There are 10 days left until the “Night of Museums”, the most nervous and hectic night for all museum workers of the year. Trud looked at how easy it is to work in a museum.
“It’s a hectic job every day of the year,” says former employee Tretyakov Gallery And Historical Museum Vladimir Gulyaev. “The museum worker is always busy either checking the movement of exhibits or filling out a book for the arrival of new exhibits.”
The description of a museum exhibit is a long and labor-intensive procedure; it is necessary so that in the event of loss and then discovery the item can be identified. Imagine how to describe a Scythian figurine so as not to confuse it with another? Or a Qin Dynasty porcelain plate? Or the sword of the crusaders?
Only higher education
Most often, museum workers are graduates of art history faculties. humanitarian universities or history departments of large universities and pedagogical institutes. They need to know the culture different countries and eras, be able to distinguish the original from the copy. Among museum workers there are those who studied technical expertise in universities and know the characteristics of canvases and paints and can talk about how they change over time.
Each museum researcher specializes in a certain period or even personality. “All my life I have been studying the history of the Decembrist uprising and the fate of the Decembrists,” says Anna Leonidovna from Moscow. But narrow specialization does not hinder the employee, and leading excursions is additional income, albeit a very small one. In different regions, a guide can receive from 100 to 1000 rubles per excursion. Those who know a foreign language and can work with foreigners receive the most. “That’s why there are many foreign language graduates among the tour guides. Especially in the cities of the Golden Ring - Suzdal, Rostov, Pereslavl-Zalessky,” sums up guide Ksenia from Rostov.
Working for an idea
In most museums, older people, most often retired, are hired as caretakers. Often these are former school teachers. The salary of such workers is the smallest - it rarely exceeds 8 thousand rubles per month.
Opening hours: 2/2 or five days a week, but always on weekends, because museums are open six days. Closed on weekdays, as Saturday and Sunday have the most visitors.
Employees of the collection department, where the exhibits are stored, start working a little later. Their salary is 10-15 thousand rubles per month, depending on the scientific titles of the employee and work experience. For example, a senior researcher at a museum with 10 years of experience and publications can receive 25 thousand rubles per month. In large museums in Moscow and St. Petersburg, salaries are slightly higher than in regional ones, but there is also much more work there: the museum collection is huge, it can occupy several rooms. Try to keep track of the presence and safety of exhibits!
“The overwhelming number of museum employees are very honest people, they are distinguished by their dedication,” says Vladimir Gulyaev.
Employees in the shadows
Museum fund employees have a work plan for the day and for the year. They must check the existence of works with what is in the books of account.
Employees who work directly with museum values and funds, as a rule, combine several positions. They work as tour guides, and not only in their field. “We hold costume parties for children, where we talk about the history of the region and drink tea from a samovar,” says Marina from a museum near Moscow. She played Baba Yaga.
The second option for researchers, the vast majority of whom are candidates of science, to earn money is by teaching at colleges or universities. They teach students history, philosophy, religious studies, history of civilizations, and sociology. For teaching you can get another 20-30 thousand a month.
And finally, the riskiest way to make money is to participate in archaeological excavations, which are held by museums or research institutes in the summer. Getting there is quite difficult - you need to have a suitable profile. So, if a museum researcher specializes in the era of Yaroslav the Wise and during excavations it is planned to study monuments of precisely this era, then you are welcome.
Manuscript funds
Until recently, museum workers kept records of exhibits using “barn books” - each work of art was entered into the accounting book manually. Handwritten accounting was a requirement of the old instructions written back in the 1980s. Museums are now switching to electronic systems accounting, but not everywhere.
Exhibits often move: from collections to exhibitions, from hall to hall, they “tour” to museums in other cities and return back.
If anyone gets bored in museums, Gulyaev says, it’s the caretakers. And then mostly in small exhibitions. These are, as a rule, older people with higher education. “But if you work hard, you never get bored. Here at the Tretyakov Gallery they are all sitting on pins and needles: the flow of visitors is large, God forbid anything happens,” he comments.
Theft
Hectic work
1. December 11, 1994 from the premises of the Russian national library 92 ancient unique manuscripts with a total value of about 140 million dollars were taken out.
2. In the same year, a Hermitage electrician stole an ancient Egyptian bowl worth about 500 thousand dollars from the museum.
