Cambridge University Reporter


The Fitzwilliam Museum Syndicate's one hundred and fifty-seventh Annual Report to the Council

This Report, which covers the period between August 2005 and July 2006, reflects the changes which have been made to the Museum's organization. It consists of reports prepared by each of the three divisions on their activities throughout the year. To these we have added this brief introduction and concluding remarks. For a further narrative, we refer readers to the Museum's Review 2004-2006 which was published in 2007.

In last year's Report we drew attention to the success of The Cambridge Illuminations, that exhibition which brought together 215 of the most important western European medieval and Renaissance illuminated manuscripts from the collections of the University and the Colleges. This remarkable collaboration between related but separate institutions highlights one of the great strengths of our collegiate University: our ability to combine resources, physically and intellectually. The exhibition was seen by more than 80,000 visitors before it closed at the end of December and was in part responsible for the highly successful pre-Christmas season for our trading company, Fitzwilliam Museum Enterprises. As their figures for the year show, exhibitions play an important part in stimulating visitor numbers and increasing receipts in the shop and the café.

In terms of publicity and media coverage, the year was something of a roller-coaster. The collision between a visitor and three 17th-century Chinese Qing vases on 31 January 2006 was captured as an image by another visitor using a mobile telephone. Within days that unauthorized photograph had travelled around the world and for the Museum the exercise became one of damage limitation. Fortunately, however, not all reactions were negative, and we record our gratitude to all of those who expressed sympathy as well as support, including Hewitsons of Cambridge who offered to pay for the conservation of the broken vases. Happily the skill and speed with which they were restored by Penny Bendall turned a favourable spotlight onto the Museum, especially after one of the larger vessels was featured in our summer exhibition, Mission Impossible?.

A further, carefully planned, highlight of the year was the re-opening of the Egyptian galleries in May 2006. We were joined by Mr Gehad Madi, Ambassador of the Egyptian Republic to the Court of St James to celebrate this most recent renovation of our Antiquities galleries. We record especially our gratitude to the Heritage Lottery Fund for a grant which enabled us to carry out extensive conservation on the collection and to develop new educational programmes as well as contributing to the construction costs.

In June 2006 we said farewell to Frances Sword, our inspirational Head of Education whose contributions to the field were recognized nationally in 1996 when her efforts earned the Museum of the Year award for innovative educational programmes. Ten years later we were delighted when her retirement was marked by another award, the Order of the British Empire in HM The Queen's Birthday Honours.

Finally, we were saddened by the death in January of Philip Grierson (1910-2006), the distinguished medieval historian and numismatist who as Honorary Keeper of Coins since 1949 was one of the Museum's most consistently generous benefactors. We joined with Gonville and Caius College, where he lived as a Fellow for most of his adult life, to pay our respects and to celebrate the achievements of one of Cambridge's truly great scholars.

Central Services

The Central Services Division supports the Museum's strategic aims through financial and personnel administration, buildings and security maintenance, marketing and press, and photography and IT services to colleagues across the museum and services to the public including access, outreach, and education. Much of its work is now supported by external funds which have allowed the Fitzwilliam to strengthen and expand its services to its many audiences within the museum and in the wider world through the website.

For the Central and Public Services Division of the Museum this was a busy year of expansion in every direction, building on the opportunities opened up in the previous year by the Courtyard Development and the extension of the Museum's public programmes and services. In 2005-06 we received 300,000 visitors of whom nearly 10,000 were children in school groups. In addition to public opening on six days a week and Bank Holiday Mondays, the Museum welcomed 4,000 guests at 41 evening and out-of-hours events which included musical concerts, client receptions, exhibition private views, student recruitment presentations, the annual University Alumni reception for 500+ guests in September, and the launch of the strategic plan of Living East, the Department of Culture, Media and Sport's (DCMS) Cultural Consortium for the East of England. In addition over 1,000 individuals attended Sunday lunchtime promenade concerts performed in the main by instrumental award holders arranged by our volunteer co-ordinator, Penny Robson. Evening concerts in the Cambridge Summer Music Recitals programme to complement the Cambridge Illuminations exhibition were well attended as were Gerald Gifford's special series of harpsichord concerts during the daytime. 2005-06 was also a notable year for the Museum Shop where Fitzwilliam Museum Enterprises, largely due to the merchandise it designed and sold in support of the Cambridge Illuminations exhibition had its most successful trading year to date, and for Tate Catering who sustained high quality services in the café and for evening functions.

Communication

Publicizing the Museum's activities and raising its profile in 2005-06 presented challenges and opportunities to the marketing and press office. For The Cambridge Illuminations a marketing and media plan was devised and delivered on behalf of both The Museum and the University Library. Five months of intense press activity surrounding this exhibition included the making of the BBC4 documentary 'The Cambridge Illuminations', and a range of filming and interviews - for broadcast and print media - was at the highest level ever experienced by the Museum.

Two half-yearly events and exhibitions leaflets and two editions of Fitzwilliam Museum News were produced and distributed, and extensive media coverage achieved for each major exhibition - with television news footage of the Cambridge Illuminations, and participation in national film initiatives such as the 'People's Museum' on BBC2 for Museums and Galleries Month (MGM). A special programme of events for MGM 2006 to mark the opening of the Egyptian galleries was extensively marketed, with visitor attendance doubling compared to the same period during MGM in 2005.

Increasing partnership work led to the production of an improved, shared marketing leaflet covering the museums of the University of Cambridge, with whom a Museums Marketing Group has been established to share expertise and good practice; the Fitzwilliam's Marketing Department has taken a lead role in this process. The Marketing and Press Officer has also been an active member of the East of England Museums Hub Communications Group and is increasingly engaged in promoting the Museum's involvement in the activities of the Hub. She also leads the regional attraction consortium Great Days Out Around Cambridge in marketing-related matters.

