Lizzie Neville runs a small
private conservation studio right in the heart of Penzance. The majority of her
clients are based in London as that is where she was working up until two years
ago when she moved to Cornwall.
Her client list includes archives, libraries and galleries such as the
British Library, National Gallery, Religious Society of Friends, Royal College
of Physicians, and the Society of Antiquaries.
From left: Monika, Lizzie
and Clare by the Mount’s Bay in Penzance.
Monika Stokowiec was the first
intern and began work in January 2011.
She was joined by the second intern, Clare Goulbourn, in October of the
same year. As the internships are
each eighteen months long it means Monika and Clare will be working together
for nine months – and then Clare will work with the third intern for the next nine
months. This means the internships overlap with each other. As we both trained
at different places and have different backgrounds it is invaluable to have
each other. It allows us to share exchange and discuss ideas, and ask questions
while working on conservation projects in the studio on a daily basis. This
also means some queries can be resolved without always having to go to Lizzie.
An important part of our internships is that
one fifth of our time is to be spent on outreach work with the community and
local heritage organisations in Cornwall to help spread awareness about
conservation and preservation of books and archival materials. Over the past year we have organised
and participated in several events, such as the “PRINT” exhibition at the
Exchange Gallery where we talked about and demonstrated simple bookbinding
techniques to the visitors; we gave a talk at the Penzance Literary Festival
about caring for books in the seaside climate; at the Cornwall Record Office
open day in Truro we talked to the public about book conservation and
preservation.
Learning to sew pamphlets at the "PRINT" Exhibition
In November 2011 Monika did the
first of a series of training days for volunteers and employees from local
museums, archives and other heritage organisations from around Cornwall. The training day covered topics such as
book structure, displaying and handling books, storing and wrapping books, and
measuring books for boxing. The
course was run twice, and in total twenty six people attended. The next training day, covering topics such
as identifying types of damage, dry cleaning of books and documents is
scheduled for March. Other training days are in the pipeline, covering making
wrappers and folders and undertaking a condition survey.
Learning how to place books on support cradles
Clare is currently working with
the Every Child Matters representative, Nicole Broadhurst, in St Ives to organise a session with a
local group of school children.
The group meets at the “Memory Café”, which is an opportunity for
elderly people coping with memory loss to socialise with the children and
exercise their minds. The session
is in the early stages of planning, but will most likely involve the children
and adults making memory scrap books together.
Working in a small studio can feel quite isolated at times, so it has been particularly rewarding to have these opportunities to interact with the wider public and share our enthusiasm with them, and this has been met with a lot of positivity and interest in the subject.
Preparing a training session and
teaching is new to both of us, so having the support and opportunity to discuss
and share ideas with another intern is invaluable. For example when Monika was preparing for her first
training, the preparations were almost finished when Clare joined the
studio. But there was still time
for her to discuss and practice her plan with Clare, and for Clare to help her
to prepare the sample packs. The
plan is that the last training session will be run by Clare, so in order to
acclimatise Clare to this scary prospect, Monika plans to delegate some of the
teaching of the second session to her.
The training days have resulted
in making good connections with various institutions in Cornwall, and
invitations for visits have been extended to us. We have already contacted a few places, such as Antony’s
House, Lanhydrock and The Museum of Witchcraft.
Even though we are both very
self-motivated, doing the internship alongside another intern makes staying in
the studio after work on winter nights much more appealing. At the moment we are spending Tuesday
evenings practicing bookbinding skills, and we have started work on a timeline poster of bookbinding history which we have both
been meaning to do for ages.
For further information about what conservation internships involve, check out the Icon interns' poster gallery at http://www.icon.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=848&Itemid=106