3. On April 6, 1999, as a result of an armed raid on the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg, two paintings by Vasily Perov were stolen. The works were found in a storage room at the Warsaw railway station.
4. December 5, 1999 from the museum Russian Academy 16 paintings by Russian artists, including Repin and Shishkin, were stolen.
5. On March 22, 2001, a painting was cut from a stretcher in the Hermitage French artist Jean-Leon Gerome, at one time purchased personally by Alexander III.
6. On May 28, 2002, two paintings by marine painters were stolen from the Museum of the Naval Corps of Peter the Great. Works worth about 190 thousand dollars were taken out of the museum by a cadet at the Naval Institute.
7. In August 2003, it became known about the disappearance from the Astrakhan State art gallery two paintings by Aivazovsky and Savrasov worth about 2 million dollars. Four years ago, the restorer removed the originals from the museum and returned the copies.
8. In August 2004, in the city of Ples, Ivanovo region, a painting by Shishkin was stolen from the Museum of Landscape.
9. On July 31, 2008, it became known that 221 exhibits, valued at 130 million rubles, had gone missing from the Hermitage.
10. On April 1, 2008, four of his paintings were stolen from Roerich’s apartment-museum in Moscow. The value of the missing paintings amounts to millions of euros.
11. On February 15, 2010, the collection of icons of Michael de Boire disappeared from State Museum-Reserve"Tsaritsyno", where it was stored. The cost of the icons is about 30 million dollars.
Rules
The International Council of Museums of UNESCO (ICOM) was founded in 1946. On this moment it includes about 17 thousand members from 150 countries with its own Code of Museum Ethics. When translated into Russian, the text underwent museum and linguistic verification.
According to the code, museum workers must first of all behave appropriately at all times and everywhere. He is allowed to oppose actions that harm the museum. A separate clause for museum workers stipulates that they cannot support the illegal market for valuables. Also, a museum worker in communicating with people is supposed to fulfill his or her professional responsibilities competently and at a high level.
The Village continues to talk about how people plan their income and expenses different professions. In this episode - a museum worker. According to the Ministry of Culture, average salary employees of cultural institutions, which include museums, in 2016 amounted to about 59 thousand rubles in Moscow and 50 thousand in St. Petersburg. Also last year, the department published a report on the earnings of heads of state museums, according to which CEO The Hermitage Mikhail Piotrovsky received 839 thousand rubles monthly, and the general director of the Tretyakov Gallery Zelfira Tregulova received 437 thousand rubles. A young employee of a large state museum located in St. Petersburg told us what his responsibilities are, what salary he receives and what he spends his money on.
Job title
Museum employee
Income
30,000 rubles
(including quarterly bonuses)
Expenses
10,000 rubles
9,000 rubles
debt recovery
3,000 rubles
transport
3,000 rubles
2,000 rubles
alcohol
2,000 rubles
1,000 rubles
entertainment
How to get to work at the museum
I grew up in a family associated with art, and I remember being a child in a museum with my parents. I had not yet thought what specialty I would choose, but it seemed to me some kind of magic that a person looks at a painting and sees not just the plot, canvas and oil, but the context, the connections of this work with others, the history of creation and ending up in the museum, the artist’s techniques . I went to study as an art critic at the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts named after Repin. This is a very important place, where art historians, graphic artists, sculptors, and architects coexist in one building, where you can enter the workshops and watch how they work. There is no such situation as in some universities, where they also teach art history, when a student studies art history, but has never seen an artist.
A significant part of the people who work in St. Petersburg museums are graduates of the Academy of Arts. In museums, there is always a need for laboratory assistants, therefore, if a position appears, they remember those who did internships, practical training and somehow proved themselves. This happened to me too. Now I am 23 years old and I have been working at the museum for four years.
Sometimes a person who wants to get a job in a museum thinks that he will do research, but not everyone understands that a museum is a huge system in which, in addition to departments related to science and art, there is a lot more - even electricians and mechanics, security service. It often happens that you have to wait for the right rate for years. For example, you are studying japanese art, because you want to work in the Oriental department, but the position has appeared in the scientific documentation department or the scientific and educational department. You have to go there and wait until, perhaps, you are invited to the desired department. Our employees are completely different. There are those who come with sparkling eyes. Some people need the status of working in a large state museum, and I even know many destinies that could have turned out better if people did not hesitate to move to other museums or organizations for fear of losing this status. But it is clear that no one comes to work in any museum in Russia because of material gain.