Within the Museum ICT was harnessed to improve communication via an extensive intranet - a closed website for staff use only - where information important to all, particularly during the University's pay and grading assimilation exercise, was posted daily.

Access

The emphasis of all our services was on access - access for education and for enjoyment, to all our services, to as many parts of the collections as possible, and especially for new visitors and visitors with particular requirements. The Guides service was run in conjunction with the City Tourist Information Service and regular Saturday tours were added to those for groups. Information Volunteers recruited among the Friends provided a welcome service and some also engaged members of the public in 'Meet the Antiquities' hands-on sessions in the galleries while others undertook training to assist visitors with visual impairment. Training for Front of House staff which also embraced staff from other University museums, focused on visitor care and recent Disability legislation.

Education

The year saw the growth of the staff and activity of the Education Department serving adults and children with new and inspiring programmes and courses, and also the discreet work with groups with special health and learning needs, both within and beyond the Museum. The Department organized 74 public talks and lectures mainly given by museum staff and attended by nearly 3,000 individuals; 33 sessions for teachers; 32 family workshops and events attended by 1,500 children and administered access for groups including 128 Higher Education groups were taught in the Museum.

At Addenbrooke's NHS Trust, working with colleagues at Kettle's Yard, a programme of work was delivered on the wards to patients suffering from cancer. The careful growth of this partnership, and preparatory work with the Head of Palliative care and the nurses of the cancer ward, have all contributed to the development of the service and the solution to the many challenges the work presented. The programme now runs to a regular pattern and provides interest and joy to many patients.

Art and Wellbeing, a social inclusion programme, flourished during the year providing education programmes in the Museum for, among others, the Alzheimer's Society (18 three-hour sessions for 30 people) and Kneesworth House Hospital. Programmes for Fulbourn Hospital and Cambridge Mental Health Resource Centre also continued, provided by the education team, but were restricted by constraints on their time. Fortunately fund-raising has been successful and will facilitate the appointment in later 2006 of an Outreach and Access Officer for three years to develop the work and involve new communities in partnership working with the Museum.

A programme for people who are homeless, Missing Links, is now in its third year and has experienced increased numbers and demand. Its success depends on close collaboration by the Museum with English Churches Housing and staff from all the other providers of accommodation for homeless people in the City, to address practical issues arising from the need for secure management of visits.

Programmes for schools, the principal activity of the Education Department, offered a wide range of gallery teaching responding to or bridging the National Curriculum delivered directly by museum staff to 9,500 school pupils aged 4-18 years. A range of 33 Inset courses were run for teachers and training sessions for students of Initial Teacher Training. The wide range of teacher notes and pupils' activities available online was updated and expanded to include resources for use in the new Egyptian galleries. Links with secondary schools were extended and developed to include new sessions exploring issues of Image and Identity and GCSE themes, as well as working with Gifted and Talented students in the galleries and studio.

Renaissance - museums for changing lives

The engagement of the Fitzwilliam as a partner in the East of England Museum Hub with Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service, Luton Museums, and Colchester Museums, funded by the government through the DCMS Renaissance programme, made possible, among other activities, two major and innovative education projects. Wordscapes, the first programme developed at the Museum under the Renaissance Education Programme Development Plan (EPDP), set out to develop creative writing programmes, for pupils of specific ages, in six museums in the East of England Region. Frances Sword, Head of Education, sought to create inspiring learning opportunities for pupils, that were enjoyable, memorable, and transformational, offering the experience and excitement of active engagement with museum exhibits to build their confidence by creating their own verbal responses, and to heighten their powers of perception and expression in oral and written work. At the same time the project provided an opportunity to raise awareness in teachers of English and literacy of new methods of teaching from visual sources, stretching, challenging, and developing the museum educators who participated and thus raising standards of museum education in the Region. Its value having been proved without doubt, it is now incorporated into the work of all six museums and is contributing to Real Teaching, the Initial Teacher Training project running in East of England hub museums and partner teacher training colleges and the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge, which will be led by Frances Sword (2006-08).

Frances took early retirement in July 2006 and handed over leadership of the Department to Julia Tozer, late of Kettle's Yard. Frances, whose work had earned the Museum of the Year award in 1996 for its innovation, was awarded the OBE in 2006, in recognition for her achievements and contribution to museum education more generally.

Transformers, 'Let There Be Light', the second Hub project, was similarly developed by the Fitzwilliam Education team working with colleagues at the Faculty of Education, and engaging and training education staff from a number of Hub and non-Hub museums in the Region. It offers a cross-curricula session investigating religion and science for the upper two years of Key Stage 2 and schools were able to choose between focusing on Christian or on Islamic art. Having explored how artists make invisible ideas about God visible in the galleries, the children then investigated invisible aspects of visible phenomena through scientific experiments in the studio.

The Fitzwilliam Museum, on behalf of the museums of the University of Cambridge, has led the engagement in the Renaissance programme which is supporting access and enjoyment for visitors, both physical and virtual. In October 2005 the first University Museum Development Officer, Dr Liz Hide, was appointed. She is based in the Museum of Zoology from where she supports profile raising and funding activity and encourages public engagement in the 'embedded' museums and the Scott Polar Research Institute. Further benefits will unfold in 2007-08.

Digitization and the importance of ICT

At the Fitzwilliam, as well as extending education and outreach work, Renaissance supports access to collections via displays, exhibitions, and the website and investment in staff training and development. It has also enabled the Fitzwilliam to add 12,000 records and 3,600 new images to its electronic collections database in the year so that by July 2006 there were 130,075 records amounting to over one quarter of the Museum's total collections, the majority of which are made publicly available through the online public catalogue (OPAC). A further 3,000 digital images of antiquities objects were identified and renamed in preparation for adding to the database. The OPAC was re-developed, following extensive evaluation, and released to the public in August 2005 offering a variety of levels of searching and browsing, instead of a single view. Catalogue data is also available for harvesting via OAI-PMH along with a number of other museums' collections, for MLA's national resource 'The Peoples Network Discover Service'.

