Our Global Neighbours: Baohua LI and Yikun LI at the Australian Museum

  • Author(s)
    Dr Stan Florek
  • Category
    Science
  • Published
    27 June 2017
  • Read time
    2 minutes

Chinese students explain the elements of Chinese culture in our collection.

GLAM+ Alliance is a cultural initiative by the University of New South Wales “to raise the distinctive international profile of arts and culture in Sydney by fostering collaboration across the Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums (GLAM)”

“GLAM+ brings together Sydney’s premier cultural organizations to develop collaborative research, development and advocacy initiatives that are beyond the capability of individual organizations.”

Within this framework, the Art and Design (School), formerly COFA, at the University of New South Wales encourages students to undertake collaborative projects with participating organisations.

Baohua LI and Yikun LI are two international students from China, enrolled at the “Master of Curating and Cultural Leadership” course. They elected to collaborate with the Australian Museum and for their major project focus on its small collection of Chinese artefacts. The result is an illustrated bi-lingual presentation, written in Chinese and English.

Baohua and Yikun’s idea is to make some elements of Chinese culture more familiar and accessible to non-Chinese audiences, as well as help Chinese visitors in Sydney to engage with the Australian Museum, initially through part of the Collection that is familiar and perhaps more enticing.

Baohua and Yikun believe that creating links via cultural familiarity fosters a desire to engage and develop understanding between people from diverse cultures, language backgrounds and philosophical traditions.

This project was supported and co-supervised by:

Deborah Turnbull Tillman – educator and doctoral candidate at the Creative Robotics Lab in the National Institute of Experimental Arts, Art & Design, at the University of New South Wales.

Kate Dunn – practising artist and Lecturer at Art & Design, at the University of New South Wales.

Dr Stan Florek - Database Manager, Cultural Collections, at the Australian Museum.

Explanation:

GLAM + Alliance members include Art Gallery of NSW, Artspace, Australian Centre for Photography, Australia National Maritime Museum, Australian Museum, Carriageworks, Museums Australia, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences, Museums & Galleries NSW, National Art School, Australian Design Centre, Royal Botanic Gardens, State Library of NSW and Sydney Opera House.

Please help to evaluate our project, thank you, Baohua and Yikun.