Features of work
The mission of a laboratory assistant in any department is to remove routine responsibilities from scientific workers so that they can do scientific work, preparation for exhibitions and conferences. I talked with colleagues from different scientific departments, and I got the impression that we do the same things, they just sometimes differ due to the specifics of the department: paintings are stored somewhere, archeology is stored somewhere. A laboratory assistant is a mixture of a secretary, a courier, a rigger and a handyman. Often people call us on the phone to get some information about paintings, events, and I answer such calls. If employees from another department come to the department, I also accompany them. State Museum- it’s always bureaucracy, here we depend on huge amount papers, signatures, seals.
Especially a lot of paperwork appears during preparation for an exhibition, if the exhibits are not from Russian meetings, and from abroad. Drawing up memos, checking documents, collecting signatures and seals is also the job of a laboratory assistant. When colleagues come to us, for example from the Louvre or British Museum, you need to meet them at the airport, escort them to Peterhof and Gatchina - this, again, is done by the laboratory assistant. As a courier, sometimes you need to go to the office and receive parcels and letters. Sometimes you arrive before dawn and check if everything is ready for the conference and if the projector is working. Each scientific department in the museum has a library, and for the most part girls work there. There are a lot of books, they are heavy and dusty, and laboratory assistants are always ready to help carry these books where they need to be.
In general, laboratory assistants are responsible for all movements of dusty and heavy objects - stacks of books, boxes, packages. Senior researchers, respectable masters and ladies in shawls will not do this. Laboratory assistants are mostly young people who have just graduated from higher education. educational institution or still receiving education by correspondence, they are from 20 to 30 years old. This is exactly the age when you can do this kind of work the best way. If you need to get a signature very quickly in another part of the building, you can literally run there, at the same time remembering all the films you know where the characters ran around museums.
The next step after a laboratory assistant is the position of a junior research fellow, then there is a research fellow, a leading researcher, a senior research fellow, and a custodian. Research workers are already people who are 30–35 years old, leading and senior, respectively, even older. But these promotions come not only due to length of service, but also due to publications and other achievements. At the same time, you need to constantly develop, monitor what is happening with the area of your research throughout the world. And for this you need to constantly go to the library, visit other museums, compare things, communicate at international conferences with your colleagues.
There are employees who, somewhere after 30 years of age, decide that they are quite satisfied with the position of laboratory assistant or junior researcher, and stop developing. These are quite conservative people with whom it can be difficult for me to discuss topics of science and art. They sometimes allow themselves to express themselves in a way that is inadmissible even for the average person, for example, they can say: “Malevich is not an artist at all, my child can draw better.”
I work five days a week from 09:00 to 18:00, but for a museum employee the work does not end with the completion working day, and continues in free time. After work, I often go to exhibitions and read books on art. Museum workers have an important privilege: they have the right to free entry to museums in Russia and some other countries using a special ICOM card. This type of leisure activity on weekends is very popular among my friends: you buy the cheapest ticket for a reserved seat on a train that arrives in Moscow in the morning. From the station you run to the Tretyakov Gallery, the Pushkin Museum, the Museum of Architecture, look at exhibitions, and so on until six o’clock. In the evening you go to the gallery, which can be open until eight, then you meet with your Moscow acquaintances, also employees of museums or other cultural institutions, and then you go back on the night train.
People from St. Petersburg travel to Moscow for exhibitions much more often than vice versa. Still, Moscow is a very cool city in terms of exhibition policy. We also have many museums, but not all of them have their own programs, interesting projects. Museum practices that are used in Moscow come to us only after several years, and not always in the right form. This often happens due to St. Petersburg snobbery and the stereotype of the cultural capital.
Income
My wage- 22 thousand rubles per month. Some may think that this is not enough, but there are St. Petersburg museums where employees receive much less. Once again, every few months there is a quarterly bonus - approximately 30–40 thousand. The bonus depends on the season and museum attendance, but probably only people in the accounting department can accurately calculate it. When you receive 22 thousand, expenses often exceed this amount, and it turns out that debts accumulate, and after receiving the bonus, I return the money to everyone from whom I borrowed.