The Museum's website was re-launched on 1 July 2006, designed to meet national accessibility standards. Significant improvement has been made to navigation, new content has been added and existing information re-organized to make it much easier to find. In-house computing staff ensured that the site is technically robust and sustainable, with scope for each curatorial department to build up collections - related information - at present the Coins and Medals department's website is regarded as an international resource by numismatists. Access and usability testing of the new site was undertaken with blind and partially-sighted users in mid June. Monthly hits on the website have run at 3,000,000 and monthly visits in the region of 200,000. As well as providing invaluable information on the collections to researchers and students, this facility will shortly enable visitors to locate objects on display in the galleries on the Fitzwilliam's website which they can access at home or on the computer terminals in the Museum.

This is simply part of the work co-ordinated through Central Services which led to the Fitzwilliam being the first Museum to be awarded Accreditation, the new national standard required to be met by all museums registered with the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council and eligible for public funding.

eGuide, the Museum's multimedia guide delivering object information on handheld computers (PDAs or personal digital assistants), continued in use but progress in 2005-06 was stalled due to the lack of suitable handsets. The development of eGuide was supported by Renaissance during 2005-06 under the Specialisms disability access strand. Family content is planned for 2006-07. The Department of Architecture's Digital Studio, with the Fitzwilliam Museum and Computer Laboratory as partners, has made a successful application to AHRC for funding for a series of seminars to be held in early 2007 under the Research Networks and Workshops Scheme. Fund-raising for the development of eGuide continues.

Renaissance Hidden Histories project under the Designation Challenge Fund - People and Faces

In April 2006 the Museum began the first year of a two-year project to develop new content for delivery via the website and other means, expanding information about the collections by taking the people associated with them as a starting point and looking, as far as possible, for links to other collections and institutions and to historical events and local knowledge. Documentation of medals, coins, and prints has continued, some of the archives have been listed and biographies developed, while an additional part-time photographer is working to create digital images of objects and to illustrate the 'stories'. An art historian will be appointed in 2007-08 to write 50-100 biographies and stories, on which we will engage in public consultation.

On account of this wealth of experience, the Museum, along with other cultural organizations, was invited to collaborate with MLA East of England in a large project funded by the East of England Development Agency (EEDA) 'Think Digital' designed to provide examples and guidance on digitization in the form of a film and guidance documents on DVD and CDRom. And, on an international level, the Museum is a partner in BRICKS - Building Resources for Integrated Cultural Knowledge Services - an EU-funded project co-ordinated by the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA) as a content provider of archaeological information. The BRICKS system offers an opportunity to improve the identification of finds across country boundaries and the creation of archaeological reference collections while supporting education.

In the course of the year, the Photographic Department moved to high resolution digital photography. The impetus to do so was the requirement for a full set of digital photographs of the Macclesfield Psalter for the Museum's use and as a condition of grant from the Art Fund. A 22 megapixel digital film pack was purchased and first used to take 504 photographs of the psalter. Subsequently a 17 megapixel digital SLR camera has also been purchased and used for extensive photographic coverage of eleven Egyptian coffins following conservation and before they were put on display in the refurbished galleries.

The availability of digital photographs has revolutionized the Museum's publications activity and has been used extensively on the website. It has also made possible the publication of catalogues in full colour at lower cost and in smaller editions using digital files supplied by the Museum's photographers, and images of the Macclesfield Psalter were converted by them into a research facsimile in Adobe Acrobat format. Over 300 copies have been sold on CD via the Museum Shop. These same images will be used in 2006-07 to publish a printed facsimile.

Digital photography also has major resource implications in terms of file storage and backup of large uncompressed files and the management and retrieval of these files. The Museum is currently engaged in developing policy and procedures for a broad Digital Asset Management policy.

Technology infrastructure

The Museum, supported by the University and MLA, continued with ambitious infrastructure expansion and improvements during 2005-06. This infrastructure provides the tools, storage, and delivery platforms on which electronic access is reliant. The focus has been to increase capacity, provide technical stability/redundancy for services, and attempt to address sustainability. In support of sustainability a number of initiatives are underway, including internal policy and procedures for the selection and recording of long-term digital assets and liaison with the University Library regarding the future use of Cambridge University's DSpace system for long-term storage of our high-value digital assets.

Buildings and services

Meanwhile, Central Services continued to maintain the buildings and services, with the support of the University Estate Management and Buildings Service. The year encompassed the completion of the major refurbishment of the Egyptian Galleries (opened May 2006), the repair to the Dome of Gallery II, the installation of a Buildings Management System, and the fine tuning of the sophisticated environmental control systems introduced with the Courtyard Development. It also saw the completion of a six-year long upgrading of all electrical services throughout the Grade 1 listed complex of buildings and ended with plans for major reviews of the fabric of the Founder's Building, the environment throughout the buildings, and the updating of the Conservation Plan to guide further maintenance.

Collections Division

The Collections Division is responsible for the display and arrangements of all the Galleries, the temporary exhibition programme, acquisitions, loans-in and loans-out, cataloguing of the collections, research into them, their overall care, and for making them accessible to the public and to scholars. Much of its work is supported by Central Services and it depends on the Conservation Service for advice and remedial and preventative care.

For the Collections Division the Cambridge Illuminations exhibition and the re-display of the Egyptian Galleries were the activities which most particularly caught the public's attention. The exhibition of manuscripts was the first time that the Adeane and Mellon had been used for a single purpose and it worked to great effect. The exhibition itself was a manifest example of how the joint forces of the University can combine to produce an exhibition of outstanding international importance. The catalogue was an exemplary piece of united scholarship and this first overview of the combined Cambridge collections of Illuminated manuscripts was also of staggering beauty. A part of the exhibition took place in the University Library and it was complemented at the Fitzwilliam by the happy acquisition, with the help of both the National Heritage Memorial Fund and The Art Fund, of the extraordinary Macclesfield Psalter, many of the pages of which were simultaneously exhibited in the Shiba Gallery.

