Reflection:

My partnership experience with PHG as a cataloguer was straightforward as I presumed. In my project outline I commented: “I think this could be interesting as I would be most likely working individually surrounded by the other staff who are focused on their own tasks,” and I was right about this as well! I usually went into the gallery and greeted everyone before quietly picking up where I left off before and working away on my own. As time went on, I noticed that I somehow just adjusted to the dynamic of the office naturally and became part of it as well. What I mean by this is that everyone was always working away at their own desks and only communicated when necessary – fairly efficient. However, this was all the more motivating because the feeling that everyone around me was concentrating made me more concentrated. It also pushed me to be independent by relying on myself so that I wouldn’t break the silent equilibrium if unnecessary. In addition, this actually allowed me to overhear and learn a lot about the planning of Polygon Gallery!!!

A funny and interesting discussion I overheard was the one where they discussed gender signs for the washrooms. They were considering creating a neutral/mixed sign for those who identified themselves different from female and male. It was a struggle because they didn’t want the sign to be so ambiguous that made people would become confused and not know that it was a sign for the washroom but they didn’t know what to use – it’s an ongoing struggle for now haha.

In that sense, I was also right about being an observer that watched from the outside to know more about the inner workings of things rather than participating hands-on, which I was used to.

In addition, from what I have observed, the gallery is really keen on having school visits and students volunteering. I think that is because that gives the gallery more exposure and by being more involved in the community through school programs, there is more validation for getting funding from the city. I don’t think there is anything super wrong with that because it is a win-win situation where the community can get involved while PHG can get necessary funding from the city to continue their activities.

Exactly what I did:

• Catalogue the PHG archive which included: magazine, books, photo journals, artist biography texts, gallery collaboration catalogues.
• The cataloguing consisted of me scanning the barcodes and (mostly) manually typing in the ISBN number, found by flipping through the books, into the online library archive.
• There were times where the barcode, ISBN, as well as the title and author’s name of the books didn’t register though. As a result, I kept track of those as well as ones that processed just fine by putting post-it notes which acted as the divider between them.

The partnership is quite flexible and Diane actually asked me when my partnership was ending because she realized that it’s the end of the term. Although I am technically done with the partnership, I told her that I would help her finish the last shelf left by doing some extra hours.

Thought about the experience: Although maintaining a gallery takes a lot of people and networking, I realize that you don’t need that many workers if you have a solid core team who are individuals that are self motivated and focused on a central goal.

Resume Lines:

Archive Cataloguing Assistant

Presentation House Gallery – September – December, 2016

My main role included organizing, handling the barcode scanner, and manually entering ISBN numbers to the catalogue the archive of PHG. I worked efficiently by having managing my time properly. I was also able to accurate with all the numbers I had to enter onto the computer by being careful and always double checking.

Images that visually illustrate the space I worked in (re-using previously posted photos – but are relevant):