About
Reexhibiting the Museum is a single-day conference which aims to shift the academic conversation away from the dominant narratives of nineteenth-century museum-making, too often centred around major national museums and galleries based in London. Instead, we want to bring together researchers working on museums and their collections across and beyond the UK, bringing new perspectives and centring new narratives.
It will explore diverse aspects of nineteenth-century museum formation, including colonialism, municipal and regional galleries, and non-museum spaces, to bring a fuller picture of museums and exhibitions — their displays and their visitors — to the historical record.
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Attendance is open to all, and tickets can be acquired via Eventbrite. Please note that attendance is free for speakers and chairs.
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Programme
Wednesday 12 November 2025
Library of Birmingham, 9:30am-8pm
9:30 – 10am Registration
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10 – 10:15am Opening remarks
Mary Clayton-Kastenholz (PhD candidate, Warburg Institute and V&A)
'Thinking beyond South Kensington’
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10:15 – 11:30am Panel 1 - Regional museums
(Chair: Dr Kate Nichols, Associate Professor in Art History, University of Birmingham)
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Frances Potts (PhD candidate, University of Nottingham)
“Wiping out a little disgrace”: the origins and early history of Nottingham Castle Museum
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Dr Anna Reeve (Research Fellow, Institute of Classical Studies, University of London)
‘The nucleus of a museum’: the short-lived Leeds Free Public Museum
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Dr Maialen Maugars (University of Warwick)
‘A treasure house of examples for reference and instruction’: innovation, progression, and accessibility at the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery
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11:30am – 12pm Tea and coffee break
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12 – 1:15pm Panel 2 – Colonial Museums
Chair: Dr Caroline Cornish (Humanities Research Coordinator, Royal Botanic Gardens)
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Anaïs Walsdorf (PhD candidate, University of Warwick and the Science Museum) & James Kiernan (PhD candidate, University of Edinburgh and Victoria and Albert Museum)
Palaces of Science, Tools of Empire: the Geological Museum in Britain and Beyond
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Polly Bence (PhD candidate, University of Bristol)
Exhibiting culture: Revealing Māori agency in Bristol
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Amalia Wickstead (PhD candidate, UCL and Ashmolean Museum)
Casting the Empire: Plaster copies of classical sculpture and colonial complicity​​​
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1:15 – 2:15pm Lunch break
​​2:15 – 3:35pm Panel 3 – Spaces of display
Chair: TBC
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Dr Rebecca Wade (Associate Curator - Cultural Collections, University of Leeds)
The Yorkshire Exhibition of Arts and Manufactures, 1875
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Dr Susan Newell (Honorary Associate of Oxford University Museum of Natural History)
William Buckland’s teaching museum: exhibiting new scientific geology at Oxford in the early nineteenth century
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Dr Katharine Ault (independent researcher)
Misattribution matters: Giotto on display in Cheltenham and Manchester
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Carys Tyson-Taylor (PhD candidate, University of Leicester and National Museums NI)
Re-imagining the Nation in the Open Air: Artur Hazelius’ Skansen and the Ethnographic Turn in Nineteenth-Century Museology
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3:35 – 4:10pm Tea and coffee break
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4:10 – 5:30pm Panel 4 – Collections and objects
Chair: Dr Oliver Cox (Head of Academic Partnerships, V&A Museum)
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Lily Crowther (PhD candidate, University of Oxford and V&A)
The ‘art-workman’ as expert: curating decorative art in the West Midlands
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Henriette Marsden (PhD candidate, University of Cambridge)
Flourishes and Fragility – Venetian Glass in Berlin’s Kunstgewerbemuseum and the Crisis of Industrial Art Institutions, 1867-1921
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Dr Lela Graybill (Associate Professor of Art History, University of Utah)
Inside the Black Museum: Evidence, Imagination, and the Testimony of Things
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Dr Rose Roberto (PhD, FHEA, Northumbria University)
W. & R. Chambers museum artefacts, publications, and the meta-museum experience
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5:30 – 6pm Break
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6 – 7pm Keynote lecture
Professor Kate Hill (Professor of History, University of Lincoln)
Museums on the periphery: Marginal people, objects and places in nineteenth-century museums
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7pm Drinks
Venue
Address
Library of Birmingham, LOB101
Centenary Square
Broad Street
Birmingham
B1 2ND
Accessibility
The Library of Birmingham is a fully accessible venue with lift access to all conference areas. An Induction loop system is available, and sensory maps of the space are provided online, alongside other accessibility measures.
More information
For more information on the venue's accessibility see Birmingham Library's access page or get in touch with us for any unanswered queries. We are committed to making Reexhibiting the Museum an inclusive and accessible event for all.
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Bursaries
We are excited to be able to offer a bursary to our presenters to aid with travel to, and accommodation in, Birmingham for the conference to ensure that there are no barriers to access for potential applicants.
Details and practicalities will be circulated to participants along with notification of a successful application, but if you have any questions in the meantime, please don't hesitate to get in touch with us via email. ​
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This event and bursaries are made possible thanks to activity funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council.
FAQs
Q: When do applications for participants close?
A: Applications should be made no later than 12 July 2025, and we will be in touch with successful applicants by 12 August 2025.
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Q: Who can apply?
A: We encourage submissions from PhD candidates, early career researchers, museum professionals, and established scholars. We welcome attendance from all!​​​​​
Committee
Mary Clayton-Kastenholz
Mary is a part-time CDP student with the V&A and the Warburg Institute. Her PhD project is a reassessment of the South Kensington Museum, looking at that institution holistically rather than as the predecessor of the 20th century V&A and Science Museums. In the other half of her week, she is the Assistant Rare Books Librarian at Lambeth Palace Library.
Dr. Maialen Maugars
Maialen recently completed her Collaborative Doctoral Award at the University of Warwick, in partnership with Birmingham Museums Trust. Her thesis focused on the acquisition, provenance, display, and reception of the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery’s collection of Italian decorative art.
Amalia Wickstead
Amalia (she/her) is a PhD candidate at UCL, co-supervised by the Ashmolean Museum through the AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Partnership scheme. Her research seeks to reassess plaster casts of Greco-Roman sculpture within nineteenth-century collections in order to highlight their role as colonial tools for the British Empire.
