country
activities

Country Director
Paul H. Elicker

Consultants
James C. Armstrong, Martis Davis, Wayne Harvey, Jay Levenson, Jack McAuliffe, Gary Osland, Jillian Poole, Jane Safer, Julian Spalding, Mary Delle Stelzer, Cathy Sterling, Sally Yerkovich

Activities Summary

Management Handbook

In 1999, The Fund completed a management handbook: Managing for Money: A Handbook for International Cultural Institutions. The book is designed to serve as a tool for international institutions adjusting to more liberalized economic conditions. The book encapsulates many of the principles that Fund consultants have attempted to convey over the years to the arts and cultural audiences that have sought our help. The handbook has been received with great enthusiasm in Russia. The State Russian Museum prepared an initial, simply reproduced version and this winter The International Charitable Foundation for the Renaissance of St. Petersburg-Leningrad, an organization headed by Alexander Margolis, financed the publication of the text in Russian. The Fund met with the U.S. Consulate to discuss a request from these two organizations for printing an additional 10,000 copies of the handbook.

Russian Seminars

Sally Yerkovich and Jillian Poole addressed the major annual assembly of regional museum directors in St. Petersburg in May. In September, The Fund conducted regional seminars under the auspices of the State Russian Museum in the Tyumen Province of Russia and in Saratov on the Volga River. These seminars represented the 9th and 10th regional programs offered by The Fund in conjunction with the Russian Museum since we initiated the concept four years ago. The seminars were made possible by the generous support of The Trust for Mutual Understanding and The Getty Grant Program.

The format for the seminars was similar in content and form to previous seminars however two factors added a new dimension. Managing for Money: A Handbook for International Cultural Institutions was made available to the seminar participants. It served as a text, enhancing participants’ understanding of the principles covered in the seminars. In Saratov, the Deputy Director of the Yaroslavl Museum who, being quite familiar now with the seminar format, joined Fund experts in presenting the material. We plan to have similar Russian involvement in future Fund seminars.

One participant in Saratov summed up the seminar experience this way, "As a result of the seminars we have become more free in our minds". We couldn’t have hoped for more.

Future Plans

The Fund has been invited by the State Russian Museum to participate in several projects in 2000. The Museum has asked that a Fund expert participate as a major presenter at a conference on 20th Century Art and that The Fund provide a museum director to lead discussion at the annual meeting of regional museum directors from throughout Russia. Both of these events are scheduled for June. The Russian Museum also requested The Fund to conduct management training seminars similar to those held in past years to museum officials in Perm and Yakutsk. Additionally, The International Charitable Foundation for the Renaissance of St. Petersburg-Leningrad has asked us to conduct a Master Class on Exhibit Design for all the museums of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad oblast later in the year. We have indicated our interest and willingness to help on all of these projects.

Reports:

Seminar report, Tyumen Province
Seminar report, Saratov