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| | ICEFAT
Newsletter #4 | |
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"A FINE ART
TRANSPORTER MUST NEVER BE SURPRISED"
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says Dr. Bo Wingren, museum man and curator. He has tremendous experience both
of exhibition work and public art in Sweden and also France. |
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| With
big exhibitions, it's not least the lending museum placing requirements for the
exhibition arranger's professional handling, security, alarm systems, climate
and transportation. According to Bo Wingren, a transporter must be attentive to
such requirements, and be very familiar with the procedures applying in each individual
case.
This is what defines the transporter's professional quality. No
element in the process must come as a surprise.
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"Apart
from professional skill and many years of experience, the transporter also has
to be flexible, and able to work with others involved in the same province. Some
museums insist on using their own transporter, with whom the chief transporter
has to collaborate."
Requirements have sharpened
International
standards for handling fine art works have been tightened over the past 20-30
years, above all in the USA and Northern Europe, according to Bo Wingren. Today's
Swedish conservators have a thorough training in the care and exposure of art
works in different materials. Not all museums have access to their own conservators,
but have to turn to larger institutions or independent experts.
It's always
the responsibility of the museum management and exhibition supervisor to ensure
that a conservator is brought into the planning of an exhibition, and is then
present for packing up, unpacking, monitoring of conditions etc. This work needs
to be planned so that couriers and conservators traveling in can work together
in situ. Picasso in Sweden
Bo Wingren started freelancing as an exhibition
curator a few years ago, when he retired from his job as office manager at the
Stockholm Arts Council.
In Spring 2003, the exhibition "Picasso in
public spaces" was inaugurated at Kristinehamn Art Museum. The reason behind
this was to draw attention one of Picasso's very largest public sculptures. Bo
Wingren was asked to supervise the exhibition.
"It's not a large museum,
but very nice and energetic, with lots of ambition. To manage a big international
exhibition of this caliber required professional outside help."
Two
or three years of preparations are needed for a huge project worth millions like
this. It's a question of locating interesting artworks, starting negotiations
in good time with lenders, making a realistic budget, arranging insurance matters,
planning transportation and exhibition arrangements.
Together with the
museum management, Bo planned the exhibition and went through the technical and
financial requirements for the project. This was a major undertaking for Kristinehamn
Art Museum: stringent security requirements, climate control, high costs for transportation,
couriers, insurance etc."We had experts from the Swedish National Museum
looking at security, we consulted conservators on handling and climate, and experts
on exhibition equipment, and so on. We were loaning items of great value from
museums and private collectors all over Europe."
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