Assistant Registrar at The Museum of the City of New York

Description

The Museum of the City of New York celebrates and interprets the city, educating the public about its distinctive character, especially its heritage of diversity, opportunity, and perpetual transformation.  Founded in 1923 as a private, nonprofit corporation, the Museum connects the past, present, and future of New York City.  It serves the people of New York and visitors from around the world through exhibitions, school and public programs, publications, and collections.

The Museum believes that traditional hiring practices have historically and systemically marginalized entire groups of people including people of color, people of different socio-economic backgrounds, women, people with disabilities, people in the LGBTQ community and veterans, to name a few. We strongly believe as an organization in deconstructing barriers and building a team that authentically represents the diverse communities, and backgrounds of New York City. We strongly encourage applications from people with these identities or who are members of other marginalized groups. 

The Museum seeks an Assistant Registrar, to work directly with the Registrar in maintaining the intellectual control of both the City Museum’s collections objects and those loaned to the Museum for exhibition. The position reports directly to the Registrar, and works closely with curators, exhibitions designers, and preparators.

Roles and Responsibilities:

• Under the supervision of the Registrar, assist with intellectual and physical control and care of art objects including loans, collection objects, and courier needs in conjunction with a rigorous schedule of long-term and temporary exhibitions.
• Assist Registrar and independently manage all logistics for incoming loans, including the shipment of objects locally, domestically, and internationally.
• Assist Registrar and independently oversee exhibition installation, rotations, and deinstallation.
• Generate and maintain physical and digital documents such as loan agreements, condition repots, object receipts, and certificates of insurance.
• Assist Registrar with logistics for outgoing loans, including the shipment of collection objects locally, domestically, and internationally, including tracking all collections objects sent for conservation.
• Act as courier for loans, as needed (domestic travel required at times).
• Work in concert with appropriate staff to contribute to the ongoing process of cataloguing and rehousing collection objects and incoming acquisitions.
• Assist Registrar with collections conservation, including oversight of budgets and payment of invoices.
• Act as collection liaison at the off-site facility for both in-house curatorial access to objects for exhibition planning, reviewing and vetting exhibition checklists, evaluating condition as necessary, as well as for external inquiries as deemed appropriate by the Director of Collections.
• Assist Registrar as needed with all aspects of the off-site storage facility, including monitoring climate conditions and warehouse activity, and work with Facilities to maintain appropriate conditions as needed.
• Schedule and oversee contract workers, such as art handlers, for special projects.
• Other duties as assigned.

Please email your resume and cover letter to the Museum of the City of New York Attention: Human Resources Department to jobs@mcny.org.   To be considered, please include Assistant Registrar the subject line of your email. Please state desired salary in the email. 

Requirements

Qualifications

• Master’s degree in museum studies with a specialty in collections administration, or equivalent museum collections experience.
• A minimum of two years of experience in an art or history museum is required, along with demonstrated knowledge of collections care and management.
• The ability to coordinate and manage multiple, often complicated, concurrent projects.
• Demonstrated attention to detail.
• The ability to develop, implement, and track project and departmental budgets.
• Strong understanding of proper documentation for acquisitions, collections objects, loans, and other administrative functions.
• Knowledge of appropriate care, handling, and storage for a wide range of formats.

To Apply:

Please email your resume and cover letter to the Museum of the City of New York Attention: Human Resources Department to jobs@mcny.org.   To be considered, please include Assistant Registrar the subject line of your email. Please state desired salary in the email.