The Egyptian Galleries reopened on 25 May after an eighteen-month project of major refurbishment and redisplay. This enabled the staff of Antiquities to reconsider how best to display the world-class collections in their care. The objects have been regrouped in thematic sequence to encourage visitors to engage with Egyptian antiquities in a different way. A conscious decision was taken to restrict the funerary displays to half a gallery. Light levels are to be kept low in this area to give a sense of the dark environment of a tomb. Displays have also been arranged to stress the archaeological context of the objects where this is known. This ensures that the beautiful mummy case of Nakhtefmut is shown together with the artefacts found in his burial. An information panel explains their relationship. Information panels are included in the new displays, as are the pictures of Egyptian sites intended to give visitors a sense of the environment from which the objects come. Computer access within the galleries gives more information about the exhibits, and it is clear from visitors' reactions that this new way of presenting our Egyptian material helps them to understand the culture that the displays illuminate. The opportunity was also taken to conserve several items and to show several artefacts that have long been in storage. The opportunity to rethink how to present the Egyptian antiquities anew has been seized to singular effect, and although the centrepiece of the second gallery remains the pink granite sarcophagus lid of Ramesses III, ensuring a happy sense of familiarity with the previous displays, visitors will find much in the galleries to make them rethink the nature of the objects exhibited.

Exhibitions

After the closure of the Manuscripts exhibition the Adeane gallery was rehung with paintings from the second half of the twentieth century, and the display cases for ceramics and glass were reinstalled. In the Mellon gallery there were two further exhibitions. A Touch of the Divine: Drawings by Federico Barocci from British collections was the first exhibition in this country devoted to Raphael's fellow Urbinate. Conceived as a means of putting into context the acquisition in 2002 of Barocci's finished study for the Institution of the Eucharist, the exhibition showed drawings from Chatsworth, the British Museum, the National Galleries of Scotland, the Whitworth Museum, Manchester, the Ashmolean, Oxford, the Courtauld Institute, London, and the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, as well as examples in private collections. The National Gallery lent the only painting by Barocci in a British collection, The Holy family with the Infant St John and a cat, and the Italian Ambassador, who opened the exhibition, lent a rare painted portrait of Count Federico Buonaventura from the Italian Embassy. The exhibition was revelatory to many who had been unaware of Barocci's mastery of drawing. Finally a fascinating exhibition on conservation, Mission Impossible?, put into focus the multifarious activities of the Conservation departments across the Museum. The unwitting highlight of this was the very successful restoration by Penny Bendall of the first of three Chinese vases which had been broken by a visitor to the Museum early in 2005.

Apart from the Mellon Gallery there are three further display areas for temporary exhibitions, the Shiba, the Charrington Print Room, and the Octagon. In the Shiba Blake's Jerusalem gave a rare opportunity to see one of only two coloured copies of his final and most ambitious prophetic book together with three other of his illuminated books, The Songs of Innocence and Experience, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, and The Visions of the Daughters of Albion. This exhibition anticipated the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of Blake's birth by one year. The gift from Jesus College in 2003 of a collection of nineteenth-century Japanese prints in a spectacular state of preservation was the catalyst for Heroes of Kabuki which followed on from Blake. These included an important set by Toyohara Kunichika of actors as firemen. The prints had been conserved with the help of a grant from the Sumitomo foundation. The ongoing conservation of the Rembrandt prints continues to be the inspiration for displays of his work in the Charrington Print Room. Rembrandt's Christmas showed Rembrandt's etchings of the Christmas story. This was followed by two splendid exhibitions devoted to Albrecht Altdorfer. The first, Prints of Nature and Artifice, concentrated on a set of images of elaborate vessels and his very rare landscape etchings made around 1520, the second, Albrecht Altdorfer in Renaissance Regensburg, showed his variety of techniques and the freshness of his approach to subject matter. In the Octagon bronze, jade, and ceramics were the materials used for the objects displayed in Life, Ritual, and Immortality: Eating and Drinking in China. This concentrated the visitor's eye on a few objects, some of consummate beauty, that are normally shown in relatively cramped conditions in the Chinese galleries. It was fascinating how much greater their quality appeared to be with more space around them. Art for Mailing mounted by the coin room showed wildlife stamp designs by Ian Loe. This attracted a rather different audience to the Museum than usual, and we much hope that those philatelists who visited the Fitzwilliam for the first time will return. The last exhibition in the Octagon, The Imagery of War, also mounted by the coin room, put in focus the exceptional collection of official gallantry and campaign medals recently acquired from Lester Watson, that included two specimens of the Victoria Cross.

Acquisitions

Yet again important acquisitions for the year came through the AIL process, in which art is accepted by HM Government in lieu of Inheritance Tax and allocated (often at the wish or specification of the former owner) to the Fitzwilliam Museum. Three departments benefited from the AIL system in the period under discussion.

For Antiquities the Newton Hall Athena, a Roman copy from the second century AD of an original Greek statue made about 350 BC provides the first large free-standing Roman figure acquired by the Museum. Its display in the Greek and Roman gallery makes a significant impact. It was discovered in the early years of the twentieth century by Sir Charles Walston, a distinguished Classical archaeologist, Lawrence Professor of Classical Archaeology, and Director of the Fitzwilliam Museum from 1883-89. From 1920 until shortly before it was acquired by the Museum it was displayed at Newton Hall near Cambridge.

For Coins and Medals the holdings in the Islamic series were doubled by the allocation of Michael Broome's collection of 3,577 coins. So rich a resource combined a representative series illustrating the monetary system in most parts of the Muslim world with more extensive and detailed holdings for dynasties that particularly interested Mr Broome, such as the Abbasids, Ikhanids, Safavids, and Ottomans. He had in addition a particularly systematic collection of over 600 coins of the Seljuqs of Rum.