All the lab technicians I know take help from their parents in one way or another. Some are given money, others are paid for housing, others are bought clothes or brought food. Parents understand that their children cannot cope without such support. My parents took on part of my expenses - housing and mobile communications.
Expenses
On average, I spend at least 3 thousand a month on books on art history and museum practices. I go to the bookstore “Everyone is Free”, where the cool guys work. When I don't have money and I see that there is only one copy of a book left, I ask them to put it aside for me for a week or two. Sometimes it happens that this bookstore calls me and says that they have a book in stock that might be of interest to me. Then I get into another debt, buy it and switch to eating mixed vegetables for 60 rubles.
I go for free not only to museums, but also to national film weeks at Rodina or Giant Park. I try to maintain my level of knowledge of foreign languages in order to communicate with colleagues from other countries, and for this I watch films without translation. There are several cinemas in St. Petersburg that show films in the original language with subtitles, but I don’t go to daytime screenings because of work, and a ticket to an evening screening costs comparable to the price of a not-so-expensive book on art history or curating. Sometimes I invite friends over to join me in watching a movie that they somehow downloaded in advance, because I don’t have the Internet at home. I'm not afraid that with the Internet I'll plunge into the abyss of procrastination, I'm absolutely sure of that. The books I buy will end up growing into a huge pile and collecting dust. And so I protected myself from the temptation to go online, read an article on Colta, then another, then go to Art Guide and, in addition, watch a couple of documentaries in the evening.
I spend about 3 thousand a month on transport. On average, it also costs about a couple of thousand for clothes. I don't buy it every month, but usually wait until Uniqlo has a sale and pick up a few basic items there. So for three to four months I will be calm, because I have simple clothes that can withstand the dust and dirt that part of the museum work. After all, there is such a law: when you buy yourself a new white shirt and come to work in it, it is on this day that you will need to drag dusty archive folders.
I spend about 8-10 thousand a month on food. Lunch is a very interesting part of my working day. My friends and I have this theory: it’s when you start taking food from home in a container that you stop being young. In addition, the museum is a rather dusty place, so it’s good to get out of it for at least an hour during the working day to breathe fresh air and warm up. Since a significant part of the museums are located in the center, you can catch some exhibition at lunchtime, and then just grab shawarma or falafel on the go. Sometimes we visit new places that open not far from the museum, evaluate the development of gastronomy - this is also interesting and deserves attention. We have a canteen in the museum, but they cook there from ingredients that not everyone eats for one reason or another, so we don’t eat there.
Since I live in St. Petersburg, I have fixed costs for alcohol. I don't drink a bottle of wine every night, but on average it costs a couple thousand a month. Recently, the Chronicle bar celebrated its birthday, and at least a thousand were definitely left there.
When they give out a bonus and some additional money appears, I, as a rule, pay off the debts. I can also go to an exhibition in Moscow or another city where I have friends who are ready to provide accommodation for the night.
Today modern museums are trying to find new ways of presenting information and communicating with the audience: from warehouses with ancient artifacts, they want to turn into cultural centers, where people will meet, communicate, exchange ideas and gain new knowledge and impressions. To achieve this, exhibition curators come up with interactive formats, project managers collect temporary exhibitions from all over the world, tour guides create free audio guides, and only caretakers cannot always find a place for themselves in this new world of the museum. Often they can be replaced by surveillance cameras, but are such changes possible in a provincial museum? whose work structure has not changed for 20 years?
Of course, such museums have their own charm, although almost no new exhibits appear there; in each hall you are watched by a strict caretaker, and the only unusual thing in the museum there is a local cat, periodically touching valuable artifacts with its tail.
Our correspondent spent one day in the role of a museum caretaker and talked about all the intricacies of the work of a typical Yaroslavl museum.
It's exactly ten o'clock.
As I climb the modest stairs of the museum located in the very center of Yaroslavl, I fantasize with anticipation how my day might go as a caretaker of one of the main museums in the city. Stopping in the first hall of the museum, to my surprise, I find myself in the dark and stumble upon a cat walking past the museum exhibits - the most faithful lover of Yaroslavl history.
It is very difficult to find a crowd of people in the museum on a weekday, so local workers take their time: one of the senior caretakers, suddenly appearing from the darkness, slowly approaches me, greets me and in a quiet voice tells me what I have to do for the next seven hours.
