果冻影院

A 果冻影院 Special Collections team is partnering with festival organisers and young people in an East London borough to tell stories of local history and encourage them to consider a career in heritage.

Engaging young people in museums and local heritage can be a challenge, particularly when 18- to 24-year-olds have other priorities such as studying and finding work.

To explore how they could work together to address the issue, the organisers of the London Borough of Newham鈥檚 Heritage Month 鈥� an annual festival held near the 果冻影院 campus 鈥� contacted Vicky Price, the Head of Outreach at 果冻影院鈥檚 Special Collections, with which they had worked to create previous festival content.

In 2020 the partnership produced a training video for the festival鈥檚 contributors, to help them to create engaging content for young people entitled 鈥榃hat is Heritage?鈥�

鈥淲e have become starkly aware that the cultural heritage sector is a tricky field for young people who do not have many qualifications or opportunities to gain voluntary experience,鈥� explains Vicky.

The 果冻影院 and Newham teams went on to develop a three-month training programme for local young people interested in working in the cultural heritage sector. The New Curators Project provides relevant training and offers real-life opportunities to deliver work to public audiences.

鈥淲e designed the project to act as a metaphorical 鈥榝oot in the door鈥� for young people who hadn鈥檛 been to university or had the financial support required to complete considerable amounts of voluntary work,鈥� explains Vicky.

With just seven months to deliver the first series of events for the 2021 Newham History Month, the team reached out to more than 40 community organisations and to Newham Council鈥檚 youth team to recruit participants. Eleven 鈥楴ew Curators鈥� were recruited and seven professionals from the heritage sector were brought in to develop workshops aiming to impart advice and wisdom on working in the heritage sector.

The online sessions covered topics such as how to use archives, what public history means, how to create an exhibition, how to speak to the public about your research and how to communicate your ideas digitally.

鈥�鈥淲e designed the project to act as a metaphorical 鈥榝oot in the door鈥� for young people who hadn鈥檛 been to university or had the financial support required to complete considerable amounts of voluntary work.鈥�

The trainee curators developed and staged a pop-up exhibition called 鈥楩ast Food-ward鈥� that explored the history of food and its production in East London. The exhibit toured nine of Newham鈥檚 public libraries and the curators delivered an online talk and produced social media content.

鈥淭he exhibition produced by the first New Curators鈥� cohort was a great opportunity for them to learn about Newham鈥檚 trade and manufacturing history,鈥� says Vicky. 鈥淭heir work was inspiring, and we hope to create an annual programme of training and coaching that will assist many more young people to find work in museums, libraries, arts organisations and galleries."

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