The Department of Paintings and Drawings received a ravishing miniature by the Swiss artist Jean-Étienne Liotard of Laura Tarsi dressed 'à la Turque'. Painted for John, Marquess of Granby, in 1740/41, it had remained at Belvoir Castle until its allocation from the estate of the 9th Duke of Rutland. The detail of the costume is a virtuoso performance. John Everett Millais' splendid double portrait of the twins, Kate and Grace Hoare, painted in 1875-76, shows another side to the Pre-Raphaelite's career: that of society portraitist. At the exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery devoted to Millais' portraits in 1999, where it was last shown publicly, it proved the 'hit' of the show. Thanks to the determination and generosity of Mrs Jean Wynne, a grand-daughter of Grace Hoare, its allocation to the Fitzwilliam will ensure it remains in the public eye. Three further items by William Blake from the estate of Quentin Keynes formerly in the collection of his father, Sir Geoffrey Keynes, were allocated to the Museum. The line drawing of Newton, preparatory to Blake's monotype of the same subject, the coloured monotype of Ruth parting from Naomi, one of two known, and a bound copy of Blake's Illustrations to Dante. These add significantly to the Blake collection at the Museum. We were also delighted to receive from Quentin Keynes' executors Jean Cocteau's L'Ode à Picasso poëme 1917.

Bequests include some French and Italian eighteenth-century porcelain from Hermione Hammond and Duncan Grant's The Hookah Smoker painted in 1951, from Graham Storey.

Purchases were once more heavily dependent on the help of The Art Fund and the MLA/V&A Purchase Grant Fund. These included Hokusai's Convolvulus and Tree Frog, a colour print from woodblocks from his very rare Large Flowers series. This joins the Irises and Grasshopper from the same series and, like that, is in excellent colour. Also included was a rare penny attributed to William of Aumale, earl of York, and, from the famous collection of Sir Ernest Cassel, a spectacular 'ginger jar' made in 1673-4 by the German silversmith, Jacob Bodendeich, who was granted English citizenship in 1661.

Several more gifts from Sir Nicholas and Lady Goodison were received through the Art Fund, and as an outright gift to honour Sir Nicholas' chairmanship (1986-2002) the Art Fund gave William Turnbull's large Blade Venus. Cast in bronze in 1990, this is the biggest sculpture in the Blade Venus series. It is placed in the Courtyard, where it is in dialogue with John Gibson's Venus.

Gifts were as plentiful as ever. Milein Cosman Keller gave a drawing of Gustav Holst to join the group of drawings by her that were given by the Friends to represent composers represented in the Fitzwilliam's collection. Nicholas Turner gave four nineteenth-century French drawings in memory of his mother, and Mrs Virginia Surtees gave manuscripts and books owned by John Ruskin, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and Sydney Cockerell.

Through Cambridge in America Dr Sandra Hindman gave four miniatures from Guillaume de Daguileville's Pilgrimage of the Human Soul in memory of Dr Michael Camille, and Mark Fisch gave Barocci's double-sided sheet of studies for the Martyrdom of Saint Sebastian. Julia Crookenden and Michael Jaye, likewise through Cambridge in America, continued to benefit the Museum, in memory of Major-General George Crookenden and Mrs Angela Crookenden, most particularly this year with a fine oil-sketch on panel of a landscape by Constant Troyon.

Principal amongst our purchases are two sculptures, both acquired from the Boscowen Fund: a marble relief attributed to Andrea da Fiesole of Christ on the Cross mourned by St Jerome and Giacomo Parodi's spectacular baroque bust of Cleopatra.

Research and teaching

All members of the Keeper Staff remain active in research and teaching, giving lectures and classes for the University and for other Higher Education Institutions. They also participate in general talks and non-University teaching and in out-reach projects detailed in the lists below.

Conservation Division

The Conservation Division worked together on a number of projects. Preparations for the Mission Impossible? exhibition, which opened on July 1 2006, involved the careful preparations of texts and the construction of working models to demonstrate the deleterious effects of high light-levels and fluctuating levels of relative humidity. The exhibition had an unexpected extra dimension after a visitor fell into three Chinese Ming vases, badly damaging all of them. A rescue operation co-ordinated by Applied Arts Conservator, Jo Dillon, ensured that all fragments were photographed and collected and stored until Ceramics conservator, Penny Bendall, was commissioned to undertake their restoration. One vase in its restored state became a focus of the exhibition. The core of the exhibition will become one of the Eastern Region touring exhibitions. Conservators also worked on forthcoming exhibitions, prepared objects for display, and checked the condition of objects requested for loan and incoming works for exhibition. Preparations for the reopening of the refurbished Egyptian Galleries continued. Julie Dawson supervised three conservators working on contract, treating papyrus, wooden sarcophagi, animal mummies, and basketwork. René Waltham was commissioned to treat the Book of the Dead of Ramose (2100 BC), originally a twenty-metre scroll, only small fragments of which had been exhibited before. Part of the two-year conservation project is to design a system for the display of the fragments once they had been carefully pieced together. A glass sandwich system is proposed, and the accurate cutting of the glass sections will be undertaken by the Engineering Department. The Museum's Hamilton Kerr Institute established an internship specifically to treat four Roman-Egyptian mummy portraits painted in an encaustic medium. Removal of wax layers applied after excavation and careful consolidation was undertaken. Issues of restoration very different from those applicable to, say, a seventeenth-century Dutch painting, were discussed and developed with the Museum's Department of Antiquities. A programme of examination and technical research on the Egyptian collection was undertaken with Dr Spike Bucklow, Research Scientist at the Institute. Equipment was loaned by Anglia Ruskin University, and a safe x-ray area was established in the basement for the x-radiography of the collection of wooden coffins. Coincidentally during the same period, the Institute treated a panel painting by George Stubbs (The Labourers, National Trust, Upton House) for the National Trust which probably has a wax ground, reflecting the late eighteenth-century interest in encaustic painting, partly inspired by the excavations at Herculaneum.

