Day 5

5 April
‘Operation pack up the archaeological metal work’ commences 9.30am …first Helen briefs me on what she has done, and gives me my beautifully packed box of useful tools, purple gloves, scissors, cotton tape, silica gel, special writing pens, soft pencils etc. Thanks Helen! Then to decide the plan.
First I photograph all the shelves, so we have a base record of where boxes were and what each shelf looked like. I hope we won’t need such a record, but best to be safe.
The metal work is all boxed and well labelled and inventoried. The only thing missing is the location label. I’m expecting volunteers Terry and Lauren to help me in an half an hour to an hour, so decide I’d better have a dummy run at it all. ‘Metalwork store, Bay 2 shelf 7’ is the starting point ….6 labels later and I hope a volunteer comes soon!
Lauren comes first, complete with table to work on. Have table will work! And immediately grasps the labelling job, spending the rest of her hours working through Bay 2 and most of Bay 1. I hope she will not dream of ‘Metalwork store, Bay 2 shelf 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7’ though it could be the museum answer to counting sheep I suppose!
Terry arrives next, clutching the inventory, and we move around a bit to accommodate another person, there is not much room for people in this store, the new build will have much bigger store rooms. Can’t wait. He then checks off the inventory, while Lauren labels and I pack. A great team.
By the end of the day we had done 74 boxes, each had been labelled with shelf location, and brief contents title, unpacked, checked for bronze disease or any other unpleasant nastiness affecting the objects, repacked with soft padding on the base, between the layers and padded out with acid free tissue to prevent movement. Finally a silica gel packet was popped in, to absorb any moisture.
Found some gorgeous things! One pair of star shaped pieces from medieval spurs, just lovely uneven, blacksmith made metal stars; a dinky chopper like a modern herb chopper, with twisted metal handle, found in a quarry; and a beautiful bundle of manicure tools from a Roman lady.

4 April
Second day packing and what would we do without volunteers? Some volunteers have been valiantly helping us pack for several months. Today it is Sarah, Pam and Anna and with them we have been working on packing assorted weaponry. We started with European swords and daggers, of which we have an interesting collection, and then moved on to Indian and Middle Eastern, shades of Cheltenham’s old colonels here, because this is what they collected and brought back as souvenirs which eventually found their way to the Art Gallery & Museum. Now we are on to African spears and daggers.

Day 3

1 April
First day packing, although in fact the collections team has actually been packing for one or two days a week since last March. Some of this has been muilti-purpose because as well as providing a well-packed item that can be moved safely we have also been improving storage. The delicate human skulls from Belas Knapp and elsewhere have been carefully packed into hand-carved supports of plastazote (think dense foam) so they are well-supported and then wrapped around with tissue. We have received a grant of £500 from the Renaissance programme for museums (given by the, soon to be no more and greatly missed, quango, the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council) to buy 24 acid free boxes to enable us to pack some of the smaller items of weaponry from Africa and India which has also much improved how these items are stored.

Day 2

2. 31 March 2011

Early (yawn) train from Cheltenham to Manchester, spent the journey thinking of the others at the museum on ‘The last day’.  How was it going?  I wonder what they are doing?  I’m missing the ‘thank you and best wishes do’ for Michelle, our brilliant documentation project officer who has been with us since last June. That’s sad.   I will miss her. Also missing the big ‘farewell to the old Art Gallery & Museum do’ at 4.30.  That’s odd.  Things will be so different when I get back, and I won’t have had the transition, the event to close one chapter and open another. 

Is it significant that I am going to a social networking course?  Is this a new chapter for curators?  Some speakers think so!  Discussions about ‘freeing up objects’, allowing people to comment on them in cyberspace, giving them a new life …. an ‘imprisoned object’ is something stuck in an institution or in a museum database, no one can see it or react to it unless they visit the buildings.

Social networking is a new way of working, releasing and trusting staff to blog about their jobs and feelings, entering into dialogue with twitter and facebook followers ….bringing the museum into people’s lives, not just releasing facts and news. 

 

Day 1

30 March 2011
Our last day open – a little wistful. The collections will greet no visitors for 18 months. But as I climb the stairs after a little staff party for the closing I am reminded that they have a life of their own beyond our lives – and isn’t that the point of it all. William Rothenstein’s Wife and Child are engrossed and Charles Gere stands quietly observant paintbrush in hand, all three of them will outlive us all.