Integrating lived experience into collaborative curatorial practices : facilitating community self-representation through an historic photographic archive
Creators: name: Wilson, Erin
Publisher: name: University of Tasmania
Year: 2024

description: Curators of historic photographic archives face significant challenges in establishing and adopting new strategies for access, research, dissemination and display. In particular, employing a collaborative approach through engaging community members as keepers of knowledge and as co-producers of historical and cultural narratives, is increasingly seen as desirable but complex. This study was instigated as a result of my own observations and challenges as the curator of one such photographic archive. The research seeks to gain deeper insight into how curators can address their problematic positioning as institutional gatekeepers who control public access to cultural collections, with a focus on the notion of the ‘archival gaze’ foregrounded by Katherine Gallan. Guided by important current curatorial discourse surrounding institutional critique, dialogical curating and decolonising museums, this thesis explores the disruption of institutionalised master-narratives through a diversification of perspectives gained through collaborative curatorial practices. The ‘archival impulse’ movement, identified by Hal Foster and pursued by artists and curators, is examined and positioned as a model that can be expanded to engage non-specialised members of the broader community as cultural collaborators.<br>The study, which adopts an ethnographic approach, was undertaken through the dual roles of researcher and curator. Throughout the course of the fieldwork and data collection, I was employed as the curator responsible for the Robinson Collection at Devonport Regional Gallery in northern Tasmania. The Robinson Collection was a suitable case study for research into this field, as a publicly-owned archive in a regional Australian community, representative of numerous such collections and communities nationally and internationally. My early engagement with both the community and the Collection highlighted the need, and potential, for a democratisation of access to, and use of, the archive. In undertaking this investigation, the objectives of the research were to develop, implement and analyse curatorial strategies for engaging diverse perspectives of community members in the dissemination and display of this local photographic archive through three collaborative curatorial projects. The findings of the research are presented through a series of case narratives, drawing on extensive interviews, artefacts, field notes, and data analysis. The concept of lived experience was identified as a recurring theme throughout each case study, and a key finding of the research overall, through both intuitive curatorial reflections and formal research analysis. Following data analysis, Ian McIntosh and Sharon Wright’s review of literature on lived experience, which draws on phenomenology, feminist writing, and ethnographic literature, was influential in understanding and contextualising the use of the term in social policy research.<br>Cumulatively, this thesis presents the concept of integrating lived experience into curatorial practice as the foundation for fostering ethical exchanges between curators and community collaborators. Conceptually, this is articulated through three core values: elevating lived experience as a valid source of knowledge; elevating lived experience as the foundation of representation; and elevating lived experience as the framework for curatorial design. In addition, a framework of applied strategies for curatorial practitioners has been developed, comprising a range of suggested curatorial strategies applicable to collaborative community projects, which are grouped into eight core categories. Categories include developing the collection narrative and reframing the role of curator; repositioning the community as the authority on local knowledge; acknowledging and addressing the limitations of the archive; establishing expectations, interests, motivations and barriers to participation; and embracing logistical risk and realism. Further, the extensive collection of curatorial strategies presents specific and practical approaches for achieving each goal. Examples include: promoting experiential and anecdotal knowledge as valid in the institutional context; identifying barriers to confident participation and incorporating solutions that empower participants; and repositioning the archive as a tool to be used in conjunction with other cultural materials and narratives to ensure collection limitations do not dictate gaps in the town narrative.<br>The values, strategies and insights highlighted in this research present curatorial practitioners with both a conceptual and applied approach to integrating lived experience into collaborative curatorial practice in an ethical way. Using the framework developed in this study, curators of historic photographic archives may be better placed to navigate the complexities of community-based cultural co-production in the future.<br>