Diary of an NUS Museum Intern: Gladys Toh

Note: Diary of an NUS Museum Intern is a series of blog posts written by our interns about their experiences during the course of their internships. Working alongside their mentors, our interns have waded through tons of historical research, assisted in curatorial work, pitched in during exhibition installations and organised outreach events! If you would like to become our next intern, visit our internship page for more information! 

-

Gladys Toh is fourth-year European Studies major and Art History minor at the NUS Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. As an Exhibitions Intern working with the Lee Kong Chian Chinese Collection, Gladys assisted with the compilation of research materials, management and digitisation of reference documents and archival materials.

In Chapter Three of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, detective Sherlock Holmes says to his assistant, John Watson, “Never trust general impressions, my boy, but concentrate yourself upon details.” My role as curatorial intern has much in common with the role of Watson. Throughout December, my main responsibility was to organise the archival materials of the late Singaporean artist, Lim Mu Hue; to find insights and report to the chief detective and in my case, the curator, Fang-Tze (Jamie). Before I proceeded to sort out the materials, I had to read up on the artist and watch videos enough to form a general impression on Mr Lim. Yet, like what Holmes had said to Watson, one should not judge based on general impressions. The devil is in the detail. I was tasked to look for signs and clues in the archival materials while I recorded them. Whether it was a pencil mark or a slight fold on the pages of a book, I had to question its intention. The archival materials were just one single part of the ‘evidence’ needed to form a narrative of the artist. His artworks and the people who had interacted with him were equally crucial. The project is very much still in progress and I look forward to being part of its next stage.

 Recording archival materials and looking for clues

My desk mates and partners-in-crime

Besides the detective and his assistant, there are other important roles too, whether it is in the story or the museum. Devi, the management assistant officer in-charge of the museum’s collection was the person who we visited really often. Devi is like the bearer of keys and the care-taker of the ‘treasures’ in the museum. The second project which I am assisting Fang-Tze on is the refreshment of artworks in the Lee Kong Chian gallery. An artwork could only be displayed for about two years before the museum had to let it ‘rest’. Fang-Tze had brought me along to view the other artworks which might be suitable for the artwork refreshment. That was when we had to visit Devi. Devi would look for the artworks which had been selected in the storage room, place them on the acid-free paper and carefully unravel the scrolls. She would also inform us if the artwork needs to be re-mounted or treated by conservators. My internship at the NUS Museum is a well-rounded one as
we did not only participate in the museology process but to take a step back (out of the museum) and to ponder on WHAT is a museum.

Earlier in this post, I have briefly shared on the two important pillars of the museum (curatorial and collection) and here is the third: education. After interning at several places, I would say that the NUS Museum internship really focuses on educating its intern and I am very grateful for that. Michelle, who was responsible for the interns, had a series of workshops and field trips planned out. The field trips revolved around the new International Council of Museums (ICOM) definition of a museum which was proposed in Kyoto, Japan (2019). Michelle felt that there were not enough voices from students during the Kyoto conference and wanted us to participate in the conversation on how to define a museum. 

The current definition is perhaps what everyone would think a conventional museum does, “it acquires, conserves, researches, communicates and exhibits the tangible and intangible heritage of humanity and its environment for the purposes of education, study and enjoyment.” I could understand why during the workshop, the current definition won majority of the votes in comparison to the proposed definition. The current definition is not as limiting as the proposed one and the value of ‘education’ is included. I do think that education is significant in a museum as it is one of the places where we could learn visually and have fun at the same time. I would get really excited every time I have a class conducted at the museum: viewing the artworks in person is much more effective than seeing it on the projector screen. The proposed definition is a tall order, yet, I still gave it my vote. The vote is for the effort of attempting to attach social responsibilities to the museum. With the emergence of social media, it would not be possible to ignore concerning issues such as climate change. The museum cannot simply fulfil its standard duties anymore. However, as I have mentioned, the proposed definition is definitely limiting. “Museums are democratising, inclusive and polyphonic spaces for critical dialogue about the past and the future…They are participatory and transparent, and work in active partnership with and for diverse communities to collect, preserve, research, interpret, exhibit and enhance, understandings of the world, aiming to contribute to human dignity and social justice, global equality and planetary wellbeing.” With eight commas in just one of its sentences, it shows how much a museum had to fulfil in-order to be considered a museum in ICOM’s perspective. The definition which encourages inclusivity had inadvertently also created a boundary on which institutions could count as a museum and which could not. Taking a step back to consider the matter, perhaps the problem with the definition is the term ‘definition’. What is the purpose of defining a museum? Who has the right to define a museum? The term should be substituted as ‘guidelines’ rather than being labelled as ‘definitions’. 

What are some words which should be included in the definitions (if the ICOM community still insists on calling it a ‘definition’)? Education had the highest votes during the discussion and I do believe that it is important to place education into the definitions. ‘Inspire’ might be a suitable candidate: to fill someone with the confidence and desire to do something. Whether it is to inspire a child to become an artist; to inspire the visitors to take action (environmental issues, for example) or to motivate people to have faith in the future. I do look forward to the progress of this discussion in the next ICOM conference.

Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to thank Fang-Tze, Devi, Michelle, my fellow interns (who brought a lot of laughter into this internship) and everyone at the museum for this rewarding experience.

Thank you for the memories!