11 January

• Cambridge Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology takes bite of doctor's arm with £25,000 Kauage painting
  A flamboyant portrayal of an artist's resistance to an injection at primary school is heading to Cambridge Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology in a £25,000 deal. Biting the Doctor's Arm (above) is a boldly-coloured 1990 scene by acclaimed Papua New Guinean painter Mathias Kauage. It depicts an encounter between Australian medical staff and a group of Melanesian children and is a metaphorical reflection of the artist’s concerns over national independence and post-colonial sovereignty and freedom. Nicholas Thomas, a Professor at the Museum, called the piece "an outstanding work".
  More information: http://www.culture24.org.uk/art/painting+%26+drawing/art74590

6 January

• ‘Clarendon Rediscovered’ launched - Heritage Tasmania (Australia)
  A brand new project funded by the Tasmanian and Australian Governments will assist in restoring Clarendon House in Evandale to its 1850s glory. The Minister for Environment, Parks and Heritage, Michelle O’Byrne, launched the project ‘Clarendon Rediscovered’ this month. “Clarendon Rediscovered acts on the National Trust’s vision for this magnificent colonial homestead,” Ms O’Byrne said. “It involves the expert input of Dr James Broadbent into the appropriate replacement of soft furnishings and other materials, advice from the Royal Tasmanian Botanical Gardens on how to manage the trees and grounds, interpretation work for the significant outbuildings, and much-needed maintenance.”
  More information: http://www.heritage.tas.gov.au/media/pdf/December%202009.pdf

• Earliest Tyrannosauroid Rediscovered in Museum Collection
  Tyrannosaurus rex and related large carnivorous dinosaurs together form the family Tyrannosauridae. A long forgotten fossil skull in the collections of the Natural History Museum in London has now provided crucial clues to the early stages of the lengthy evolutionary history of these fearsome predators. Almost a century after its discovery, the specimen, named Proceratosaurus, has now been recognized as the oldest known relative of the Tyrannosauridae.
  More information: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091104122538.htm

4 January

• Underwater museum for Egypt / Jacques Rougerie
  Architect Jacques Rougerie -an expert when it comes to space and underwater structures- has designed the soon-to-be first underwater museum. It will be located off the coast of Egypt, near the new Library of Alexandria, where Cleopatra once had a palace on an island in one of the largest human-made bays in the world back in the day, submerged by earthquakes in the 4th century. The ruins were discovered years ago, and include several sphinxes, statues, roman and greek shipwrecks and pieces believed to be from the Pharos of Alexandria lighthouse (one of the seven ancient wonders of the world).
  More information: http://www.archdaily.com/7427/underwater-museum-for-egypt-jacques-rougerie/

• Egypt's first revolution museum to come up on Zamalek Island
  Egyptian Culture Minister Farouk Hosni approved the Supreme Council of Antiquities’ (SCA) request to build a museum to commemorate the Egyptian revolution of July 1953. This will be the first ever museum dedicated to the revolution. It will be put up in a building used by Egypt’s revolutionary leaders in El-Gezirah on Zamalek Island in Cairo. The decision came after the SCA’s Permanent Committee listed the site of the revolution’s leadership on Egypt’s Islamic and Coptic heritage list. This structure is the former site of several meetings of the era's leaders who made most of the critical decisions there. Built in 1949 by the late King Farouk on the banks of the Nile River, this historic edifice consists of three floors with 40 rooms. King Farouk built it and used it as dock for his royal yacht. Dr. Zahi Hawass, secretary-general of the SCA, met today with architect Ahmed Mito to discuss plans of turning the building into a museum. Hawass calls on all historians, artists, intellectuals and anyone interested to get involved and to share in developing the museum. Ideas, art concepts and artistic ability will help benefit bring the building up to better shape while turning it into a museum...
  More information: http://www.thearchaeologicalbox.com/en/news/
  Egypt%27s+first+revolution+museum+to+come+up+on+Zamalek+Island

• (in Italian) Finalmente MAXXI. Le tappe principali: dal progetto architettonico al cantiere d’autore
  Il MAXXI, acronimo di Museo delle Arti del XXI secolo, dopo circa tredici anni dalla sua ideazione, aprirà le porte al pubblico nella primavera del 2010. Il progetto nasce dalla volontà di avere a Roma, un museo come campus delle arti, un laboratorio di sperimentazione e ricerca. L’idea si concretizza nel 1998, quando l’allora Ministro dei Beni Culturali, Walter Veltroni, chiede alla Sopraintendenza Speciale alla Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna, di bandire un concorso internazionale di idee, per la realizzazione a Roma, di un polo espositivo per l’arte e l’architettura contemporanea. Si tratta di una Fondazione, con committenza e proprietà pubblica. All’interno del MAXXI risiedono due istituzioni museali: il MAXXI Arte e il MAXXI Architettura. Il primo si propone di diffondere la conoscenza della produzione artistica, del XXI sec., attraverso mostre, conferenze, manifestazioni, documentari, visite guidate etc. Il Maxxi Architettura, è il primo museo nazionale di Architettura, in Italia. L’approccio al contemporaneo, viene accompagnato di pari passo dall’attenzione a tutta l’architettura del XX sec, storicizzandola. Al concorso, per la progettazione del nuovo Museo, parteciperanno oltre 250 architetti internazionali, il progetto vincitore è quello dell’architetto Zaha Hadid...
  More information: http://www.tafter.it/2010/01/04/finalmente-maxxi-le-tappe-principali-dal-progetto-architettonico-al-cantiere-dautore/

