Claire Madge Interview
I spoke to Claire Madge – Consultant, Researcher, Writer – about her interests, her career path, her blog (Tincture of Museum) and consultancy (Autism in Museums) and her approach of advocating for accessibility in museums. She also offered many useful advice to me and to people starting at the museum/arts sector. I hope this conversation will help other emerging museum professionals to think and be more accessible and inclusive in their practice. Find out more about Claire and her amazing work!
I feel I had a bit of a weird journey where I’ve fallen into a lot of different things throughout my career. I did a degree in History as I’ve always loved history. Then I worked for a year at the Financial Times as a Graduate Trainee. Afterwards, I went back to university and did an MA in Library and Information Studies, but I was never really a traditional librarian. I worked at a law firm, the London School of Economics, then went back to the Financial Times as a researcher, and I worked there for quite a few years. I realise when I look back that I’ve enjoyed research and finding out information. During this time, I had my kids, started our family, and worked alongside it part-time which was quite a balancing act. Then when my daughter was six or seven, she was diagnosed on the autism spectrum. It was a really difficult time because she didn’t want to go to school, and I was finding things difficult to manage. At this time, I realised that I wasn’t enjoying my job; I was doing it because it was flexible with the kids. Also sadly, my father-in-law passed away, but he left us a little bit of money so working part-time wasn’t the most important thing, so I decided to take a step back and concentrate on the kids. I thought I would start a Twitter account (when Twitter was still good), write a blog and volunteer. It was quite challenging with my daughter and my parents kindly offered to watch the kids for me one day a week so I could go off and do something for myself. So, I started volunteering in my local museum and that is really where my museum interest/blogging and consultancy idea all started.
At the museum, they were working on a National Lottery Heritage project, and I got a bit involved in that. Then I met someone from the Museum of London who was doing a project that sounded really interesting, so I applied for it. They ran a Volunteer Inclusion Project at the time where they brought together people from different backgrounds to work on archaeology projects – and I wrote about that. That’s where my blogging started. I was writing about being a volunteer and seeing the other side of museums and what happens behind the scenes.
Then I wrote a blog about us (as a family) going to the Science Museum for an Early Birds relaxed opening for autistic families. That was the first time we visited the Science Museum altogether. I wasn’t aware of anywhere else that did that kind of event, and I wrote about that. I found it difficult to write about that (us) because it was quite personal. Everything I’d written up to that point hadn’t been about me and my family. Interestingly, so many people read that blog post and it went viral for its time. I’ve only had a few views on my blogs before and that had about 1000 views in a day and read around 8000 times. It made me realise that so many families had similar experiences to us and can’t go to museums. Based on the interest in my blog post, museums started to get in touch and say that they read my blog and asked me how they could be more accessible. Autism in Museums started from there really, and I helped a lot of people over the years. Initially I did it all for free, but I just got inundated with requests and got exhausted doing it. I’ve built up quite a lot of knowledge over the years working with different types of organisations and that gave me the courage, knowledge, and experience to turn Autism in Museums into a consultancy. Lots of things were going on that were interconnected. Through the consultancy, I was speaking to families about their experiences as we were working on visual stories for the Science Museum. At that time, I was also on the National Lottery Heritage Fund panel looking at projects. I also won awards for volunteering. I feel that through the projects, training sessions with Kids in Museums and the blogs, I was getting a wider view of what was happening in museums.
In the early days of Autism in Museums, people just wanted to have a chat. I was happy to do so; I would share what it was like as a parent, but also how important it is for museums to speak to other families who have autistic children or children with additional needs because my experience isn’t the same as everyone else’s. They need to make sure to talk to lots of people as people have different needs.
We did a Museum Marathon and raised some money for Autism in Museums and through that we gave away free sensory bundles of equipment to museums, I had a panel of young autistic people decide who should get what. We had some money left over and I spoke to National Museums Liverpool, and they offered me a training room for free and I gave a free training session on Autism in Museums. That was my first experience of training, and it gave me confidence to share my knowledge and experiences. It was from there that I began to work with Kids in Museums offering a more in-depth training session with case studies. I don’t think I was a natural trainer, so I’ve learned as I’ve gone along. I would evaluate the sessions and see what I could do to make them better. I always wanted it to be practical and useful. A lot of it was about giving staff confidence to not have this fear that you’re going to do the wrong thing. I think often it’s much better to give it a go and learn as you go. Evaluation is key to making it better. During lockdown, we ran a lot of online Zoom training to museums in England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, that was a real highlight spreading autism awareness across the country. I also wrote a resource for Kids in Museums which you can find on their website.