Conservators also continued to undertake preventive conservation measures throughout the Museum. These included the continual monitoring of the museum climate, using the independent monitoring system which continuously records temperature, relative humidity, and light levels throughout the Museum. Any problems in the air conditioning systems can be identified, and, if they are significant, the system sends warning messages to specific members of staff. Working with the Estate Management and Building Service (EMBS) and outside consultants a start has been made on examining holistically the air conditioning plant in the newer sections of the building and the structure, heating, and ventilation systems of the 19th-century Founder's Building with the intention of identifying particular problems and designing more precise solutions sustainable in a Grade 1 listed building. In the meantime effective local solutions such as the controlled humidification of the Carpet Store proved to be very effective. The Division instituted ' Housekeeping Days', when conservators and technicians working with students and interns from the Hamilton Kerr Institute tackled the dusting and cleaning of display cases and the improvement of storage.

Ongoing conservation projects in Museum departments were wide-ranging. Bryan Clarke continued the preparation and mounting of the Museum's collection of Rembrandt etchings, and Svetlana Taylor continued the conservation of the Handel Manuscripts. Bob Proctor continued to work on the recently acquired Macclesfield Psalter. Pigment analysis was carried out on six manuscripts as part of the EU-ARTECH project. The analysis used XRF, FTIR, and Micro Raman supplied and operated by experts from the Istituto CNR Scienze e Tecnologie Molecolari (CNR-ISTM), University of Perugia.

The Institute was awarded a two-year AHRC Resource Enhancement grant of over £300,000 from January 2006, to digitize and investigate recipes of the artists' colourman, Winsor and Newton, from about 1830 to end of the 19th century. Dr Mark Clarke was appointed to supervise the project, and two full-time research assistants were appointed to assist with editing and data-editing. A system of capturing high resolution digital images of each page of the archive was developed which is capable of capturing images of 600 pages per day.

Marie Louise Sauerberg with Jo Dillon undertook a technical examination of the Museum's collection of wooden sculpture and polychromy.

The Hamilton Kerr Institute treated 40 paintings of which 14 were from the Museum's collection. The conservation of Murillo's Vision of Fra Lauterio was completed. Extensive over-painting, presumably applied to cover damage to the paint surface from bat urine, was removed to reveal many hidden details of the original composition. Cleaning of A Village Festival, formerly attributed to Jan Steen, confirmed the painting to be an early work by the artist. A study by Couture, Head of a Girl, was executed as a demonstration piece for his students. Later additions to give the study a more finished appearance were removed. Two large paintings by Snyders were treated. The Larder painted around 1620 is unlined. It was surface cleaned and consolidated so that it could be exhibited as part of the Mission Impossible? exhibition as an example of a painting in a largely untouched state.

The Westminster Retable which was exhibited at the National Gallery after conservation at the Institute was moved to its new permanent position in the Westminster Abbey Museum in October 2005. A showcase with its own micro air-conditioning unit, designed in Austria, was commissioned and has proved to provide a stable environment. Supervised by Marie Louise Sauerberg, work started on the conservation of the Tester of the Black Prince at Canterbury. Renate Woudhuysen with the assistance of students Alison Stock and Jessica David completed the restoration of Federico Zuccaro's Calumny of Apelles for the Royal Collection.

All conservators in the Division gave lectures to Art History students, with first-year students and those taking the Display of Art option. Lectures to the public connected to exhibitions or as part of the Art in Context series proved popular. Papers were given at specialist conferences and articles published. Renate Woudhuysen taught courses on practical painting techniques at the University of Oslo and the University of Helsinki. Bob Proctor advised the Egyptian National Library in Cairo on the conservation of their manuscript collection.

In addition to the students and interns attached to the Institute, three conservation interns worked in the Museum, in the Department of Antiquities and with the conservator of prints and drawings. It is hoped that the Museum will be offered funded conservation internships in the future through the HLF-funded Institute of Conservation's Bursary scheme.

Teaching and related activities

Information on teaching and related activities carried out by Museum staff is available from the Museum. The full Report is also available at http://www.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/about/AnnualReport2005-2006.pdf.

Publications by members of Museum staff

Martin Allen, 'The coin hoard', in C. Cessford with A. Dickens, 'Castle Hill, Cambridge: excavations of Saxon, medieval, and post-medieval deposits, Saxon execution site and a medieval coin hoard' Proceedings of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society, 94 (2005), pp. 73-101, at pp. 86-94.

Martin Allen, 204 entries in Numismatic Literature 145 (2003).

Martin Allen, 'The volume of the English currency, c. 973-1158', in Coinage and History in the North Sea World, c. AD 500-1200. Essays in Honour of Marion Archibald, edited by B. Cook and G. Williams (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2006), pp. 485-523.

Martin Allen, 'The weight standard of the English coinage 1158-1279', Numismatic Chronicle, 165 (2005), pp. 227-33.

Martin Allen, 'The fourteenth-century hoard from Chesterton Lane Corner, Cambridge', British Numismatic Journal, 75 (2005), pp. 63-90.

Martin Allen, 'The interpretation of single-finds of English coins, 1279-1544', British Numismatic Journal, 75 (2005), pp. 50-62.

Martin Allen, 'The quantity of money in England 1180-1247: new data', British Numismatic Journal, 75 (2005), pp. 44-49.

Martin Allen, 'The salaries of mint and exchange officials in the Long Cross recoinage of 1247-1250', British Numismatic Journal, 75 (2005), pp. 173-5.

Martin Allen, Julian Baker, Mark Blackburn, and Rory Naismith, 217 entries in 'Coin Register 2005', edited by Martin Allen, Richard Abdy, and Philip de Jersey, British Numismatic Journal, 75 (2005), pp. 176-99.