She leads me through the halls of the museum, periodically repeating: “You can’t touch anything here, otherwise the alarm will go off. It’s better to turn off the lights here while there are no visitors. Don’t even think about leaving things here, otherwise they might steal it. Well, don’t forget to put your phone in your bag while visitors are in the hall, otherwise it’s dangerous.”
Not really understanding the danger of my phone, I follow the caretaker into the last hall of the museum, where I will have to watch visitors throughout the day, and, putting my things aside, they slowly begin to examine the exhibits in the hall.
The museum where I was sent to practice as a caretaker has been operating since 1985 and is especially popular among out-of-town tourists, who usually enthusiastically look at all the exhibits, intently study the accompanying labels and admire the history of our city. However, despite the constant flow of tourists, many of whom are usually residents of the capital, among local population the museum is not in great demand (not counting young schoolchildren and students, who are herded into the museum and forced to devour the objects around them with their eyes).
It seems that the development of the museum stopped at the end of the 20th century: behind the huge shelves there are exhibits, many of which are printed copies or models that require urgent restoration, the further from the halls dedicated to ancient history city, the more boring it becomes to watch the development of Yaroslavl over several centuries. A sure way to attract attention and dilute the emptiness of museum halls on weekdays is to completely change the presentation of information. For example, instead of boring exhibits with accompanying labels, a museum could try to include innovative assistants in its displays.
True, any, even minimal, change in the museum, such as repairs or installation of new shelving, cannot be carried out without money, which is difficult to obtain.
An hour passes.
The first visitors begin to appear in the halls of the museum and carefully examine the exhibits. Because at a time when there are people in the halls of the museum, I cannot take out either a book or mobile phone, there is nothing left to do but carefully examine the tourists, to my surprise, studying with great attention what is under the shelves. In pursuit of a new amount of knowledge, some of them cautiously approach me and begin to ask questions regarding the exhibits on display. However, I can hardly answer most of them, which causes surprise on the part of tourists - after all, the caretaker should know everything.
The silence of the museum halls and the silent movement of visitors slowly makes me doze off. I close my eyes for a few seconds, but soon I flinch from the stern voice of one of the caretakers: “To stay awake, you better watch the visitors.”
A little perplexed, I answer: “What could happen to the exhibits, since they are under the shelves?” “Well, what if visitors bring a bomb into the museum. We don’t have metal detectors, so we, the caretakers, must be as attentive as possible,” the woman answers, and meanwhile I understand that all my ideas that the museum’s exhibitions should be updated modern technologies, seem funny, because here local workers, modestly moving around the hall and whispering comments to visitors, are asked to prevent terrorist attacks.
Several more hours pass.
I fight hard against drowsiness and try to keep an eye on the visitors. Suddenly the silence of the museum is broken by noise.
On the stairs you can hear the footsteps of people heading to the central hall of the museum. One of the caretakers whispers to the other: “Today at the museum thematic lesson" After these words, tourists begin to pass by me, the column of which is headed by museum employees dressed in costumes from the times of “War and Peace” by L. N. Tolstoy.
It's funny to watch the museum's guides and research staff hobble around in fluffy dresses and then clumsily begin to dance the mazurka.
The museum is trying to somehow attract the attention of tourists who have long since memorized all the permanent exhibitions, but their love of history has brought them to this place again. Such thematic events, of course, will not replace updated shelves with exhibits or audio guides, but they will definitely attract visitors who will want to see the theatrical abilities of the museum staff. And it is thanks to the museum workers, who do not hesitate to put on a fluffy dress during breaks between scientific activity, this place continues to live, albeit without fresh renovations, unique finds and big salaries employees.
Every day they come to the same museum halls, take their place and unobtrusively watch the visitors. No one will allow guests to the exhibition without them. Caretakers make sure that no one who comes to enjoy the art violates museum rules. What mistakes do Tomsk residents often make at exhibitions, what else, besides observation, is the responsibility of the caretaker, what paintings make a special impression on guests? All the details were told to us by Ekaterina Mikhailova, the caretaker of two halls of the permanent exhibition of the Tomsk Regional Art Museum.