• (in Italian) Master on-line di primo livello in Didattica generale e museale all’università di Roma Tre
  Presso la Facoltà di Scienze della Formazione dell’Università degli Studi Roma Tre è attivato per l’A.A. 2009/2010 il Master di primo livello in Didattica generale e museale.
  Il Coordinamento del Master ha sede presso il Centro di Didattica Museale, Facoltà di Scienze della Formazione dell’Università degli Studi Roma Tre.
  Il Master ha come obiettivo quello di consentire agli insegnanti della scuola primaria e secondaria di approfondire gli aspetti teorici dell’organizzazione didattica, riferita in particolare alla fruizione museale, ed acquisire le competenze necessarie per una pratica impegnativa dell’attività di formazione. Il Master riflette le posizioni più attuali raggiunte dalla ricerca nel campo della didattica generale e museale, sia per quanto si riferisce agli sfondi problematici, sia per ciò che riguarda le due principali categorie di musei, quelli storico-artistici e quelli scientifico-naturalistici...
  More information: http://www.tafter.it/2009/12/10/31-01-10-master-on-line-di-primo-livello-in-didattica-generale-e-museale-alluniversita-di-roma-tre/

16 December

• Touezekt Museum-Mauritania
  Touezekt Museum was inaugurated in 2005 and is run by the association “Maison d’Arts”. It is located 13 km away from Atar. Its collections are varied and include elements from the Neolithic times to the Colonial period with wooden and ceramic materials, coins, manuscripts written in Arabic and military badges. This private Museum is not exempt from polemic because its archeological materials come from Atar surrounding sites and were recovered during the last years by Khalil Sid Dah, the promoter of this initiative, without a related archeological research.
  More information: http://universidadypatrimonio.net/doc/touezekt_musee.pdf

• Infoletter LAMIC (Laboratory of Museology and Culture Engineering) University Laval, Quebec. Canada-December 2009
  The Laboratory of Museology and Culture Engineering (LAMIC) is a research infrastructure specialized in experimental museology that focuses its scientific activities on the ways of culture transmission in a museum context. It is a technological platform which explores relationships between artefacts, visitors and space where protagonists gather for an unprecedented meeting by means of a trajectory called an exhibition. This particular dimension is what interests us and the one we explore in multiple ways, under and from different angles. The museum experience ethnography summarizes, to a certain extent, the way we approach a phenomenon that has not yet been totally figured out.
  More information in French: http://www.lamic.ulaval.ca/

15 December

• Course on Basic Skills to Care for Works of Art in Private Collections
  This is a course aimed at teaching how to care for works or art. It is neither a restoration course nor a course for museum conservationists. On the contrary, it is a course that will explain where the non-expert involvement should end and where we enter the domain of the expert in terms of care, conservation and restoration of a work of art or an old item. Basic daily cleaning aspects will be dealt with, alongside the transferral of works of art, the prevention of light damage, temperature, pollution as well as the orientation for temporary restoration decisions. It is important to teach to not change a frame, to not recover with hangings, to not trim a postcard, simply because of your own taste or other criteria.
  More information in Spanish: http://www.feam.es/Cursos/Default.asp?Sesion=0

11 December

• Protecting your possessions against bushfire – AICCM media release
  The Australian Institute for the Conservation of Cultural Material has released an information sheet STORING COLLECTIONS IN HIGH BUSHFIRE RISK AREAS, aimed at assisting individuals and those working with cultural collections to reduce the risks of fire when storing their precious possessions. It is being distributed to arts and cultural heritage organizations, local councils, emergency service providers and the media.
  More information: http://www.aiccm.org.au/

Cultural Heritage Protection Booklets online in many linguistic versions
The Section of Museums also would like to draw your attention to the four volumes of the Cultural Heritage Protection Handbooks Series. This series of comic strip booklets is of immense interest for museum professionals. Witty illustrations, accompanied by short texts, are intended to show museum staff and the daily users of museums the correct behaviour and appropriate measures to be taken for the conservation of movable cultural heritage. In particular I would like to point out that the publications are available for download on the UNESCO homepage at the links indicated below. In 2009, four new versions joined the series thanks to the cooperation of colleagues in Cuba, Indonesia, Uzbekistan and Cambodia.
http://portal.unesco.org/culture/en/ev.php-URL_ID=35516&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html

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