Agenda item

To welcome Camilla Hampshire, Museums Manager.

To consider the report of the Assistant Director Economy - report circulated.

The Chair welcomed Camilla Hampshire, the Museums Manager to the meeting.

Her report reviewed the seven month period of service delivery following the re-opening of the Royal Albert Memorial Museum and Art Gallery (RAMM) post its capital re-development. It covered the full spectrum of Museum operations in order to provide a whole view of the service, the interconnections between different aspects of its work and to describe how these feed into public outputs. Though starting from a very positive position, it also described some of the constraints, pressures and challenges facing the service in coming years. The presentation itself focussed on people stories, providing a different perspective through which to understand the work carried out at the RAMM.

She responded as follows to Members’ queries:-

·         the outreach programme during the four year closure period had been very successful with approximately 1.6 million public contacts made. It had attracted national attention. Some aspects of outreach had been maintained since re-opening, this included RAMM representation at the Contemporary Crafts Fair run in conjunction with the Devon Guild of Craftsmen and attendance at the County Show. Partnerships remained central to RAMM’s work and examples include over the past seven months “in-reach” with Age UK on “Culture Café” and with the Devon and Cornwall Police and the County Council’s Social Services on an Intervention Project to address the needs of Young People at Risk of Offending;

·         RAMM had submitted a successful partnership bid with the Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery with the result that the peninsula’s two principal Cities had been selected as part of the Arts Council for England’s Major Grants Programme. The bid had included a letter of support from the University of Exeter;

·         there was active engagement with the City’s small ethnic communities, a springboard being provided by RAMM’s internationally important World Cultures Collection;

·         regional museums, unlike the Victoria and Albert or British Museums, for example, found it difficult to operate shops at a successful profit margin because of high overheads, especially staff costs. In order to minimise risks to the Council, the decision had been taken during the run up to re-opening not to operate a shop at RAMM. Currently there was a sales point with a limited number of souvenirs;

·         school sessions in RAMM were teacher led using their own resources or the RAMM’s Marketing Research Pack or activity sheets sent to them when they book their visit (also downloadable from the website). Schools could also pay for session at St Nicholas Priory led by an independent school specialist;

·         Monday closures were important for maintenance, cleaning and review/re-organisation of displays but also meant that the Museum was closed on the four Bank Holidays. The new Saturday and Sunday pattern of openings had been established in response to public requests. Saturday and Sunday openings were popular and successful, with the latter popular with many families - there were up to 650 visitors on Sundays;

·         a post of Building Services Officer had been created with the post-holder able to undertake a specified range of electrical and mechanical maintenance tasks, but with specialist officers from the contracts unit engaged as necessary;

·         Dartmoor Kitchen was currently operating the “pop up” café and, although the tendering process had been reviewed, it was anticipated, at present, that an in-house Council operated café would not be viable because of the specialist nature of catering operations which are not currently covered in the range of Council services. This would be re-examined;

·         The Debate – Great Exhibition - Great Debate, chaired by John Humphries, had been very successful and it was hoped to hold further events of this nature. Pricing, for any future similar events would be examined, the cost of this event, which had been experimental, having been aligned with classical music events in the City; and

·         the Museum was looking to invite talented local artists to display their work. The value of involving talented local artists as well as regional and national ones was recognised and would be allied to an Express and Echo feature between 22 November and 5 December on local art groups.

The Chair thanked the Museums Manger for an excellent presentation and he and other Members congratulated the Museums Service and its staff on the quality of the outstanding new facility and the early successes. They also offered their congratulations on RAMM winning the Arts Fund’s Museum of the Year Prize.

(Report circulated)