When visitors appear in the adjacent museum hall, Ekaterina Mikhailova turns on the light and waits for the guests to come view the exhibits presented in her “domain”:
Visitors come into “my” hall - I get up and meet them, say hello, the majority also greet me, explains Ekaterina Ivanovna. “Then I quietly and carefully watch them, it’s not for nothing that we are called caretakers.” Many people touch the paintings with their hands or bend over so that they touch the works with their heads; this is prohibited because it is harmful to the paintings. Then I make comments, politely saying: “Sorry, please, you can’t touch anything.” According to the rules, the distance from a person to a painting should be 40 cm. We try to remind people of our rules politely, so as not to spoil the mood of our guests. The duty of making a comment is the most difficult thing for me in our work. I understand: a person came to relax, see an exhibition, and then they come up to him and begin to prohibit something. It is important not to offend a person, to be friendly, but at the same time quite strict.
True, most guests treat such comments with understanding. Conflicts rarely arise. Although sometimes people begin to be indignant, they say that in museums abroad they are allowed to touch exhibits with their hands. Then such guests are reminded that the permanent exhibition presents masterpieces, these are originals, truly ancient works created in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. If everyone touches them, they won’t last long.
Other violations that visitors commit include entering museum halls with large bags and outerwear. Such guests will not be allowed into the halls, but will be politely sent to the cloakroom. Outerwear in the halls is undesirable due to the abundance of street dust and bacteria, which are very harmful to paintings. And large bags are a safety issue.
Museum caretakers have a lot of safety instructions. Introduces all the rules to the hall staff chief custodian Art Museum Olga Komarova. But all points are quite doable:
“All the requirements are accessible to a person of our age,” says Ekaterina Ivanovna. - You must be honest, responsible, observant, have good hearing and vision.
Caretakers are hired after an interview with the chief custodian and administrator. Looking in work book. Usually they try to find people by recommendation - after all, the responsibility here is high, but the salary is the opposite. You have to work from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. with virtually no breaks. You can only leave for 15 minutes for lunch when there are no visitors and be sure to ask the caretaker from the neighboring rooms to observe. Food is usually brought from home with you. Sometimes you can go have tea behind a screen in one of the halls, but also for no longer than 10 minutes, and notify your neighbor.
Ekaterina Mikhailova has been working at the museum for 17 years. First she came to the position of caretaker, and then became an administrator. But 2 years ago I returned to the museum halls and felt that I wanted something quieter:
The administrator’s job is difficult,” explains Ekaterina Ivanovna. - All the caretakers are subordinate to him, there are many other responsibilities, he needs to know everything that happens in the museum and make sure that there is order everywhere.
Although the museum curator doesn’t have to be bored either. In addition to direct observation, he has plenty of other things to do. Discreetly turn on the lights before guests arrive, so as not to flip the switch in front of them. You also need to pay attention to the special lighting:
The work looks good with her,” Ekaterina Ivanovna is sure. - The lighting was installed recently, already under our director Irina Viktorovna Yaroslavtseva. It was also during her time that display cases called “glasses” appeared, thanks to which we can present those exhibits that were previously stored in storage rooms. For example, in my hall there is a beautiful vase painted in gold in such a display case. It was created at the Imperial Glass Factory back in mid-19th century. It is safe in the display case and will not be damaged accidentally. And the lighting allows the vase to appear before visitors in all its glory; without it, the golden pattern would not be so noticeable.
Also, soft, comfortable benches have recently appeared in the halls, on which visitors can relax, because the permanent exhibition of the museum is large, ten halls are located on the second floor, four more on the third. The benches are especially popular with children. On weekends, families come to the museum, and the children get tired, sometimes the little ones can even lie down on the soft benches. Elderly visitors also appreciate the recreational opportunities and often visit the permanent exhibition.
In addition to observation itself, the caretaker has other responsibilities:
“When there are no visitors, we dust off the equipment in the hall,” says Ekaterina Ivanovna. Each caretaker has his own bucket; we wipe the glass of shop windows and window sills with a damp cloth twice a week. Of course, we don’t touch the paintings, they can only be dusted researchers. I watched how they took care of the works - they put on a special soft mitten and carefully move it around the exhibit.
Sometimes the caretakers are asked questions - not everyone orders a tour, some watch the exhibition on their own, such visitors often want to clarify something, and they turn to the employee they see in the hall.
