|
The Heritage Canada Foundation’s Election 2006 Information
Package is now on-line at www.heritagecanada.org.
This information will help members of the conservation community
make informed choices in the upcoming election. The site
includes party leaders’ responses to questions on
key conservation issues, and suggestions on how you can
engage local candidates in responding to these issues.
The Heritage Canada Foundation – giving Canadians
a voice in protecting the built historic environment. Visit
www.heritagecanada.org today.
For more information:
Carolyn Quinn
Director of Communications / Directrice, Communications
Heritage Canada Foundation / La fondation Héritage
Canada
613-237-1066
cquinn@heritagecanada.org
Since the spring, our membership coordinator, Rebecca Bunch,
has been working with an AMSoft database recently purchased
by the Canadian Museums Association, a database considerably
more complex than the CAC needs. In response to this, the
CAC Board approved the purchase of a new, simpler membership
database. This database, MemberTies Professional, will better
meet the needs of our organization and will give us full
control of our membership management. It also permits more
flexible office arrangements, which will ensure more timely
service to CAC members and may even reduce expenditures.
As a result, the Board has decided to end the office agreement
with the CMA that has been part of CAC operations since
1997. In January 2005, the CAC will have a new office and
a new address. With these changes, we should be able to
provide better, more efficient membership services into
the coming years.
As of January 2005, contact the CAC at:
CAC
P.O Box 87028
332 Bank Street
Ottawa, ON K2P 1X0
E-Mail: coordinator@cac-accr.com
Telephone: 613-231-3977
Fax: 613-231-4406
Web Site:
www.cac-accr.ca
After months of hard work, the redesigned CAC website is
now open for viewing. Final touches are still in progress
so your patience and ideas are appreciated. Thanks to Fiona
Graham, Sue Bigelow, Shelagh Linklater, Cliff Cook and VanderPas
Design for this excellent contribution to CAC service and
outreach.
After seven years of valuable service, Sue Bigelow is stepping
down as the CAC webmaster. We want to thank Sue for the
unfailing effort she has made since the website was set
up in 1998. Shelagh Linklater of the Archives of Manitoba
has graciously offered to take on this most important job
for our organization. She will be assisted by Cliff Cook
on technical matters. For any web-related issue, please
contact Shelagh at slinklater@gov.mb.ca.
The Conservation department of the Art Gallery of Ontario
is offering the following item to not-for-profit organizations:
a Conservation hot table, measurements 2'11" x 11'6" x 7'11".
If interested, please contact Lorraine Underell-Mason at
416-979-6660 ext. 203 before December 3, 2004.
From May 16th to 21st, 2005, conservators met in beautiful
Jasper, Alberta in the Canadian Rockies for CAC's 31st annual
conference and workshops.
CAC ran three pre-conference workshops this year. The first
of these was a Board Development Workshop that existing
and potential board members were encouraged to attend. Twelve
people including CAPC board members took advantage of this
training opportunity. The free workshop was delivered by
instructors from Alberta Community Development's Board Development
Program. Their experience with different kinds of governing
bodies and organizational structures was evident in their
understanding of CAC's and CAPC's needs as national, non-profit,
volunteer-run professional associations. The participants
found this workshop to be very useful.
Following the governance workshop, the courageous organizing
committee offered two simultaneous workshops: Fur Trade
Legacy: The Preservation of Organic Materials and Art Handling
and Packing. Both workshops proved to be very popular.
The Fur Trade workshop attracted 48 participants, twice
as many as anticipated. The first day was devoted to presentations
on the subject of fur and feathers, from the history of
their use in fashion to state-of-the-art conservation treatments.
On the second day, two hands-on sessions allowed participants
to practice fur identification using microscopy and to experiment
with adhesives and dyes for leather conservation. The group
found the workshop to be a wonderful learning experience
enlivened by excellent presenters and instructors. Many
thanks to all the presenters who came from far and wide
(Anchorage, Edmonton, London, Whitehorse, Athens, New York
and Ottawa!) and most particularly to the workshop instructors,
Bob McClymont, Head of the Forensics Laboratory at Alberta's
Fish and Wildlife Division, and Theo Sturge of Sturge Leather
Conservation in the UK. We are very pleased that the proceedings
of this workshop have been published as preprints so that
others can benefit from the information shared during the
sessions. Publishing costs were covered by a generous grant
from the Hudson's Bay Company.
The Art Handling and Packing workshop also proved very
popular with the 28 participants. Merv Richard, Deputy Director
of Conservation at the National Gallery of Art in Washington,
DC gave a comprehensive overview of issues in the handling
and packing of museum collections. This was followed by
a hands-on packing exercise where participants exercised
their creativity and skills to safeguard priceless objects
(!) by constructing custom crates. Thanks to Merv for sharing
his extensive knowledge and experience on this subject.
The conference itself attracted 106 attendees from Canada,
the U.S., the UK, Greece and Hong Kong. In addition to the
usual selection of papers on interesting treatments, the
program committee organized Collections on the Move, as
series of papers examining various projects related to transporting
collections. The Education and Training Session featured
reports on the history and current state of Canadian conservation
training programs as well as a student's overview of her
internship experiences. Lisa Mibach delivered the Per Guldbeck
lecture, which will be published in an upcoming issue of
the CAC Bulletin. Lisa discussed the realities and the perceptions
of the conservation job market in Canada and proposed concrete
advocacy strategies to sustain the profession.
The essential business of the corporation was carried out
with little fuss at the AGM. The membership approved by-law
changes related to terms of office. Agenda items requiring
further discussion include spending decisions for a portion
of CAC's invested monies and ongoing questions regarding
the organization of annual conferences.
As with all CAC conferences, half the fun was in the extracurricular
activities organized by the local committee. This year they
outdid themselves. They offered morning yoga, lunchtime
hikes with local guides, trips to the Miette Hot Springs
and even a Conservation Outreach Movie Night at the local
cinema. CAC presented the film A Question of Attribution,
the story of Soviet spy Sir Anthony Blunt who held the post
of Surveyer of the Queen's Pictures.
The banquet, which took place at the beautiful Tekkara
Lodge on the banks of the Athabasca River, was superb. It
was also action-packed, thanks to frenzied bidding at the
silent auction. Dozens of CAC members and their institutions
contributed artwork, books, gift certificates and goodies
to this fundraising event. Dozens more bid somewhat strategically
and certainly enthusiastically to raise a total of $2790
for CAC. Exhilarated conservators then finished off the
evening with hotly contested foosball (table soccer) matches
and the punk music of Edmonton band Escalator at the Downstream
Bar in Jasper.
This was indeed a memorable conference and we owe a debt
of gratitude to the organizers. The mountains, the river
and the wildlife were a bonus, as was the scenic town of
Jasper itself. And next year we will meet again in an environment
equally as wild and wonderful, but in a very different way
- downtown Toronto!
CAC gratefully acknowledges financial assistance for the conference
and workshops by the Government of Canada Department of Canadian
Heritage, the Hudson’s Bay Company History Foundation,
Government of Alberta Department of Community Development,
Board Development Program and Alberta Historical Resources
Foundation.
CAC's 32nd Annual Conference and Workshop will take place
at St. Michael's College, University of Toronto from May
15th to May 19th, 2006. See you there!
|
GO
