Introduction
Organizations possessing living collections may choose to use distinct language to describe their policies and procedures for managing their plants and animals. Borrowing rules should be in place for institutions that do not possess collections but instead borrow and utilize things held by others. While serving the public, collections promote the museum’s goal. People expect museums to uphold the highest legal, ethical, and professional standards since collections are kept safe for the public and made available for their benefit. Museums create policies that support their purpose and operations, as well as guide decision-making, in order to illustrate these standards. Policies allow the museum’s governing body, employees, and the public to understand standards and assist the museum in fulfilling its stewardship obligations.
Collection Management Policies
A good policy is created to address the unique demands of the institution and its collection and is continuous in the day-to-day administration of the institution’s collections. It is critical to devote the time and resources necessary to consider and design a practical and usable document (American Alliance of Museums, n.d.). It is damaging to the institution and the public it serves to establish a policy that is not enforced, and for each document, there is no one-size-fits-all template. Because museums are so diverse, each museum’s background, audience, collections, and management should be represented in its policy. Interconnected policies and strategies help to create a unified vision and mission. While collections management rules differ in terms of structure and content, there are certain similar features to look for.
Vision, mission, and history are the important points that help to develop management policies. The mission should be supported by policies, processes, and strategies. As a result, many museums open each document by restating their goal, which is followed by other introductory content, such as the museum’s statement of vision and a short history of the museum and its holdings (American Alliance of Museums, 2018). Authority is another important part of a collection management policy. A museum’s governing body, committees, and employees all contribute to the museum’s duty as custodians of its holdings. The mission section normally includes the name of an institution, its mission, and who is accountable for administrative and fiduciary concerns, which highlights their duties and obligations. The declaration of authority, along with the purpose, vision, and history, is featured in the opening parts.
A code of ethics is crucial in developing a policy as well. It is a collection of rules that guide museum personnel, volunteers, and governing authorities in their conduct, decision-making, and behavior. A policy statement outlines ideals and standards that allow the museum to perform its goal while putting the public’s interests ahead of the museum’s or any individual’s (McCarthy, 2020). Each museum should create its own code of conduct that is tailored to its activities and demands. Staff, governing authorities, and volunteers are all mentioned in this text. A museum’s code of ethics is frequently included in the collection management policy, either in its whole, in an extract, or as a reference. The scope of the collection is a general description of the museum’s holdings as well as an explanation of how and what they are used for.
Loans enable museums to communicate information among themselves and with the public they serve. The requirements for the temporary transference of collection artifacts from or to the institution are outlined in this section. This section is typically used by museums to provide information about loan acceptance and approval, loan charges, documentation, insurance, and monitoring. Museums can include policies regarding previous loans and limited works if they are appropriate. Institutes that do not have their own collections but borrow and utilize things held by others must have rules related to this.
There are several aspects that influence the quality of collection care. Museums must adequately maintain and care for the items held by them. Museums are urged to address these areas in their collections management strategy to safeguard the collection from deterioration: storage, temperature, humidity levels, pest control, conservation, item handling, disaster preparedness, and location inventories. A museum’s long-term conservation plan can be noted here if one exists. Risk management is an important aspect of the museum’s job to minimize any possible difficulties or threats to the artifacts. This section provides a summary of the museum’s approach to collection protection as well as the types of insurance protection available. The collections management strategy is accompanied by a more detailed catastrophe plan.
The remaining significant aspects are acquisitions and disposal. The act of collecting an item or thing for one of the museum’s collections is known as acquisition. Accessioning is a legal procedure of adding an object to a museum’s permanent collection or to a category of material possession in the public trust by the institution (Saponaro & Evans, 2019). As a result, it is critical to write acquisition rules with the museum’s objective in mind. Each acquisition must add to or enrich the museum’s collections and be appropriately cared for, preserved, and utilized. Disposal is the permanent withdrawal of an item from a museum’s collection, and it is the polar opposite of acquisition. Deaccessioning an object has a variety of causes, some of which are contentious, but it is a common component of collection care and a means for the museum to streamline its collection. It is critical that the museum comprehends the legal and ethical ramifications of deaccessioning and drafts a policy that allows it to be transparent and responsible to the public.
These policies shaped collections primarily in terms of the transparency of how they are treated in the museums in every aspect. Due to their assistance, the information regarding how collections are created, disposed of, kept, and categorized is accessible to the public and the governing authorities (Chatterjee, 2020). This creates an opportunity to prevent any issues that may occur with the items at the institution and allows society to have control over the processes at the museums that serve them. It shapes collections to be treated more carefully and provides their safety.
