The New Museum seeks an experienced Digital Archivist to lead the second phase of the museum's digital archive project. The Digital Archivist will provide leadership and strategic planning for the project, manage the museum's physical and digital assets, train staff on best practices, research and digitize materials, ensure public dissemination and develop new areas of the archive.
Working hours will be 40 hours/week, 10:00 - 6:00 p.m., Monday through Friday. The position reports to Deputy Director and works closely with Information Technology Manager, Curatorial, Education and, External Affairs departments. NEW MUSEUM DIGITAL ARCHIVE (background) http://archive.newmuseum.org Founded in 1977 by Marcia Tucker as an alternative museum site, the New Museum has been an important platform for emerging theories, cultural debate, and early exposure and scholarly treatment for important yet under recognized figures in contemporary art over the last 34 years. Our acclaimed solo exhibitions and landmark group shows define key moments in contemporary art history, the evolution of contemporary art institutions, and reflect the global nature of art today. Unlike most museum digital archives whose purpose is primarily focused on object collections, the New Museum's Digital Archive is a groundbreaking project to archive the programmatic history of an institution - what an art museum did, not what it owns. Over the past 5 years the museum has been developing a digital archive of the programmatic activity of the institution -exhibitions, public programs, performances and publications encompassing its 34 year history. The digital archive currently contains over 7000 images and documents, 200 audio recordings, 60 videos, 45 publications and over 4000 artists, curators and authors associated with New Museum. Phase I of the Archive has accomplished the following. 1) Established infrastructure and meta-data structures, 2) Digitized and imported primary materials 3) Launched public website and internal interface. The archive was built and developed in Collective Access software, an open source code and database system and uses modified Dublin-core metadata standards. RESPONSIBILITIES * Preserve the New Museum's history that would otherwise be lost or inaccessible by organizing and cataloging our current physical and digital assets; * Research and digitize materials, manage the selection of the appropriate formats, and ensure that all items are properly encoded within the archive; * Contribute to the development, digitization and implementation of new digital archive areas not in Phase I including, institutional history, building architecture, and educational materials, including curriculum and teaching guides; * Continue to research and import comprehensive audio, visual, and textual digital materials on the Museum's exhibitions, performances, publications and public programs of the past 34 years according to a prioritized matrix of assets. Phase I includes approximately 40% of the possible assets for the archive and additional materials are to enrich and amplify existing asset categories; * Organize, catalogue and classify existing physical and digital materials to be used internally and externally; * Create procedures, train staff, and establish a sustainable work flow for the maintenance of the digital archive into the future; * Establish and manage an archive internship program working with local university undergraduate and graduate programs. Supervising in-house digitization process, data entry and application of criteria; * Ensure the Archive is widely disseminated to the public-universities, libraries, archivists, scholars and museum professionals by establishing digital links and participating in professional forums, panels and discussions. GENERAL QUALIFICATIONS Candidates must have Master's degree in Library and Information Science or equivalent. Candidates must have 2 to 5 years experience in the digital archive field. In addition to technical skills below, applicants must possess excellent written and verbal skills and ability to provide leadership within a collaborative environment. Knowledge of contemporary art history and previous work experience within museum or cultural non-profit art environment preferred. TECHNICAL QUALIFICATIONS Thorough knowledge, aptitude and experience with database systems commonly employed for digital archives. Working knowledge of Collective Access in particular extremely helpful. Knowledge of software programs such as Adobe Photoshop, Final Cut Pro video editing beneficial. Programming knowledge in PHP a plus. SALARY: Competitive salary including full benefits with healthcare insurance. PLEASE E-MAIL RESUME TO: jhatfield at newmuseum.org NO PHONE CALLS PLEASE. The New Museum is an affirmative action/equal opportunity employer.
