Profession museum scientist

Museum scientists perform and/or manage the curatorial, preparatory and clerical work in general museums, research collection repositories, botanical gardens, art galleries, fine arts related collections, aquariums or similar areas with collections of natural, historical and anthropological material that is educational, scientific or aesthetic in purpose; and perform other related duties as required.

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Personality Type

• Conventional / Investigative
• Enterprising / Conventional

Knowledge

• Collection management software

  Be familiar with specialised collection management software used to document and keep record of the museum collection.

• Art collections

  The variety of paintings, sculptures, prints, drawings and other works that form collections in a museum and prospective new collections which are of interest for a museum or art gallery.

• Museum databases

  The tools and processes involved in working with museum databases.

Skills

• Supervise special visitors

  Serve as docents for special visitors and groups.

• Study a collection

  Research and trace the origins and the historical significance of collections and archive content.

• Select loan objects

  Select specimens for exhibitions loans.

• Prepare exhibition programs

  Work on exhibition programs and write concept texts.

• Work with cultural venue specialists

  Call upon the competence of other professionals and specialists, from within and outside the organisation, to contribute to activities and provide documents to improve public access to collections and exhibitions.

• Maintain museum records

  Keep museum records current and in conformity with museum standards.

• Communicate in English in a competent way

  Competent use of English; R351refers to level C1 in the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR).

• Advise on acquisitions

  Investigate acquisition options, compare them and give advice.

• Perform lectures

  Present lectures to various groups.

• Document museum collection

  Registrars are concerned with documentation and record keeping of museum collections. Documentation includes information about an object's condition, provenance, materials, and all of its movements within the museum or out on loan.

• Use ICT recources to solve work related tasks

  Ability to choose and use ICT recources in order to solve related tasks

• Supervise projects for the conservation of heritage buildings

  Supervise protection and restoration projects of cultural heritage. Use own expertise to make sure the project runs smoothly.

• Maintain catalogue collection

  Describe, inventorise and catalogue items in the collection.

• Monitor museum environment

  Monitor and document environmental conditions in a museum, in storage as well as exhibition facilities. Make sure an adapted and stable climate is guaranteed.

• Report analysis results

  Produce research documents or give presentations to report the results of a conducted research and analysis project, indicating the analysis procedures and methods which led to the results, as well as potential interpretations of the results.

Optional knowledge and skills

Source: Sisyphus ODB