Sally-Ann Ashton, review of Kurzbibliographie zu den übersetzen Tempeltexten der griechisch-römischen Zeit edited by Christian Leitz in Journal of American Oriental Society 2004, 414.

Sally-Ann Ashton with M. J. Hughes 'Large, late and local? Scientific analysis of pottery types from Al Mina' in A. Villing (ed.), The Greeks in the East, The British Museum Research Publication 157 2005: 93-104.

Mark Blackburn, 'Money and coinage', in The New Cambridge Medieval History, vol. I (c.500-c.700), ed. P. Foreacre (Cambridge, 2005), pp. 660-74, 893-4.

Mark Blackburn, 'Coin Finds as primary historical evidence for medieval Europe', Kaheinimiru Dynamism: Ou Chu Nichi Hikakuno Shitenkara (Dynamism in Coinage: Europe, China and Japan, Comparative Viewpoints), Dai 12 kai Shutsudosenkakenkyukai Houkokuyoushi in Fukuoka 2005 (Proceedings of the 12th Conference of the Coin Finds Research Group held in Fukuoka 2005), ed. Shinichi Sakuraki (Fukuoka, 2005), pp. 7-50 (in English and Japanese).

Mark Blackburn, 'Coin Finds as primary historical evidence for medieval Europe', Chuseishi Kenkyu to Koukogaku: Chusei no Nippon to Europa deno Ryutsu to Kahei wo Chushin ni (Archaeology and the Study of Medieval History: Highlighting Distribution and Money in Medieval Japan and Europe), Kokusai Symposium, Shiryoushu 2005.11.12, Chuo Daigaku Kourakuen Campus (Proceedings of an International Symposium held 12 November 2005, at Chuo University Kourakuen Campus [Tokyo]), ed. Kaname Maekawa (Tokyo, 2005), pp. 1-27 (in English).

Mark Blackburn, '81. West Wratting, Cambridgeshire: Viking gold ingot or arm-ring fragment' and '82. Haslingfield, Cambridgeshire: Viking silver ingot', Treasure Annual Report 2003 (2005), pp. 63-5.

Mark Blackburn (with J. Davies), 'An iron coin die', in H. Wallis, Excavations at Mill Lane, Thetford, 1995 (East Anglian Archaeology 108; 2004), pp. 45-7.

Mark Blackburn, 'Presidential Address 2004. Currency under the Vikings. Part 1: Guthrum and the earliest Danelaw coinages', British Numismatic Journal, 75 (2005), pp. 18-43.

Mark Blackburn, 'Some unpublished coins of Henry I and Stephen', British Numismatic Journal, 75 (2005), pp. 164-9.

Mark Blackburn, 'Review of the Year, 2004', British Numismatic Journal, 75 (2005), pp. 216-17.

Mark Blackburn, 'Philip Grierson (15.11.1910 - 15.1.2006)', International Numismatic e-Newsletter 4 (February 2006), pp. 9-11.

Mark Blackburn, 'Two new types of Anglo-Saxon gold shillings', in Coinage and History in the North Sea World, c. AD 500-1200. Essays in Honour of Marion Archibald, edited by B. Cook and G. Williams (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2006), pp. 127-40.

Mark Blackburn, 'Philip Grierson (1910-2006)', CCNB Newsletter 37 (March 2006), pp. 6-7.

Mark Blackburn, 'Bibliography for 2004. 7 Numismatics', Anglo-Saxon England 34 (2005), 330-1.

Mark Blackburn, 'Disseminating find evidence; the British Corpus of Early Medieval Coin Finds', XIII Congreso Internacional de Numismática, Madrid 2003, Actas, ed. C. Alfaro, C. Marcos, and P. Otero (Milan, 2005), I, pp. 169-71.

Mark Blackburn, 'Coin finds from Kaupang: A Viking emporium on the North Sea', XIII Congreso Internacional de Numismática, Madrid 2003, Actas, ed. C. Alfaro, C. Marcos, and P. Otero (Milan, 2005), I, pp. 1143-49.

Mark Blackburn, 'Interpreting the coinage - the contribution of detector finds', Whose Find is it Anyway? Conference Held at the British Museum 18 December 2003, ed. K. Suenson-Taylor, C. Heywood, and J. Dillon (London, 2006), pp. 47-53.

Mark Blackburn, 'Penny of William of Aumale, earl of York', The Art Fund Review 2005, p. 66.

Lucilla Burn, Greek and Roman Art (ed.3 with revisions), London 2005.

Lucilla Burn, 'How few men have the right head on their shoulders!', in N. Crummy (ed.), Image, Craft and the Classical World. Essays in honour of Donald Bailey and Catherine Johns (Montagnac 2005), 17-21.

Jo Dillon, ed. with K. Suenson-Taylor, C. Heywood, 'Whose Find is it Anyway? - Treasure, Metal Detecting, Archaeology & Conservation - the life of detected finds after recovery', The Institute of Conservation (Icon) Archaeology Group, 2006.

Jo Dillon, 'In the News .... the Fitzwilliam smashed porcelain vases', 'IconNews', (The Institute of Conservation, London), May 2006, Issue 4, cover photo and pp. 27-29.

James Lin, published an article 'Three Emperors: 1622-1795 exhibition in the Royal Academy', on Bulletin of the National Museum of History, Taipei: 2005. 11, pp. 76-82.

Ian McClure: 'The Problem of the Seven Foot Door', in Sally Woodcock, ed.: Big Pictures, Problems and Solutions for Treating Outsize Paintings, Archetype Publications, London, 2005, pp. 52-59.

Jane Munro, Suite française. Dessins de la collection Jean Bonna, Paris, 2006, pp. 321-332.

Jane Munro, 'John Robert Cozens (1752-97) The Chasm at Delphi', The Annual Report of the National Art Collections Fund, 2005 Review, p. 63.

