QVMAG Collection Audit Underway
Media release – Wednesday 6 November 2019
The Audit of the City of Launceston's Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery's collection is underway and we're inviting the community to come and watch us at work.
The Audit is aimed at creating a database of QVMAG's 1.5 million objects. It is the first full audit of our collection since the museum's inception in 1891.
Until the start of this Collection Audit, approximately 18% of objects were registered in our database. We have now committed to digitally documenting every item - from the smallest of native fleas to the largest railway carriage - so that communities now and well into the future may treasure and learn from them.
The Audit is underway at the Art Gallery at Royal Park. The temporary exhibitions gallery located on the ground floor of the Art Gallery has been repurposed as the Audit Space, in which our curators, officers, registrar and volunteers are meticulously documenting the collection in full view of the public. We encourage the community to come along and watch us at work through the glass doors.
As part of the Audit, each artwork or object is briefly removed from its storage area, details entered into the database, a basic ID photograph taken and a barcode allocated, before being returned to its storage location.
After the collections are entered into the database, they can be uploaded to an online catalogue so that audiences around the world can research and engage with our wonderful material. Once this digital information is created, it can be used in exciting new ways.
Creative Arts and Cultural Services Director Tracy Puklowski says the Collection Audit has presented an excellent opportunity to reconsider the presentation of spaces at the Art Gallery.
"Most of the classical works in the former Colonial Gallery are now on display in the Corner Gallery that is still open to visitors.
"While our central upper galleries are closed, we will be refurbishing this space in order to better control the environment, keeping our treasured works safe into the future. We hope to reopen the spaces in late 2020.
"In the meantime we will be showing ArtRage 2019 in the Front Galleries and a bold live art project downstairs in our Main Gallery."
The Collection Audit will be ongoing as we work our way through the vast collection while also acquiring new objects.
We hope this Audit creates an outstanding model for collections research, care and maintenance for industry and future guardians of the QVMAG archives.
More information about the audit is available on our website: www.qvmag.tas.gov.au/CollectionAudit
Watch out for updates about the Collection Audit across our social media pages, also.