I have always been more intrigued by the 95% of things hidden in the back rooms of a museum or art gallery than the highlights on display (I rather like those things too) but to have access to collection material not readily available to the public is something I covet. It is very hard to lose me in a museum. As a conservator, I’ve spent my professional life caring for artwork and you will find me literally centimeters away from a display trying to determine how something was made, what it looks like in microscopic detail or how it has been installed.

To me, museums are the ultimate reflection of our cultural traditions and value system. Why was that particular object acquired? Why is it significant? What story does it tell? Museums and art galleries are repositories of what we value or historically valued as a society, and they act as safe houses for those cultural traditions. The collections held are like time capsules that represent intellectual movements, philosophies and ways of thinking in the era they were made.