Category: Emerging Conservation Professionals

“500 Words or Less.” A workshop about writing abstracts or short proposals. 20 April 2010 . 11am US Eastern time (GMT -5) 90 minutes.

More information at http://bit.ly/AWW_410 or http://bit.ly/AWW_410sc

Members of the Emerging Conservation Professionals can claim the discount by noting “ECPN” in the discount code section of the online form.

If 5 or more get together to join, I’ll drop the price further — just email me.

The following are my notes from a meeting with Meg Craft and Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation faculty and students on March 11, 2010.

The meeting began with a brief description of AIC:
It is a membership organization instead of a institutional organization.
There are 3,300 members
supported by a staff of 10
FAIC is a separate organization, AIC is the office and membership portion
Both are non-profit, but the FAIC applies for educational grants, receives donations, while AIC is in a better position for political advocacy. AIC is the only member of FAIC, we are all members of AIC

Current Topics – Environmental Standards

One activity this year is the re-assessment of environmental standards. AIC cannot change or make up the standards, but they can form a committee or a task force to keep everyone informed. The IIC roundtable at the AIC 2010 meeting will give us a litmus test of how everyone feels about changing standards. Sustainability, Economics, protection of objects, need for access, we’ve reached this point by which we need to re-evaluate. AIC can be a resource and a place to put this information about environmental mangement and make it available to all members

CoOL – Conservation OnLine

Cool – COnservation OnLine has been taken over by FAIC. We would like it to be maintained made into a functional and growing resource. There are significant costs to maintain and operate the website. The site needs to be mapped, and there are numerous broken links on the site. If you find a broken link send it to Brett Rogers or Rachel Arenstein at AIC.

Who uses the resources in Cool? Mainly developing countries and conservation programs without library sources use cool as a primary source. AIC is looking to form an international board, and they have a strategic plan. Mapping will not be very expensive, but will require organization. They are looking at putting CoOL in other languages.

Ethics Complaints

There has been an increase in ethics complaints, now more than ½ the membership is in private practice. Meg encouraged students to use a contract for everything, write down changes and risks involved in treatments and have the owner sign the contract before the treatment and if there are changes add these in the margins and initial at the end when the object is returned. Since it is always not possible to predict if your client will like their object after it has been treated, be sure to outline how it will look post-treatment as much as possible.

How to get more involved – thoughts from Meg Craft and the students

The meeting ended with a discussion of how students could be more involved in AIC, Meg suggested joining a specialty group, becoming involved with Angel’s Projects, helping out with the online projects as needed (CoOL, the Wiki), offering to edit JAIC, and/or writing a book review for the JAIC (bonus – you can keep the book! AIC has a stock of books waiting to be reviewed). For the journal information you can contact Brett Rodgers at AIC. It was also mentioned that we may begin a ‘student day’ at the AIC annual meeting which would offer a great opportunity for students to present their work.

Overall, it was a great introduction to AIC and what is currently on the President’s desk. Thanks to Meg for taking time out of your lunch to update us all.

Dear Colleagues,

I am currently teaching an undergraduate class called “Critical Issues in art conservation” to undergraduate students at the Johns Hopkins University. The course looks at issues in the history, ethics and contemporary practice of conservation and tries to grapple with how conservation changes art and artifacts, as well as our interpretations of them. As part of our course, the students contribute to a blog: www.criticalissuesinartconservation.blogspot.com. One student posts a new reflection on the reading for that week and his/her colleagues respond by posting comments to the blogpost. I think that it would be tremendously interesting and exciting to this group of dedicated and serious students if some of the authors of the articles they are reading (and you can find a reading list as a link at the blog) would comment on their blog entries and perhaps suggest weblinks of interest. Part of what I was hoping for in this blog was that it would be an interactive forum for the students, conservators and the general public. I’d be most grateful if you would look at the blog and the reading list, and if the authors we are reading especially (but all are welcome to comment) would write something in response to the blogposts. There is also a little poll that is posted on the blog to get a sense of who is looking at it. If you would kindly take the poll, that would be helpful to understand our audience as well. New student posts appear every Monday, so please do check back!

Also, any suggestions for me on other readings that might be appropriate for undergraduates would be most welcome.

with thanks in advance,
Sanchita Balachandran

Meg Loew Craft, President of AIC and senior objects conservator at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, will have a casual lunch discussion at the Winterthur Museum Research Building on March 11, 2010. It will be during lunch, around noon to 1PM.

The WUDPAC graduate students have been invited and anyone in the area is encouraged to attend. The purpose of the lunch discussion is to talk to Meg Craft about her work in AIC and to allow a forum for students to ask questions about AIC, and voice their concerns as emerging conservators.

Written-in questions are encouraged, and if you would like you can ask questions in the comments section of this post, or e-mail questions to me at rose.daly[at]gmail.com. It would be helpful to give a list of questions to Meg Craft before the meeting so she can be better prepared to answer them. A summary of the discussion will be posted on this ECPN blog.

