Present day
18-05-17
The Fundación Gondra Barandiarán becomes a member of the Board of Trustees of the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum
The Fundación Gondra Barandiarán becomes a member of the Board of Trustees of the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum and signs a collaborative agreement for the award of new training grants and the organisation of the first Gondra Barandiarán-Museum Summer Course
4th Gondra Barandiarán Grants
Among the founding aims of the Fundación Gondra Barandiarán is the development and promotion of activities focused on culture, education and the creation of thought through the award of funding for training in all fields of knowledge. This objective is reflected in the agreement reached between the Fundación and the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum, two institutions which have been working together since 2014 with the shared aim of promoting training and of introducing young adults to the world of work through the Gondra Barandiarán-Museum Grants programme.
Since that date and in the three years in which this funding been awarded, 23 young people have received training grants sponsored by the Fundación and coordinated in terms of their implementation by the museum. These grants have allowed recipients to acquire new skills over the course of their 9 months duration, working in different areas of museum management represented by the departments of Collections, Exhibitions, Publications, Administration, Library and Archive, among others. The programme thus offers a learning process in a real working environment through training and the gaining of new experiences which complete knowledge previously acquired during academic studies.
The opening date for applications for this 4th year of Gondra Barandiarán-Museum grants is today, 18 May (more information at: https://www.museobilbao.com/empleos-becas.php), coinciding with the celebration of International Museums Day.
Up to now the results of this programme have been exceptionally satisfactory both for the Fundación and the museum due to the resulting contribution to the founding aims of both institutions and from the perspective of all those who have received these grants and who have been able to expand their professional curriculum in a historic institution with the level of cultural experience of the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum
1st Summer Course New Narratives. New Museographies
This relationship between the Fundación and the museum has now been strengthened with the signing of the collaborative agreement through which the Fundación Gondra Barandiarán joins the Board of Trustees of the Fundación Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, the museum's maximum governing body. Board members include institutional representatives – the City Council of Bilbao, the Provincial Council of Bizkaia and the Basque Government – as well as other individuals or entities whose contribution to the museum or knowledge of its activities may assist in the achievement of its founding aims.
This agreement involves a commitment between the Fundación and the museum to maintain and improve the quality of the Gondra Barandiarán-Museum Grants programme. It also sets out the bases for the first edition of the Gondra Barandiarán-Museum Summer Course, which will also count on the participation of the Universidad de Duesto.
As a result, and for the first time in the museum's history, the academic year 2017-2018 will see the development of an academic programme which, with the title New Narratives. New Museographies, will offer a monographic focus on the study and analysis of new trends in museography today.
Once a year leading international specialists will be invited to analyse issues relating to the manner of exhibiting, presenting and exploiting the full potential of works of art from the viewpoint of the most innovative tendencies. There will be an in-depth focus on topics ranging from narrative strategies adapted to a wide range of audiences to the new technologies applied to museum curatorship, education and dissemination.
Over the course of a week artists, art historians, museum directors, architects, designers and other specialists will take part in lectures and round tables, sharing their expert knowledge on ways of exhibiting and displaying works of art.
This course has an enrolment fee. The Fundación Gondra Barandiarán will fund attendance for a group of no more than 20 students (including the 7 museum grant students associated with its grant programme) and will provide academic accreditation for this activity at postgraduate level through its collaborative agreement with the Universidad de Deusto.
This new activity aims to make the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum a reference point for academic reflection and training within the specialist field of modern museology. This is a little known field of knowledge in Spain and one that can only be successfully promoted and developed within the context of an institution such as the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum.