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'There are many hidden treasures in over-stretched storerooms across the country, but currently they may not always be most appropriately placed for study, care, or interpretation. There may also be arguments for limited divestment of individual objects to enable the re-shaping or balancing of a collection.' Dawn Austwick, Director, Esmée Fairbairn Foundation
Effective Collections is a programme of work emerging from the central theme of the original Collections for the Future report - that too many museum collections are underused. The museum collections of the UK are a huge public resource that should be available for everyone, and Effective Collections aims to develop the culture and the processes for museums to share them better.
With a grant of just over £1million from Esmée Fairbairn Foundation to spend over five years, the main strand of work enables increased numbers of long loans. In addition, Effective Collections encourages an active approach to disposal.
Effective Collections is a programme to enrich displays across UK museums, and to give museums that currently do not lend and borrow the skills and confidence that they need. It is a source of expertise, advice and funding that will encourage uses of collections that would not be possible for museums working on their own.
The programme was formally launched on 10 July 2007 with an introductory report entitled Making Collections Effective, which was sent to MA members in August 2007 and can be downloaded below. The report also contains an update on Collections for the Future, since its publication in June 2005.
With Effective Collections, the Museums Association (MA) and Esmée Fairbairn Foundation chose to focus on long loans (i.e. three-five year agreements) so that the effort of lending is sustained in displays and in long-term relationships between museums. The Effective Collections programme also includes disposal, the result of which is often a permanent transfer to another museum, which has much in common with a long loan.
Effective Collections began with a two-year pilot phase at the end of 2006. During the pilot phase the programme is developing guidance and training in the areas detailed in the linked sections below. We're also undertaking trials of how the brokering and collections review services will work by piloting long loans and disposals with a small number of museums. Case studies of those undertaken so far can be downloaded below.
At the end of 2008 the full phase of the Effective Collections programme will begin, when museums will be able to apply for assistance in any or all of the elements of the programme linked to below. Over the course of Effective Collections all of the guidance, case studies, application information and training developed by Effective Collections will be added to this website.
If you can't see what you're looking for on this page, or if you have a particular document in mind, try looking in our A-Z list of resources or by using the search box at the top of the page.
To see the A-Z list of resources, please click here
For information about the MA's other collections work click here
During the early stages of Effective Collections the MA commissioned research into levels of long loan and disposal activity as a baseline from which to measure the impact of the programme. The research also asked participating museums about barriers to increased lending and disposal. The report from this research can be downloaded here.
| If you would like to contribute to the resources and services being developed as part of Effective Collections, or take part in a pilot project, contact the MA's collections coordinator, Sally Cross: sally@museumsassociation.org. |
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