Boxing clever
For someone who didn't plan to work in museums, IWM North boss Graham Boxer has had a wide-ranging career so far. He talks to Simon Stephens
“I actually got into museums by mistake,” says Graham Boxer, who became the head of Imperial War Museum North in April last year and has his civil servant dad to thank for starting him out on a career in the sector.
“When I came out of higher education I was working in a record shop and my father wasn’t particularly impressed, so he said, ‘I’m going to get you a proper job,’ and he wrote off to various civil service departments,” Boxer says.
“I got offered a job at the Department of Health and Social Security or the British Museum as a clerical officer. Not surprisingly I thought the British Museum sounded more interesting so I went there.”
Hooked by the British Museum
In fact, he started on the same day, 4 January 1977, that the British Museum director David Wilson began his 15-year tenure. Once inside the door, Boxer was hooked.
“It was fascinating, this wealth of material culture from around the world suddenly opened up and it just intrigued me,” he says. “I don’t want to get too political about this, and I’m sympathetic to cultural restitution, but for me, as a young person, having this wealth of global culture in one place was absolutely fantastic.”
Boxer then did some work at the Museum of London before taking a history degree as a mature student. After this he did the museum studies course at the University of Leicester.
But it was his first full-time job, as assistant museums officer and curator at the Museum of the Manchester Regiment, that really shaped his career. It was a formative experience as Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council asked him to help create the museum in Ashton-Under-Lyne from scratch.
“The politicians had already decided that it should not just be a military museum, but a social one as well,” says Boxer, who included subjects such as family life, conscientious objectors and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in the displays.
“That was one of the very first museums to take that social/historical approach. It was a fascinating training ground and it was good to work on what is quite a complex and difficult subject and to make it relevant and interesting.”
Fast-forward nearly 30 years and Boxer is in charge of a much larger museum that also focuses on the social impact of war and conflict. In between the Museum of the Manchester Regiment and IWM North, he created a gallery for the King’s Regiment at National Museums Liverpool (NML).
Boxer’s time at NML also saw him work on the development of the Museum of Liverpool Life and a gallery about Customs and Excise.
He later became the director of St George’s Hall, a vast neo-classical building near Liverpool’s main train station. He led the £23m restoration of the hall, which reopened in 2007. He later had jobs at the Liverpool Culture Company and Liverpool City Council.
Engaging visitors
His wide-ranging roles have given him firm views on the power of objects and how they can be best used to engage visitors.
“I do believe that curatorship is really important,” he says. “But it’s not curatorship in the sense that it tends to get articulated, as if it’s almost like a priest guarding the relics and [the curator] being the interface with the visitor. I think curators have to be enablers; they have to help make that connection between people and the objects.”
Boxer also believes that it is the narrative around objects that the public find interesting: “An object might look interesting, attractive or quirky, but it only comes alive when [museum visitors] know the stories around it. And the thing about war and conflict is that our objects have really profound, life-changing stories around them.”
IWM North’s philosophy is that “war shapes lives”, says Boxer. “We tend to say war is about ordinary people in extraordinary situations, because it is.”
For Boxer, the challenges at IWM North are different to most of his previous jobs, which often involved starting museums or galleries from scratch, including large capital projects such as St George’s Hall.
But IWM North has had one other director, Jim Forrester, since it opened in 2002 and has an established track record. Since opening it has attracted three million visitors, has held 60 exhibitions and has won more than 30 awards.
So, surely Boxer can just put his feet up and watch the visitors roll in? If only life was that simple. The recent announcement by the Science Museum Group that it might have to close one of its sites in northern England if there is a 10% cut in the next spending round showed that museums outside London can be vulnerable when money is tight.
This is not to say that IWM North is under threat of closure but, like all of Imperial War Museums’ five sites, it is expected to make a financial contribution to its running costs.
Boxer says that IWM as a whole is in a good position as it has a high level of income generation (50%) in relation to its grant-in-aid but spending cuts will continue to be a challenge.
Funding risks
“It is likely that grant-in-aid is going to decrease in the future,” he says. “[Culture secretary] Maria Miller is talking about how culture has to demonstrate its economic value, so income generation is really important and that is one of our priorities here – how we can maximise our income generation from all sources, through secondary spend, corporate hire, sponsorship, trusts and foundations. It is really important for us to address that balance and make us more resilient to cuts.”
Like others involved in museum fundraising he is aware that it’s a tough ask outside London. Nevertheless, he says he enjoys fundraising and is optimistic about his chances of success: “Let’s go for it and just see what we can do – what have we got to lose?”
Boxer also says that running exhibitions for longer periods as a cost-cutting measure is having an impact on the number of repeat visits that the museum gets and it needs to build back in what he calls marketable change. Boxer also has to work with the IWM North building, designed by Daniel Libeskind.
The Polish-born architect thought the structure should reflect how disorientating and disconcerting war is. The design is based on the concept of a world shattered by conflict, a fragmented globe reassembled in three interlocking shards representing conflict on land, water and in the air.
