A Week of Field Trips- The Bowes Museum

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Automata, coursework, Durham, exhibit design, exhibit lighting, field trips, Northumbria University, Preventative Conservation, Silver Swan Automaton, The Bowes Museum

The next stop for us on our mini bus adventures during the week of field trips was down to The Bowes Museum in Newgate, Durham, England. After an hour and fifteen minute drive south and to the west, we arrived to the large museum and garden. The French Neapolitan style building was purpose built to be a public museum by John Bowes (the illegitimate son of the 10th Earl of Strathmore) and his wife Josephine Chevalier. During their lifetime the couple collected an immense amount of china, silver, jewels, furniture, and pictures ranging from El Greco and Van Dyck to Turner and Toulouse- Lautrec. Unfortunately the museum opened to the public after both died.

The Bowes Museum from the Gardens

The museum features a top quality cafe and encourages frequent and regular visits from those who live around it. There are lots of displays for children to play with and learn from, even including an exhibit on illustrations in a popular childrens book while we were there. The museum has a conservation department and there are displays relating to conservation located through out the museum. Photography of the exhibits is encouraged, as is engaging with social media. Once again we were all on the hunt for environmental management tools in the galleries, as well as noting and enjoying their unique and innovative exhibit design and lighting design. Unfortunately we were there during working on their heating system, so the galleries were a bit cold, but we enjoyed our day there thoroughly!

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The museum is will known for its silver swan automaton (a self-operating machine). Wonderfully the museum runs the swan once a day, every day at 2pm. Many other museums with automata do not work or they do not run them, rather electing to show a video of what it would do if it were run. The French swan ducks its head down into the glass rod river and plucks up a silver fish which it promptly eats. A wonderful display and incredible machinery considering it was made in the late 1700s!

Next up is the Beamish Outdoor Museum!

Wow, It’s Been a Whirlwind!

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Freshers, Friends, Induction Week, IT, Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumbria University, Pub Quiz, StudentCastle Newcastle

I’m writing this post sitting in my new home for the next year. It’s hard to believe I have been in Newcastle upon Tyne for almost 2 weeks now. To catch up I am planning a couple of back posts about moving and my vacation in Scotland. But, for now I’ll offer what I have been up to for the past week!

It has been induction week at Northumbria University. Induction Week simultaneously happens at the same time as Freshers Week. Freshers week is a series of parties, pub crawls, dances, and fairs to welcome to first years to the uni (university). Insanity all week basically. Still trying to get over the fact that there are 3 pubs and a club in the student union….So different than American University! Induction week is also geared towards first year students (both undergraduate and graduate, though more the former). The typical lectures given at orientation in the US are offered during this week within each department, as well as some basic syllabus talks. Students also meet with their program once during the week. It’s a combination of orientation and a syllabus week in the US. I will admit the English seem less inclined to give specifics and helpful tips during this time like you would receive at orientation, so most of us international students still feel pretty lost. But we are making do! Fortunately there are so many people who are excited to have international students (particularly Americans), so many people have been very helpful and friendly. This is making the process a bit less painful since much of the IT has not been working for me!

My building has been offering events every night this week, so it has been a great way to meet people and get out of my studio. They have taken us out for Sunday Roast, clubs, and pubs, as well as pizza and quiz nights in. I’ve made friends with a few of the older students in my building (most are 1st or 2nd years.. they’re 17 and pretty young- living on their own for the first time. I can’t blame them; It’ll be fun to watch them grow this year.) So far my friends from my building and my course are ranging from across the world: Germany, Indonesia, Australia, Canada, Puerto Rico, Norway, Nigeria, Singapore, Greece, Spain, Portugal, Poland, Wales, and England. It’s been a bit harder to meet English students as the international programs keep us away from them and my program has very few UK students. I’m hoping to befriend more locals in the next few months, but so far so good. Last night I joined my friend Tom, a British Army cadet studying Mechanical Engineering at Northumbria, and his English friends for a pub quiz at our local pub. I was one of few women in there and the only American- pretty wild, but it finally felt like I was getting outside of the ‘international student bubble.’ Here’s to more of those nights!

Time for some fun out on the town tonight and the beach on Sunday since it is supposed to be 75F and sunny! **knock on wood**

My School- Northumbria University

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Art Conservation, Burt Hall, City Campus East, City Campus West, cleaning system, conservation ethics, conservation science, coursework, Diploma, dissertation, documentation, field trips, inpainting, Northumbria University, Painting Conservation, Painting Conservator, Paper Conservation, Photography, Preventative Conservation, Summer Internship, tear repair, X-Radiography, x-rays

Northumbria University

Burt Hall, Art Conservation Department Building

Northumbria features two campuses in the city centre- City Campus East and City Campus West. Most of the larger buildings have a very modern feel and were built in the 2000s. There is a historic part of campus and that is where my classes take place. My classes take place in Burt Hall on City Campus West.  The school itself is well equipped with a large sports centre, a student run student union (with 3 pubs and a night club!), as well as 2 libraries and much more. I am told the facilities for the conservation students are quite nice and fulfill all our needs from pyrolysis gas chromatography mass-spectrometry to x-ray and much more. I’m looking forward to exploring all of this!