The Education and Training Committee is looking for a current student to serve as a student liaison on our committee. The student liaison term would serve a 1 or 2 year term, depending upon their anticipated graduation, and begin after the 2010 Annual Meeting. Contact the ETC Chair, Jennifer Hain Teper (jhain@illinois.edu) if you are interested.

Conservation Department
Cincinnati Art Museum

The Cincinnati Art Museum is seeking an advanced paintings conservation intern for the June 1, 2010-August 19, 2010 time period. The Conservation Laboratory has been awarded a conservation grant from the Kinney Foundation for the extensive collection of Frank Duveneck paintings that are part of the museum’s permanent collection.

Candidates who demonstrate a career interest in the conservation of American Painting will be especially welcome to apply. Candidates must be fluent in both spoken and written English.
The internship is intended for students currently enrolled or recent graduates of one of the North American conservation graduate programs. The internship will include surveying and prioritizing the conservation needs of 119 paintings, technical examination and treatment of selected paintings and frames. The tasks will be coordinated and supervised by the Chief Conservator and by the Curator of American Paintings, Sculpture and Drawings.
The internship is set up to further the career of a conservator in training. The preferred candidate would posses strong organizational skills, solid understanding of the field of conservation including practical conservation techniques and current approaches both ethical and philosophical.

Please send a letter of interest along with Curriculum Vitae. In addition, enclose 2 letters of recommendation from conservation professionals familiar with the applicant’s work sealed in envelopes with the referee’s signature across the flap.

The application deadline is February 26th, 2010. Candidates chosen for a phone interview will have to submit additional information, such as treatment examples and scholastic research.
The internship is paid bi-weekly with a total stipend of approximately $4,500 that is subject to all applicable taxes.

The applicant will be notified no later than April 1st, 2010 by phone.

The Cincinnati Art Museum is an equal opportunity employer and is strongly committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment where a variety of backgrounds, cultures, orientations, ideas, and talents can flourish.

All applications should be sent to:

Jennifer Hart | Director of Human Resources
Cincinnati Art Museum
953 Eden Park Drive
Cincinnati, Ohio 45202

Research and Writing provides editorial and business management services to artists, artisans, academics, professional practitioners and small non-profits. We are pleased to offer members of the Emerging Conservation Professional Network a discount on my services. Of special interest may be:

“500 Words or Less”: Writing an Abstract or Short Proposal
Next scheduled session: 20 April 2010.
Regular price: $50. ECPN price: $45, with complimentary editorial review of one abstract if submitted by 15 June 2010

Your Life as an Independent [Whatever]
A three-week online workshop for unemployed, underemployed and independently employed artists, artisans and academics–or anyone interested in learning more about integrating who you are and what you do. Develop the tools for your independent life. More information at http://www.scribd.com/doc/19645357/Your-Life-as-an-Independent-Whatever
Next scheduled session: 8-28 February. Regular price: $275 ECPN price: $245

Proposal Writing Workshop
A three-week online workshop about the writing process, focused on writing a proposal or bid. Bring your own project—a book or thesis proposal, a job application, project bid or other application-based writing project—or ask for an ‘assignment.” More information at http://www.scribd.com/doc/19645371/Proposal-Writing-Workshop
Next scheduled session: 24 January-13 February Regular price: $275 ECPN price: $245
Contact me for the deeper discount for groups of 5-8 and 8 or more.

I’m also pleased to offer ECPN members an across-the-board 10% discount on editorial or business consulting services.

You’ll find more information about Research and Writing and all the online courses, meetings, and hot topics meeting series we offer at http: bit.ly/RaWblog and at http://www.scribd.com/doc/23541119/Research-Writing-2010A

For editorial and consulting fee schedules, to register for these or other online courses with discount, questions, etc email me at researchandwriting.nyc@gmail.com

-Sarah Lowengard

ECPN Conference Call
October 15, 2009

Rachel Penniman
Ryan Winfield
Ruth Seyler
Katie Mullen
Anne Simon
Karen Pavelka
Jason Church

I. Welcome

II. Project Updates

1. Communications –

a. Conference Call – Ryan and Ruth say recognize that the calls are committee conference calls. People would still be invited to sit in and the call number is posted, but we won’t set out blasts. Issue and theme calls could be specially promoted and separate. These could include interviews, webinars, twitter conferences.

b. Museums Wiki – we’ve been asked through a comment on the blog to list ECPN here. Katie will post this.
http://museums.wikia.com/wiki/Online_communities

c. Effort to get calls for bloggers is ongoing. Ryan will look at analytics. Investigate with Anagpic to see if they will let us link from that site. Karen will get us a name to contact about the ANAGPIC website. One new possibility is to invite people who are doing posters for AIC to submit them as blog postings, but that is contingent upon how presenting the posters after the conference is over is being handled by the poster committee.

