Program is a Create NSW devolved funding program, administered by Museums & Galleries of NSW on behalf of the NSW Government.

2019 SUCCESSFUL APPLICANTS

Helen Brackin, Norfolk Island Museums and Research Centre
Fellowship at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa,  National Services  Te Paerangi

Helen will use her fellowship to establish international contacts and to gain skills to overcome challenges faced due to the remoteness of Norfolk Island and the multiple locations she manages. She is interested in gaining feedback across exhibition currency, education and conservation as well as learning more about the Pitcairn and Norfolk Island artefacts in the Te Papa collection. The fellowship will facilitate time talking to professionals throughout the organisation and also meet with key people in other important cultural organisations such as Heritage NZ who protect historic sites and buildings, and Manatū Taonga, the Ministry for Culture and Heritage.

Ali Haigh, Manning Regional Art Gallery
Mentorship at the Art Gallery of NSW

The Mentorship will provide Ali with an insight into the Learning and Participation division supporting four key areas of public engagement: Education, Public Programs, Community Programs and Visitor Experience. Ali is passionate about fostering curiosity and enquiry through programs that reflect and incorporate changing artistic practices. The opportunity to undertake the placement will enable her to further explore and develop ideas to support art programs in the region and encourage active engagement with contemporary art and artists.

Ms Bethany Holland, Norfolk Island Museums and Research Centre
Mentorship at Sydney Living Museums, House Museum Portfolio

This mentorship will enable Bethany to develop strategies to activate and improve access to the Norfolk Island Museum collection through observing the practices at Elizabeth Farm and other Sydney Living Museum properties and seeking feedback and advice from educational officers, curators and other collections staff. Following her placement, Bethany hopes to develop an educational program for the museum including tours targeted at children

Ms Cecilie Knowles, Orange Regional Gallery
Mentorship at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Australia

Cecilie will use her mentorship to increase her knowledge of visual art programming for youth and people with special access requirements by experiencing firsthand how the MCA approaches the engagement of these audiences. The placement will allow her to gain new perspectives, develop professional networks and draw on the wide ranging expertise of the MCA’s Public Programs and Learning teams. Orange Regional Gallery is entering a period of growth and Cecilie looks forward to sharing what she learns with the team in Orange and using it to help plan their approach to increased audience engagement over the next three years.

Mr Jeremy Kruckel, Wagga Wagga Art Gallery
Mentorship at the Art Gallery of NSW

Through this mentorship with the Art Gallery of NSW Collection and Registration team, Jeremy will gain important knowledge and expertise that could then be applied in his position at Wagga Wagga Art Gallery. During his placement, Jeremy will concentrate on the most recent practices of collection management and conservation; data management systems including Vernon software; building techniques for long term collection storage as well as suitable packing techniques. He will also build professional relationships which will prove vital in maintaining the use of best management practices in a regional setting and enabling the development of a mutually beneficial and supportive network across institutional gallery communities.

Miss Bree Rooney, Newcastle Museum
Mentorship at Sydney Living Museums, House Museum Portfolio

With Newcastle Museum’s recent expansion to multiple heritage sites and close working relationships with other cultural institutions across the City of Newcastle, this mentorship will assist Bree in facing challenges as to how to best communicate and collaborate on ideas and corresponding programming to both compliment and distinguish the different heritage sites and their needs and expectations. She hopes to further develop her skills across diverse methods of visitor engagement and to learn about the procedures, planning and communication strategies that support the institution holistically, and then apply these to her own role and institutional challenges.

Ms Julianne Salway, Goulburn Mulwaree Council
Mentorship at the Anzac Memorial in Hyde Park

As Museums Officer for the soon to be upgraded Rocky Hill War Memorial Museum, Julianne will learn from the experiences of the Anzac Memorial’s own recent transformation and draw on expert advice to further develop her skills and knowledge in exhibition planning and conservation practices. This Mentorship would also provide a great opportunity for Julianne and the Anzac War Memorial staff to learn more about each other’s museums and how they have evolved, particularly how the public’s attitudes have changed over the years regarding conflict and commemorating war.

Dr Diane Westerhuis, Camden Haven Historical Society Museum
Volunteer placement at the NSW State Archives & Records

Diane will use her placement to develop her skills in the management of paper based collections and archives, paper conservation and care, digitisation, cataloguing and indexing and to build on knowledge acquired in other archival research in order to assist the Camden Haven Historical Museum to care for their collections. Through the experience Diane hopes to extend her project management skills in a museum archives context, and understand the materials better including the physical care of documents as well as the utility of their contents.

Ms Leonie Lane, New Italy Museum Inc
Volunteer placement at Albury LibraryMuseum

During her placement, Leonie will spend time working with a small sub-collection, conducting research and making recommendations against the collection policy, in addition to assisting with the installation of a major social history exhibition. Leonie looks forward to the opportunity for hands-on experience in creating displays about local history via interactive science and contemporary multimedia to build on her existing design education and museum experience.