While there is no doubting the drama of the building, some visitors find it so disorientating that they have difficulty spotting the entrance.
A changing environment
Another issue is that IWM North is now located in a very different environment to the largely brownfield site that existed when the museum opened. Many more buildings have sprung up recently, including MediaCity, which houses 2,500 BBC staff.
This is changing the museum’s visitor profile as it gets more general tourists. Many of them arrive from the MediaCity side of the site, where they enter the museum through what used to be a fire exit. Boxer plans to rework this space as well as making improvements to the exterior through landscaping.
Inside the building, the main exhibition area features the Big Picture Show, a 360-degree experience that uses sound, moving images and photographs to bring people’s experiences of war to life.
It’s an impressive feature but the museum has spent lots of time getting it to work better for visitors. The recently made films are far shorter and take advantage of digital technology. The latest is aimed at younger visitors and has been developed with the Horrible Histories brand.
Like many other museums, IWM North is hoping for a surge in visitors during next year’s 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the first world war. IWM in London is the national coordinator for the centenary and Boxer is aware that there will be lots of organisations running events.
“We don’t want to create first world war fatigue, but given that it was such a watershed for society, it is important to mark it and make it relevant for people today,” he says.
Boxer feels that, whatever the subject, it is the personal touch, whether that’s visitors chatting with volunteers, veterans or staff, that helps bring the museum alive.
“You not only get the objects [at IWM North], you get people in the galleries who are willing to talk to visitors and share their experiences. I think that personal touch really pays off – it is a much more collaborative, discursive approach rather than being didactic.
"In essence that is the direction I think we need to go in as a museum – to maintain those personal stories, maintain that individual involvement and make it more of a dialogue and a discussion.”
Graham Boxer joined IWM North in April 2012 from Liverpool City Council where he was the head of arts, heritage and participation.
Before that, he was the head of heritage development at the Liverpool Culture Company.
While in Liverpool he also led the £23m restoration of St George’s Hall, which reopened in 2007.
His first full-time permanent museum role was as the assistant museums officer and curator of the Manchester Regiment Collection, which was managed by Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council.
IWM North is one of the five museums operated by Imperial War Museums (IWM).
The museum has attracted more than three million visitors since it opened in 2002.
IWM as a whole receives about half of its annual funding as grant-in-aid (£21.9m in 2011-12) from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS). It employs 570 staff.
The Heritage Lottery Fund recently awarded IWM North £528,700 to develop a three-year volunteering project with Manchester Museum aimed at those at risk of social and economic isolation.
Its next major temporary exhibition will be Catalyst: Contemporary Art and War.
This will follow Saving Lives: Frontline Medicine in a Century of Conflict, which closes on 28 August.
“When I came out of higher education I was working in a record shop and my father wasn’t particularly impressed, so he said, ‘I’m going to get you a proper job,’ and he wrote off to various civil service departments,” Boxer says.
“I got offered a job at the Department of Health and Social Security or the British Museum as a clerical officer. Not surprisingly I thought the British Museum sounded more interesting so I went there.”
Hooked by the British Museum
In fact, he started on the same day, 4 January 1977, that the British Museum director David Wilson began his 15-year tenure. Once inside the door, Boxer was hooked.
“It was fascinating, this wealth of material culture from around the world suddenly opened up and it just intrigued me,” he says. “I don’t want to get too political about this, and I’m sympathetic to cultural restitution, but for me, as a young person, having this wealth of global culture in one place was absolutely fantastic.”
Boxer then did some work at the Museum of London before taking a history degree as a mature student. After this he did the museum studies course at the University of Leicester.
But it was his first full-time job, as assistant museums officer and curator at the Museum of the Manchester Regiment, that really shaped his career. It was a formative experience as Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council asked him to help create the museum in Ashton-Under-Lyne from scratch.
“The politicians had already decided that it should not just be a military museum, but a social one as well,” says Boxer, who included subjects such as family life, conscientious objectors and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in the displays.
“That was one of the very first museums to take that social/historical approach. It was a fascinating training ground and it was good to work on what is quite a complex and difficult subject and to make it relevant and interesting.”
Fast-forward nearly 30 years and Boxer is in charge of a much larger museum that also focuses on the social impact of war and conflict. In between the Museum of the Manchester Regiment and IWM North, he created a gallery for the King’s Regiment at National Museums Liverpool (NML).
Boxer’s time at NML also saw him work on the development of the Museum of Liverpool Life and a gallery about Customs and Excise.
He later became the director of St George’s Hall, a vast neo-classical building near Liverpool’s main train station. He led the £23m restoration of the hall, which reopened in 2007. He later had jobs at the Liverpool Culture Company and Liverpool City Council.
Engaging visitors
His wide-ranging roles have given him firm views on the power of objects and how they can be best used to engage visitors.
“I do believe that curatorship is really important,” he says. “But it’s not curatorship in the sense that it tends to get articulated, as if it’s almost like a priest guarding the relics and [the curator] being the interface with the visitor. I think curators have to be enablers; they have to help make that connection between people and the objects.”
