Curating archives in exhibitions of fine art

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The research proposes to investigate how and why archives are used within exhibitions of historic art. It will study the display strategies of archivists and curators, and their objectives, as well as analyse the effects and meanings produced by these display practices. This research emerges directly from my role as Head of the Research Centre at the National Gallery and my own practice in curating, researching and interpreting archives. The project has the potential to make a valuable contribution to understanding how exhibitions are currently conceived and designed and therefore how museums mediate our cultural heritage to the public.The project will consider the use of archives as a means to broaden and/or to deepen public engagement with the art collections; or as manifestations of a growing interest in historiography. Exhibitions of historic art will be examined in comparison with the placement of archives within displays of contemporary art, a phenomenon that can be understood within the wider context of a more self-reflective exhibition practice that has developed in the contemporary art world over the past century. How does this practice relate to placing archives within exhibitions of historic art and what is the purpose of including archives in such exhibitions? What is the approach of curators in the historic field and what response does it engender in critics and visitors? Is there a dichotomy between historical and contemporary curatorial practice or is there a continuum between the two informed by an artistic and/or historicist framework?