SOLD! The Year of the Dealer: Antique Dealers, Art Markets and Museums

The art market and its practices has attracted increasing attention from academics in recent years, it also continues to fascinate the general public. Within the broader structures of the art market 'antiques' remains an immensely popular subject, with TV programmes such as the 'Antiques Roadshow' regularly in the top viewing figures and one cannot ignore the scores of other programmes from 'Bargain Hunt' to 'Lovejoy' that reveal, and mythologise, the practices of the antique trade and the figure of the antique dealer. And yet the history of the antique trade, an awareness of its practices, and a clear understanding of the role of the antique trade in the complex and shifting landscape of our fascination with antiques remains an obscure and little understood cultural phenomenon. In the museum world, the history of antique dealers in the biography of museum objects has often been supressed or dislocated from the interpretation of museum objects in the public domain. The proposed 'Year of the Dealer' project aims to direct renewed attention to the history of the antique trade in the development of public museums and the significance of the antique trade in British cultural life.

The project is based on the AHRC research project 'Antique Dealers: the British Antique Trade in the 20th century, a cultural geography' (2013-2016) and draws on the rich research resources that the project assembled, including 36 oral history interviews (more than 100 hours of archive), 8 major dealer archives and an active community of more than 30 volunteers working on data input into the project websites and on cataloguing and conservation of dealer archives. The 'Year of the Dealer' aims to co-produce innovative museum interpretation materials, to engage stakeholders in the themes that have emerged as a result of the research project and to disseminate and embed key research findings in the wider public domain. We aim to reveal the potential for new and previously hidden stories to be told about world-renowned and familiar museum objects and to demonstrate the potential for the adoption of the new narratives in public museum interpretation on a national and international scale.
Over the course of one year the project team and the well established community of project volunteers will work in collaboration with 6 national and regional museums (The V&A, National Museum, Scotland, The Ashmolean Museum, The Lady Lever Art Gallery, The Bowes Museum, and Temple Newsam), a university art gallery, a community theatre and a leading antique dealer business to deliver an innovative programme of museum interpretation interventions, exhibitions, workshops and public events, training workshops and a high profile theatre performance.
The project outcomes will include 6 individual 'hidden history' trails of up to 20 objects in the collections of major museum partners; a series of 4 individually designed workshops based on key questions that have emerged on the relationships between museums and the art market, co-produced with museum partners; a series of 3 public engagement 'In Conversation' events at 3 of the partner museums; staff and volunteer training workshops at each partner museum; a small-scale 3 month exhibition reuniting dealer archives with museum objects and an associated archives workshop; a high-profile, public performance of the play 'Quinneys', led by student actors and directed by a leading academic in theatre directing; an associated participatory workshop, led by a leading academic in theatre and performance; both play and workshop foreground themes of which are central to the construction of the social and cultural identity of the antique dealer.
This rich series of activities, managed and disseminated through a dedicated project website, aims to facilitate a permanent shift in the potential for new interpretations of public museum objects and engage a variety of stakeholders and the public in the results of the research project

The Year of the Dealer project aims to inculcate a permanent shift in the interpretation of objects in public museums and to engage museums, the public and art market professionals with the significance of the history of the antique trade in Britian. The project has considerable support from collaborating partner organisations, more than £63,000 of 'In-Kind' support, which is a testament to the value that they have assigned to the project. We have consulted closely with all our partners to develop the programme of activities and events.
The Key Impact Beneficiaries will be:
1. Partner Museum staff, who will be better informed about the history of the antique trade in Britain and the history and significance of dealers associated with their respective museums; enhanced resources for object interpretations will enable new narratives for well-known museum objects; co-production will enhance cross-institutional dialogue with and between national and regional museums; the workshops will enable shared perspectives from stakeholders.
2. The General Public, who will have an enhanced visitor experience in the 6 partner museums through the 'hidden history' trails; enhanced engagement as participants in the 'In Conversation' events staged at 3 public museum venues and via restaging the play 'Quinneys' and associated workshop.
3. The professional British antique trade, whose business will benefit from increased exposure of their history; discussion and dialogue with museum professionals, academics, students and the public will enable shared perspectives.
4. Museum volunteer communities and University student volunteers at UG, TPG and PGR levels, through enhanced engagement with a key research project and through skills training on research impact capture and evaluation and mentoring opportunities.
5. Theatre professionals, theatre and performance students, through enhanced creative practice and expertise in theatre performance.
6. Academic staff, who will benefit from the collaborative dialogue with a wide range of partners from the museum world, the performance and theatre world, the art business world and the general public.

Our approach to Impact is to embed continual assessment and impact data capture as an integral part of the project. Impact will be developed, monitored, recorded, assessed, and archived by PI/CI and museum-based admin post and our small team of trained volunteer researchers (travel and subsistence for up to 4 UG/PG volunteers is part of the funding bid). We aim to undertake interviews, develop online surveys embedded in the project website, and run focus group sessions with key stakeholders at various points in the project. All activities will conform to university ethical code of practice for research procedures and requirements. Specialist training in surveys, focus groups and interviews are already part of the existing research team and will be made available to the impact capture volunteers. Our partner organisations may also run their own museum visitor surveys to assess the effectiveness of the proposed museum trails and the performance of 'Quinney's' and the associated workshop at Bowes Museum; such information will be made available to the project.

We plan to record specific events for podcasts, hosted by the project website - the 'In Conversation' events; the re-staging of 'Quinneys'; aspects of the 'Dealing with Authenticity' workshop, to ensure enhanced dissemination and public engagement with the project and to allow impact to endure beyond the events themselves.

A dissemination plan for national publicity and public engagement is being developed with key organisations such as the British Antique Dealers' Association (BADA), The Antique Dealers' Association (LAPADA), The International Antique Dealers Association (CINOA) and with project media partners such as Apollo Magazine and The Art Newspaper; the 'SOLD!' exhibition at Bowes Museum will aggregate and amplify media attention.