Boxer also believes that it is the narrative around objects that the public find interesting: “An object might look interesting, attractive or quirky, but it only comes alive when [museum visitors] know the stories around it. And the thing about war and conflict is that our objects have really profound, life-changing stories around them.”
IWM North’s philosophy is that “war shapes lives”, says Boxer. “We tend to say war is about ordinary people in extraordinary situations, because it is.”
For Boxer, the challenges at IWM North are different to most of his previous jobs, which often involved starting museums or galleries from scratch, including large capital projects such as St George’s Hall.
But IWM North has had one other director, Jim Forrester, since it opened in 2002 and has an established track record. Since opening it has attracted three million visitors, has held 60 exhibitions and has won more than 30 awards.
So, surely Boxer can just put his feet up and watch the visitors roll in? If only life was that simple. The recent announcement by the Science Museum Group that it might have to close one of its sites in northern England if there is a 10% cut in the next spending round showed that museums outside London can be vulnerable when money is tight.
This is not to say that IWM North is under threat of closure but, like all of Imperial War Museums’ five sites, it is expected to make a financial contribution to its running costs.
Boxer says that IWM as a whole is in a good position as it has a high level of income generation (50%) in relation to its grant-in-aid but spending cuts will continue to be a challenge.
Funding risks
“It is likely that grant-in-aid is going to decrease in the future,” he says. “[Culture secretary] Maria Miller is talking about how culture has to demonstrate its economic value, so income generation is really important and that is one of our priorities here – how we can maximise our income generation from all sources, through secondary spend, corporate hire, sponsorship, trusts and foundations. It is really important for us to address that balance and make us more resilient to cuts.”
Like others involved in museum fundraising he is aware that it’s a tough ask outside London. Nevertheless, he says he enjoys fundraising and is optimistic about his chances of success: “Let’s go for it and just see what we can do – what have we got to lose?”
Boxer also says that running exhibitions for longer periods as a cost-cutting measure is having an impact on the number of repeat visits that the museum gets and it needs to build back in what he calls marketable change. Boxer also has to work with the IWM North building, designed by Daniel Libeskind.
The Polish-born architect thought the structure should reflect how disorientating and disconcerting war is. The design is based on the concept of a world shattered by conflict, a fragmented globe reassembled in three interlocking shards representing conflict on land, water and in the air.
While there is no doubting the drama of the building, some visitors find it so disorientating that they have difficulty spotting the entrance.
A changing environment
Another issue is that IWM North is now located in a very different environment to the largely brownfield site that existed when the museum opened. Many more buildings have sprung up recently, including MediaCity, which houses 2,500 BBC staff.
This is changing the museum’s visitor profile as it gets more general tourists. Many of them arrive from the MediaCity side of the site, where they enter the museum through what used to be a fire exit. Boxer plans to rework this space as well as making improvements to the exterior through landscaping.
Inside the building, the main exhibition area features the Big Picture Show, a 360-degree experience that uses sound, moving images and photographs to bring people’s experiences of war to life.
It’s an impressive feature but the museum has spent lots of time getting it to work better for visitors. The recently made films are far shorter and take advantage of digital technology. The latest is aimed at younger visitors and has been developed with the Horrible Histories brand.
Like many other museums, IWM North is hoping for a surge in visitors during next year’s 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the first world war. IWM in London is the national coordinator for the centenary and Boxer is aware that there will be lots of organisations running events.
“We don’t want to create first world war fatigue, but given that it was such a watershed for society, it is important to mark it and make it relevant for people today,” he says.
Boxer feels that, whatever the subject, it is the personal touch, whether that’s visitors chatting with volunteers, veterans or staff, that helps bring the museum alive.
“You not only get the objects [at IWM North], you get people in the galleries who are willing to talk to visitors and share their experiences. I think that personal touch really pays off – it is a much more collaborative, discursive approach rather than being didactic.
"In essence that is the direction I think we need to go in as a museum – to maintain those personal stories, maintain that individual involvement and make it more of a dialogue and a discussion.”
Graham Boxer at a glance
Graham Boxer joined IWM North in April 2012 from Liverpool City Council where he was the head of arts, heritage and participation.
Before that, he was the head of heritage development at the Liverpool Culture Company.
While in Liverpool he also led the £23m restoration of St George’s Hall, which reopened in 2007.
His first full-time permanent museum role was as the assistant museums officer and curator of the Manchester Regiment Collection, which was managed by Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council.
Imperial War Museum North at a glance
IWM North is one of the five museums operated by Imperial War Museums (IWM).
The museum has attracted more than three million visitors since it opened in 2002.
IWM as a whole receives about half of its annual funding as grant-in-aid (£21.9m in 2011-12) from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS). It employs 570 staff.
The Heritage Lottery Fund recently awarded IWM North £528,700 to develop a three-year volunteering project with Manchester Museum aimed at those at risk of social and economic isolation.
Its next major temporary exhibition will be Catalyst: Contemporary Art and War.
This will follow Saving Lives: Frontline Medicine in a Century of Conflict, which closes on 28 August.