Elizabeth New, Editorial Assistant, The Parliament Rolls of Medieval England, 127-1504, gen. ed. C. Given-Wilson (Oxford, 2005), 16 volumes or CD-ROM.

Elizabeth New, 'The Jesus Chapel in St Paul's Cathedral, London: a reconstruction of its appearance before the Reformation', Antiquaries Journal 85 (2005), 103-124.

Elizabeth New, with M. Forrest, 'Impressed in Metal: the Seals of a Devon Tax-Collector', Antiquaries Journal 85 (2005), 366-373.

Stella Panayotova, 'Art and Politics in a Royal Prayerbook', The Bodleian Library Record, vol. 18, n. 5 (2005).

Stella Panayotova, co-editor with Paul Binski, The Cambridge Illuminations: Ten Centuries of Book Production in the Medieval West (London and Turnhout, 2005).

Stella Panayotova, The Macclesfield Psalter (The Fitzwilliam Museum, 2005).

Stella Panayotova, 'A Ruskinian Project with a Cockerellian Flavour', The Book Collector, vol. 54, no. 3 (2005).

Stella Panayotova, 'Il Visconte Illuminato: I Codici del Fitzwilliam Museum', Alumina 12 (2005), 32-41.

Stella Panayotova, 'Discretion betrayed', review of Christopher de Hamel, The Rothschilds and their Collections of Illuminated Manuscripts, London, 2005, in TLS (24 February).

Stella Panayotova, 'Il sorriso della fede: Il Salterio Macclesfield', Alumina 13 (2006), 6-19.

Julia E. Poole, Review of John D. Griffin, The Leeds Pottery 1770-1881, Burlington Magazine, CXLVIII (June 2006), p. 426. Contributions to the 2005 Review, The Annual Report of the National Art Collections Fund, p. 65, silver ginger jar and cover by Jacob Bodendick, p. 155, marriage chest by Wales & Wales, and p. 154, gifts of ceramics and glass by Sir Nicholas Goodison.

A. Popescu with K. Lockyear, T. J. Sly, 'Noviodunum Archaeological Project' in Cronica cercet**L371**arilor arheologice din România. Campania 2004, Bucharest, 2005, p. 188.

Duncan Robinson, Foreword to Spirit of Trees: Charcoal Drawings 1980-2005 by John Hubbard, 2006.

Marie Louise Sauerberg and Spike Bucklow, Das Westminster Retable, in Westfalen Band 80 (2002), Postprints to the colloquium**L342** Das Soester Antependium und die frühe mittelalterliche Tafelmalerei. Kunsttechnische und Kunsthistorische Beiträge', eds. J. Poeschke et al., Münster 2005, pp. 353-372.

Marie Louise Sauerberg, Book review of 'Making Medieval Art', Burlington Magazine, Vol. CXLVII, No. 1229, pp. 564-565.

M. L. Sauerberg and S. Bucklow, 'Das Westminster Retabel', (translated by M L Sauerberg into German), in Westfalen Heft für Geschichte, Kunst und Volkskunde, 80, 2002, pp. 353-372.

David Scrase, 'A Touch of the Divine': Drawings by Federico Barocci in British collections. Exhibition catalogue, The Fitzwilliam Museum, February 2006.

Helen Strudwick, Pocket Timeline of Ancient Egypt (London, British Museum Press 2005).

Acknowledgments

We gratefully acknowledge support for the Museum from the following individuals and organizations.

Anna Plowden Trust
The Art Fund
Arts & Humanities Research Board
Austin & Hope Pilkington Trust
Charlotte Bonham-Carter Trust
The British Academy
Cambridge City Council
Cambridge University Press
Constantine Ltd
Mr Gifford Combs
Coutts & Co
Eridge Trust
Ernest Cook Trust
Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund
Mark Fisch
The Friends of the Fitzwilliam Museum
Professor P. Grierson
The Grocers' Charity
S. G. Hambros
Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox
Heritage Lottery Fund
Hewitsons
Idlewild Trust
International Partners on behalf of Melvin Seiden
Italian Cultural Institute
Mr Christopher Jeeps
John Coates Charitable Trust
John Lewis Partnership
Daniel Katz
Samuel H. Kress Foundation
Mr Ian Loe
The Marlay Group
Martineau Trust
Mr Hamish Maxwell
Michael Marks Charitable Trust
Modern Humanities Research Association
Museums, Libraries & Archives Council
Museums, Libraries & Archives Council East of England
National Manuscripts Conservation Trust
Paul Hamlyn Foundation
Prince of Wales Arts & Kids Foundation
Radcliffe Trust
Ridgeons Ltd
South Cambridgeshire District Council
Thriplow Trust
Westminster Foundation
Woodmansterne Publications Ltd
The Worshipful Company of Armourers and Brasiers
The Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers

Conclusion

We were naturally pleased to learn in September that the Arts and Humanities Research Council had approved an increase in Core Funding for the Museum for the years 2006-09. Though the sum was smaller than we had applied for, the news came as a welcome endorsement of what the Council described as 'an application of the highest quality, to be funded as a matter of priority'. At well over £1 million per annum, this grant, which derives from funds reserved for university museums by the Higher Education Funding Council for England, has become a significant line item of income in an operating budget of just over £3 million. The uncertain future of the scheme beyond 2009 is therefore of considerable concern to us and to the other museums which benefit from it. If, as has been suggested, it is to be rolled into the block grant to the University, we foresee a number of risks, not least that we will lose the opportunity to argue the case for our museums outside the University and to earn, by doing so effectively, what is perceived as additional funding.

ANNE LONSDALE (Chair)RICHARD CORK DAVID MCKITTERICK
NICHOLAS BARING MARTIN DAUNTON VERONICA SUTHERLAND
PAUL BINSKI CAROLINE HUMPHREY RICHARD WILSON
JOHN BROWN JOHN KEATLEY 
PAUL CARTLEDGE JEAN MICHEL MASSING 

(as of 1 October 2006)