The program offers three different masters degrees. There is a year long masters of arts in preventative conservation, as well as two 18 month programs in both paper conservation and paintings conservation. Each path takes somewhere from as few as four to as many as 14 students every year. They do not take a fixed class of 10 students like the US schools.  The number fluctuates depending on who applies and who accepts the offer of admission. For paintings and paper our first semester is spent taking a conservation science course, as well as a course on preventative conservation and conservation ethics. This work is augmented weekly field trips related to our studies.

The second semester is spent four days a week working in the studio of our desired specialization. Mine is paintings! Here we spend time learning how to document the paintings condition before, during, and after treatment through reports, photographs, xrays, and more. We also begin to learn the various hand skills needed to complete treatment such as cleaning systems, tear repair, inpainting, and much more.

The summer is spent working at internship sites around the world for approximately 4 months. I’ll most likely be coming back to the US with a possible short stint somewhere in the UK. The third semester, the fall, finds us back in residence in the studio learning more and fine tuning our hand skills. The fourth semester, 3 months in the spring from January to March, is spent writing our 15,000 word dissertation. This can be nearly anything! A literature review, a comprehensive treatment, a treatment with art historical or conservation science implications, or really whatever excites us! I’m hoping to explore auxiliary support structures such as lining canvases and auxiliary support boards. Not sure where I’m going with this yet… but I’ll figure it out! Finally in July of 2015 I will receive my diploma, a Master of Arts in Fine Art Conservation- Easel Paintings, and my new title will be conservator of paintings. Hurray!

After all this information, I’ll leave you with a lovely image of the Northumbrian countryside outside of Newcastle….

(Many thanks to Wikipedia for my information and pictures!)

Where am I moving?……..Newcastle upon Tyne, England!

Tags

Art Conservation, City Centre, History, Newcastle, Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumbria University

I’ll admit I applied to the Northumbria University program without much prior knowledge. The U.S. programs (UCLA/Getty, NYU, Buffalo State, and Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation (WUDPAC) are all pretty well known and understood within the conservation community in the US. Overseas programs are more well known on an individual basis. Some conservators know about the programs based on their attendance, their interns attendance, or a friends attendance. My only tie to knowledge about Northumbria University is through a friend, Brittney, who is currently attending the school for paper conservation.

Once I found out I was accepted to Northumbria, I set out to find out information about the school and the city I am moving to in September. I’ll share with you all a little of what I have learned so far….

 

Newcastle upon Tyne, England, United Kingdom

Millenium Bridge Over the River Tyne

With a population of around 300,00 people, it is much smaller than I am used to in DC (700,000 people without the tourists). The city is one of the driest in the UK and features moderate temperatures year round (33-66 Degrees Fahrenheit). I’ll certainly be living in boots and sweaters! Primarily a coal and shipyard city until the mid 20th century, Newcastle (said as one word,not  separated into New Castle) locals, Geordies, are employed primarily within the public sector. This includes the two universities located in the city- Newcastle University and Northumbria University. The city is also home to Newcastle United FC, a football/soccer team, as well as the womens team Newcastle United W.F.C. Additionally there is a basketball team called the Newcastle Eagles. Their biggest claim to fame is hosting the worlds largest half marathon, The Great North Run, where individuals run along Hadrian’s Wall at points.

The town features a large ethnic food scene- including a Chinatown! Perhaps all of this awesome food will remind me of living in D.C. and it and my friends won’t seem all that far away. The city features many theatres, art galleries, pubs, clubs, and much more. It is rated number 7 for top nightlife in the world. Not sure I’ll have much time for this… but if anyone comes to visit perhaps we’ll venture out to experience this! Newcastle Beer and Sting are from here!

The city centre still features a predominately medieval street layout (meaning the roads randomly stop and start and don’t fit cars all too well) with mostly neoclassical architecture like you see below. My school is located in the city centre next to city hall. I’m excited to be surrounded by all of these historic buildings every day! I’ll also be able to take the underground metro and buses throughout the city. Trains and planes are at my disposal to explore beyond Newcastle. After all Edinburgh, Scotland is only 1.5 hours away and London is a little less than 3 hours!

Neoclassical Architecture in City Centre

(Many thanks to Wikipedia for my information and pictures!)