I think museums wanted me to be a middleman to talk to the community and build trust. You can see museums having roles like community producer or community connector now; they realised that it takes a lot of time and energy to build close relationships with community groups. It is great to see museums now prioritise hiring someone purposely to make those connections strong, otherwise, you have a short project working with a community group then the connections lapse and you must start again from scratch.
Originally when I started the blog Tincture of Museum all my posts were in one place. There was quite a bit of crossover of exhibitions and museums I visited which I reviewed and the blogs about accessibility. When I started Autism in Museums and made it into a consultancy, I pulled all that information out and put it in its own standalone place. That’s when the Tincture of Museum became slightly separated, however, there is no escaping seeing the accessibility needs and lack of sensory engagement offered by museums. Recently I went to a fashion exhibition, all about clothing, all about material and nothing to touch or feel. I think so many museums are missing out on ways to engage people in a sensory way.
Recently I had to rethink the consultancy due to lack of time and energy. My family has needed me, and I have had to prioritise them. I’ve reassessed a lot of what I’ve been doing and taken a bit of a step back from it all, which is quite hard. But it’s been quite interesting because I’ve taken a different approach this last year. I organised a meeting with a lot of the people I’ve helped in London to get them together. There are so many people doing great work now which is brilliant because when I started there were only a couple of museums. I realised how many people I’ve worked with, and I decided to get them all together and tell them that I am stepping back from consultancy and encouraging them to start talking and helping each other as they are all doing brilliant work. It was supposed to be for a one-off meeting, but everyone was asking if we could do it again so now I’m now organising quarterly meetups. It’s about bringing people together and they talk about what they’re doing, which might be a specialised program that they run outside of regular hours or making the everyday visit more accessible. There has been a whole range of people coming from learning teams and learning producers, but we’ve also got front-of-house and operations people. We’ve had museums that I’ve worked with, but we’ve also had London Zoo, the Houses of Parliament and organisations that aren’t museums. I’m really pleased it’s broadened out. We just had our 4th meeting and we had 17 people come from 9 different organisations. While it’s not the same as 1-2-1 consultancy, I feel that it’s going well and maybe it’s just about a different approach and a new iteration. I think Autism in Museums is still evolving and changing and by bringing people together so they can hear each other and learn from others. A big issue with what I am doing is making it sustainable and maybe this approach is a new way to embed change. I feel it’s really important to have different case studies and people who are doing accessibility work talking about their work, we are all learning from each other, and it is a safe space to ask questions and get help.
Alongside the Meet Ups, I currently share a monthly newsletter about Autism in Museums, and I update an events calendar highlighting various relaxed openings at museums for families on the website I also share blogs by museums professionals on their autism work. I still keep Tincture of Museum going as a separate website where I review exhibitions and museums. I love getting a chance to keep learning from all the wonderful stories that museums share.
I think there is a huge amount of crossover with accessibility work. When you embed accessibility in a museum you are not just doing it for one group of people, it is a much wider approach. It’s a layered approach, it might be specific events or a museum wide approach to accessibility that has an impact every day for every visitor. For example, if you do a visual story, have a space to chill out, more seats, and tactile objects they can support neurodivergent visitors or visitors living with dementia. There are lots of things you can do to make museums more inclusive and accessible but there are lots of crossovers. Never forget that small changes can have a big impact. I think my approach has always been to learn wherever and whatever I can. Going to exhibitions helps me because I get to see a lot of different perspectives and aspects.
My advice for people in the museum sector or emerging professionals is:
- Listening is so important! I interviewed museum directors during COVID and listening to them was fascinating. Their thoughts and approach were very interesting. Go to free events and listen to different people, don’t be afraid to approach someone and ask for their time and ask your questions. People generally are friendly and helpful within the sector and most likely would have time for a coffee and chat with you.
- Your network is really important, it takes time to build it and nourish it but over time you realise you have an amazing set of people around you. Support and inspire each other!
- Take opportunities. Volunteering has a part to play it provides an opportunity to meet new people and develop new skills. It is a balance; good volunteering provides good learning opportunities.
- Take advantage of organised networks. For example, the Yorkshire Accessible Museums Network is a useful network to join and hear about the amazing work people are doing and it is free to join their zoom meetings. If you’re at a museum and you see they’re doing an event and it sounds interesting, then ask if you can join. I’ve learned a lot just by observing and going along and seeing what other people are doing.
- Think of accessibility and inclusion every day! Even if it doesn’t feel like that’s your focus, it should be in everyone’s focus. It should be a core part of everything you do.
Hugs and Buttons 