Graciela Weisinger

Graciela Weisinger with Lyndel King and Steph Scholten.

Graciela Weisinger, Argentina

It is with great sadness that we were informed of Graciela Weisinger’s death, yesterday. Graciela was in the UMAC Board between 2014 and 2019, first as Secretary and then as Vice-president. She was currently President of ICOM Argentina. We are all in shock at her sudden death.

I am grateful to Karin Weil for preparing the text below, in Spanish and English.

Marta Lourenco, UMAC President


“ El lema de este año es Museos por la igualdad, diversidad e inclusión, pero propongo que vayamos un poquito más allá de ellos. Porque no todos somos iguales y porque cada persona es única, propongo que desde los museos trabajemos en la aceptación. La aceptación de la diversidad cultural, para así tan solo no incluirla, sino más bien integrarla.”

(Graciela Weisinger, 18 de mayo 2020)

Graciela Weisinger Cordero, con justa razón merecedora del Premio “ Asociación Amigos del Museo Mitre” por mejor desempeño en la carrera de Museología. Doctorando en Historia. Lic. en Museología de la Universidad del Museo Social Argentino (UMSA) y Técnico Superior en Museología Histórica de la ENAM. Titular de cátedras en las carreras de Museología y Gestión del Patrimonio Cultural, en Peritaje y Valuación de Obras de Arte y en Conservación y Restauración de Bienes Culturales en UMSA. Es Investigadora del Instituto de Investigaciones y Estadísticas Científicas y Sociales de la UMSA y curadora de la Colección de UMSA. Se desempeñó como profesional en diversas instituciones diseñando muestras permanentes y temporarias. Publicó libros, documentos y artículos propios y en colaboración con profesionales de diversas disciplinas. Organizó seminarios, jornadas y encuentros nacionales e internacionales. Actualmente era la presidenta de ICOM Argentina, donde también fue Vocal y Tesorera, ejerció la Secretaría y luego la Vicepresidencia del Comité Internacional de UMAC (Comité de Museos y Colecciones Universitarios de ICOM) en el período 2014-2019. Siempre comprometida y aportando activamente al desarrollo de la museología, gran admiradora de Hugues de Varine por su trabajo comunitario, al que ella también se dedicó. 


“This year’s slogan is Museums for equality, diversity and inclusion, but I propose that we go a little further than that. Because we are not all the same and because each person is unique, I propose that museums work on acceptance. Acceptance of cultural diversity, so that we don’t just include it, but rather integrate it”.

(Graciela Weisinger, 18 May 2020)

Graciela Weisinger Cordero, rightly deserving of the “Association Amigos del Museo Mitre” Award for best performance in the Museology degree. Doctorate in History. Degree in Museology from the Universidad del Museo Social Argentino (UMSA) and Advanced Technician in Historical Museology from the ENAM. Professor in Museology and Cultural Heritage Management, in Appraisal and Valuation of Works of Art and in Conservation and Restoration of Cultural Heritage at UMSA. She is a researcher at the Institute of Scientific and Social Research and Statistics at UMSA and curator of the UMSA Collection. She has worked as a professional in various institutions designing permanent and temporary exhibitions. She published books, documents, and articles of her own and in collaboration with professionals from various disciplines. She organized seminars, conferences and national and international meetings. She was currently the President of ICOM Argentina, where she was also a member and Treasurer, and was the Secretary and then Vice-President of the International Committee of UMAC (University Museums and Collections Committee of ICOM) in the period 2014-2019. Always committed and actively contributing to the development of museology, she is a great admirer of Hugues de Varine for his community work, to which she also dedicated herself. 

Karin Weil, 30 June 2022

 

New issue UMACJ: Pedagogy Hub

University collections and museums are increasingly used for teaching. The latest issue of the University Museums and Collections Journal (Vol. 13, No. 2), edited by Alistair Kwan and Andrew Simpson, brings together essays from all over the world on the roles of university collections for state of the art pedagogy. 