2. Outreach – Angels Project

a. Ruth has been contacting sites; other folks have also been assigned sites to contact. Karen has contacted Paul M. for information on scheduling. From the board’s point of view the Angels project is the most visible and important thing we’re doing. That said, not much can be done until the site is selected. What can we anticipate? One example is supplies – however, again, that will be contingent upon what Paul hands over in terms of scheduling. Jason asks, if the project can still be moved to a Saturday – Ruth says both the Tuesday and Saturday are viable dates at this point.

b.Mentoring program –
1.AIC staff did the matching this time, due to concerns about letting the information on the matching forms go out of the office. Next time around, we may designate one officer from the group, the board liaison and a staff member to do the matching, so that multiple perspectives are represented.

2. We need to come up with a list of criteria that can be tested to see if mentoring is successful. Possibilities are geographic area, specialty, and manner of communication. Contact the parties that are participating 3 months out and solicit feedback on whether the match is good for both the parties involved. Figure out how to adjust matching process based on this feedback. This information, not connected to names, can be shared with the group. We should allow people to apply as a mentor or mentee as they become interested in the program, and not set a yearly deadline to apply.

3. Lack of architectural conservators applying as mentors is a problem – two more mentors in this area are needed. Ryan has sent an email to be posted on their specialty group listserve, but is not sure if it has gone through. Karen suggests two people to contact, and Jason has the name of one architecture conservator who has definitely expressed interest in being a mentor.

c. Purchasing a Recorder – AIC’s lendable AV equipment lives with (the multimedia coordinator for AIC) Brett – the recorder will too. Jason will contact Ryan about creating a form for lending that includes a disclaimer that AIC retains ownership of any recording made with it.

3. Professional Development/Training

a. Rachel reports on behalf of Amber that Amber has been working w/ IIC on attracting submissions for a student poster session for their Istanbul conference. They will make their outreach effort to U.S. grad programs through ECPN.

b. Ryan will contact Amber about her questions on finalizing the survey. Survey Monkey can be used for the survey instrument.

III. New Business/Open Discussion
1. Amber Kerr may attend IAG on behalf of Rachel Penniman.

IV. Setting of next call and adjournment
Next call:
Thursday November 19th, 1PM.

ECPN Open Conference Call
September 17, 2009

Present
Ruth Seyler
Ryan Winfield
Rachel Penniman
Karen Pavelka
Rose Daly
Anne Simon

I. Welcome

II. Project Updates

A. Communications

i. Guest Bloggers

Ryan has granted Katie admin status on the blogspot account in order to be able to add authors. To attract more bloggers, we need to brainstorm on incentives to post. Be more proactive about setting up a date to blog, so that it’s not on their back burner. Facebook posting has been good – what other ways are there to spread the blog? Maybe the people in the training advisory group can recruit their classmates – talk to Amber to see if we can’t ask in a welcome email to them that we’re looking for posters. Contact Dan Cull – see if he can share tips on how to get guest bloggers, or have suggestions on who to contact.

ii. Logos –
Get ourselves more branded. Try to tag posts. Logo needs to go by AIC board before they actually are used. Once posts are tagged we can ask for more submissions.

B. Outreach – Angels Project
Tony Rajer and Ruth Seyler have identified 5 potential sites. They in talks to pinpoint the final site, then we’ll move on to sponsorship and supply and the other issues. Karen Pavelka points out that this is the most important thing we’re doing from the group’s perspective. And it’s an enormous amount of work. Ruth will contact Paul Messier and see if he has a calendar/timetable set up based on his experience. Rachel Penniman asks what the group can do to help our more – Ruth says not to worry, there will be plenty to do once we get a site set up and a timeline in place.

C. Professional Development/Training
Karen Pavelka reports on behalf of Amber Kerr – no updates right now on PD/training.

D. 2010 budget
Ryan Winfield outlines the next budget
– travel to anagpic for chair $500
– travel to IAG for chair $500,
– Refreshments at annual meeting ECPN meeting $800.
– Possibly cost to rent mailing list from the college arts association to get out the fliers to relevant undergrad programs – will be minimal, probably $250. Or we can ask for money to print and then fall back on mailing list option.
– Check with Jason Church to see if we need budget for Audio Visual equipment.
This budget assumes that we won’t try for a workshop at the 2010 Annual Meeting. Deadline for all budget issues – October 1st. The Angels project has a separate budget. Ryan will draft a budget, and then it will be sent out to EPCN group officers for approval. The draft should be sent out by the end of next week.

III. New Business/Open Discussion
A. ICCROM– Amber is working with ICCROM to set up poster session.

B. Mentoring – Anne Simon says she and Angie would like help with matching participants and with logistics. Can there be another point person for the mentoring program? Discussion of the merits of trying to attract more participants to the mentoring program – Karen Pavelka points out that starting small is actually good. Match up who we can, and she will reach out to her contacts if more mentors are needed. We’ll do another blog post about mentoring, what a mentor can offer, so that potential mentors have a better sense of what they can offer and how to participate. Rachel Penniman and Katie Mullen will both help to get this off the ground and do whatever needs to be done – they will set up call with Ryan, Angie and Anne to get this sorted out.

IV Setting of next call and adjournment

October 15th, 1PM

A message will be sent out a day or two before the call with the phone #and pin #
No agenda requests will be sent out in the next meeting reminder in the hopes that more people will participate.