An example of it can be found at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The purpose of its collections management policy is to ensure the inventory, safety, acquisition and disposal, accessibility, and related activities of the collections held in the museum. Its purpose is to chronicle the policies that drive the museum’s art collection’s growth, presentation, and care in accordance with the museum’s goal and professional museum standards.
In the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the acquisitions section consists of general principles, purchase procedures, gifts and bequests-related procedures, accessioning, and provenance guidelines. It is necessary to note that the acquisition policy for staff is mentioned in a separate section. The acquisition policy states that Curators should suggest extraordinary pieces of art for the collection that contribute significantly to the museum’s declared objective (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2021). Unless the degraded physical condition is important to the message of the work, all works must be in, or able to be brought to, an acceptable level of preservation. According to commonly established museum procedures, the museum should be able to show, keep, and maintain the planned purchase. The museum is dedicated to the notion of collecting in accordance with the highest ethical and professional standards.
The staff acquisitions policy in the Metropolitan Museum of Art states that it has traditionally been the museum’s policy not to issue assessments to contributors. Because of the obvious contradiction with its duty as a donor, the museum cannot operate as a competent appraiser under existing IRS criteria. If a donor requests help to find an appraiser, the curators may recommend many qualified appraisers, such as the Art Dealers Association as well as auction companies, and there must be more than just one name supplied. The museum should not organize an evaluation and cannot afford to pay for one. The appraiser shall be given access to the piece of art, photos of the work, or any other relevant actual facts in Museum files upon request.
When an employee hears about an art piece for sale that is fairly likely to be relevant to the museum’s collection, he or she is obliged to prioritize the museum’s interests over their own in obtaining the work. As a result, in all such circumstances, the worker must bring the work’s accessibility to the notice of the relevant curatorial department head or the Director if the worker is the department head. When the possible buyer is the Director, the museum gets the first crack at the piece since the Committee of Acquisitions is aware of it.
All purchases require a detailed report from the curator who recommends the work of art to be purchased, which includes a description of the piece, its condition, publishing history, importance to the museum’s collection, a rationalization for acceptance, provenance, intentions for exhibition and publication, and the donation or fund against which the purchase will be charged. All proposed purchases must be examined by a conservator and, if necessary, a scientist, who must give a report that includes a study of the work as well as an assessment of its condition, date, and attribution.
Regarding the staff’s personal collections, the policy states that the museum understands that its staff can and does collect art for personal enjoyment. Employees of the Museum, particularly those directly linked with curatorial responsibilities, have a sense of responsibility in this respect and must use caution to ensure that no contradiction arises between them and the museum. Each employee must use their best judgment to evaluate if the scope of their personal collection and collecting practices merit a meeting with their department head. Personal collecting activities should be discussed unless they are insignificant. An employee cannot operate as a trader in the purchase or sale of pieces of art, nor can an employee utilize the museum’s influence in the market for personal benefit. An employee may not take remuneration from any collector, artist, dealer, or institution unless the Director, in collaboration with the General Counsel, has provided prior written approval to receive such commission or stipend. Only with the Chair of the Board’s prior written consent may the Director and President take any such fee or stipend for themselves.
In terms of disposal policies, all legal restrictions on the donation or bequest of any item of art are respected by the museum. Before recommending that a given art be deaccessioned, the curator double-checks the gift records to ensure that the donation is unrestricted. Furthermore, donor wishes that do not create any legal obligations in connection with a bequest or gift of a work of art shall be honored to the degree possible until changed by the donor or, if the donor is deceased, the donor’s descendants or legal representatives. There are certain cases when the museum can dispose of the works that it possesses. These include the further misalignment of work with the museum’s mission, the work’s redundancy, poor quality, low importance, requested return by the lawful owner, and the inability of the museum to keep the object.
Conclusion
In conclusion, collection management policies are crucial for museums to be transparent to the public and the governing authorities. It provides information about how collections at the institutions are acquired, held, disposed and treated. The policy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art represents how such policies affect different procedures related to the works within institutions. Acquisition and disposal policies define what the museums are capable of doing with the items and what their employees can do on the art market. This provides a legal basis for authorities to make judgments in case of any conflict and provides the public with what the museums serve regarding the conditions under that collections are kept.
References
American Alliance of Museums (n.d.). Collections Management Policy.
American Alliance of Museums (2018). Developing a Collections Management Policy.
Saponaro, M. Z., & Evans, G. E. (2019). Collection management basics. ABC-CLIO.
Metropolitan Museum of Art (2021). Collections management policy. Web.
McCarthy, C. (Ed.). (2020). Museum practice. John Wiley & Sons.
Chatterjee, H. (Ed.). (2020). Touch in museums: Policy and practice in object handling. Routledge.