As Alistair Kwan writes in the issue: “As this collection of essays shows, there are important things for university museums and collections—as hubs—to contribute to the scholarship of teaching and learning, and to the steering of our universities into exercising their sociocultural, epistemic and economic privileges more critically, more wisely, more ethically, more influentially over the coming century of widely anticipated struggle.”

Access the issue here.

 

Two more issues of UMACJ in Chinese

A complete volume of UMACJ — volume 12, comprising 2 issues — has been translated into Chinese and is now accessible.

The translation is a result of the ongoing collaboration between UMAC and the University of Shanghai Museum. 

Please read UMACJ Chinese version here.

 

New IMAGINATIONS videos published

Learn more about the daily lives and aspirations of young museum professionals around the world.

Zhao Ke, Co-Chair of UMAC Futures and Director of the Museum of Electronic Science, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, CHINA, has released three more videos of the series IMAGINATIONS:

  • Holly Millward, Australia
  • Mohamadou Moustapha Dieye, Senegal
  • Rebeca Bombonato, Brazil

The videos can be seen in UMAC YouTube channel. Here is a shortcut.

RELEASE: UMAC GUIDANCE ON RESTITUTION

After extensive and in-depth open debate, UMAC is releasing the final version of the document UMAC Guidance for Restitution and Return of Items from University Museums and Collections.

The document is the outcome of the project UMAC-ER: The Ethics of Restitution and Repatriation (2020-2021), chaired by Vice-Chair Steph Scholten (The Hungarian, University of Glasgow, UK), supported by ICOM and involving partners such as ICOM’s Committee for Professional Ethics (ETHCOM), ICOM Committee for Collections and Museums of Ethnography (ICME), ICOM Australia and UNIVERSEUM.

The document can be accessed here.

 

 

 

Update on UMAC 2022 Prague

Dear UMAC community,

This year, our annual conference will happen in August, in Prague, Czech Republic, included in the 26th ICOM General Conference.

This year’s ICOM General Conference will be a hybrid conference, in other words you will be able to register to attend in person or remotely. As always, registrations will be handled centrally by ICOM and should open soon.

As for UMAC 21st Annual Conference, it will be shorter than usual and have two parts:

PART 1 – 22-23 August: we will have a joint meeting with colleagues from three other ICOM committees: NATHIST (natural history museums), ICME (ethnography museums) and ICR (regional museums)

A Call for Papers for this is opening now.

PART 2 – 25 August: UMAC will meet separately at the Faculty of Sciences of Charles University (Hrdlicka Museum)

UMAC will give a limited number of grants to help cover travel and accommodation costs of members traveling to Prague. Please make sure you’re eligible.

You can find all the information about UMAC 2022 here: http://umac.icom.museum/activities/conferences/

We’re excited with our conference this year and we look forward to meeting you in Prague.

Warm regards,

Marta Lourenço, University of Lisbon

UMAC Chair

PS As mentioned earlier, this year’s Annual General Meeting will not happen in Prague. It will be 19th September, online.

New volume: Call for Papers

CALL FOR PAPERS

Communication, Cultural Heritage, and Digital Strategies: University museums and collections

 
 
University museums and collections as repositories with heritage value and didactic and investigative vocation raise many questions and a diversity of approaches, both in theoretical foundations and in the strategies used for its conservation, exploitation, or public dissemination. For this reason, it is essential to develop an open mind that promotes the multidisciplinary integration of the different areas of knowledge and that coordinates work about the scientific, technical, and educational heritage produced or to be produced in the context of the institutions of higher education with shared values of respect for cultural heritage and service to society (Owen et al., 2016; Simpson, 2019).
 
 
Deadline: 28 February 2022.
 
Coordinated by Francisco Javier Frutos-Esteban and Valeriano Piñeiro-Naval, Universidad de Salamanca, Spain.