We do not have such deep knowledge as tour guides in our job responsibilities“We shouldn’t talk about the paintings,” explains Ekaterina Ivanovna. - But if we can, we answer visitors’ questions. Most of all guests are interested in: “Do you have copies or originals?” We answer that mostly in our halls we display originals, even the frames of the paintings are original. Many people ask about Empress Maria Alexandrovna, whose enormous ceremonial portrait can be seen in the hall where I work. They find out whose wife she was, I tell her that Alexander II.
TO royal family museum caretakers are not indifferent; almost everyone can tell a lot about the Romanov dynasty. They read a lot at the museum: when there are no visitors at the exhibitions, the curators are allowed books of a small format (so that they do not interfere with noticing guests in time). Ekaterina Mikhailova prefers historical novels, loves the works of Edward Radzinsky. And interest in the Romanov dynasty arose partly thanks to the portrait of the empress presented at the exhibition:
This work immediately interested me,” notes Ekaterina Ivanovna. - We also have in the museum interesting portrait Nicholas I, written before he took the throne. Impressed by the work, I took books about the Romanov dynasty from the library, read them with enthusiasm, and then shared them with my colleagues.
According to the observation of Ekaterina Mikhailova, visitors to her halls most often freeze for a long time near the portrait of the Empress and near the painting depicting a frightened peasant girl (children especially like to look at it):
Many people also like two works by the artist Pleshanov - his self-portrait and the image of a girl, they are very good-looking, but, in my opinion, this is too idealized beauty,” Ekaterina Ivanovna shares her impressions. - We have very characteristic works, for example, “Head of an Old Man”, a portrait created by an unknown author, where we see something unusual, expressive, probably once Beautiful face old man.
Ekaterina Mikhailova has been spending her working day in the same two halls for two years now. And she says that she doesn’t get bored with them at all:
- How can you get tired of such masterpieces?! - the caretaker is surprised. - I really love both the paintings presented in the halls and our entire permanent exhibition. I am glad that such a collection of works is in Tomsk, I think this is the brand of our city.
The only thing that upsets the caretaker is the too restrained attitude towards the unique collection of the Tomsk residents themselves. They don’t go to the museum very often, but city guests are delighted with the collection, and even Muscovites and St. Petersburgers, spoiled by museums, are delighted when they encounter authentic works in Tomsk famous masters. Ekaterina Mikhailova would like townspeople to value more their unique opportunity to enjoy masterpieces.
Text: Maria Anikina
32.9
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Reference
Museum or "museon" - word Greek origin, translated as “temple of the muses.” The ancient Greeks collected everything they considered valuable into this temple: paintings, statues, astronomical equipment, books, stuffed animals, medical instruments, anatomical busts and other objects of education. One could easily get lost among this diversity. To help visitors find this or that exhibit, a special person appeared in the museum - a curator.
One century followed another, the number of valuable objects increased. For comfort museum exhibits distributed by era, geographical location and purpose. The custodian's profession also changed, and new responsibilities appeared. Now the museum curator not only knew what this or that exhibit was for, but could also tell visitors about what it meant for its time, what scientific discoveries helped to accomplish. In other words, the museum worker became a guide not only through the museum, but also into history cultural heritage humanity.
Description of activity
No matter where you go, local history museum, military museum or museum fine arts, - everywhere you will be greeted first by a museum worker. From appearance employee, his ability to maintain a friendly atmosphere and smooth out conflict situations depends on the image of the museum. Therefore, students studying are required to attend master classes on creating an image and participate in trainings on conflict management.
A museum worker never gets bored. The list of responsibilities, as a rule, depends on what level of museum he serves in. There are very small museums, occupying literally one room, and there are entire galleries, museum complexes. A whole army of employees works in large storage facilities: exhibition organizers,... In museums, all these specialists are replaced by one person - a museum worker.
Employees major museums, especially state-owned ones, own several foreign languages. If you have ever visited museums in Moscow and St. Petersburg, you have probably seen that excursions are offered at various languages- from English to Chinese.
Wage
average for Russia:Moscow average:average for St. Petersburg:
Features of career growth
A museum employee must keep up with the times: explore opportunities information technologies, computer programs and applications that are actively used in museum affairs. It is important to constantly work on your memory and erudition, travel and visit museums in other cities and countries, and gain experience. Institutions additional education Regularly conduct advanced training courses for museum workers.