Curator Administer collections, such as artwork, collectibles, historic items, or scientific specimens of museums or other institutions. May conduct instructional, research, or public service activities of institution.
Curator is Also Know as
In different settings, Curator is titled as
- Collections Curator
- Collections Manager
- Curator
- Education Curator
- Exhibitions Curator
- Exhibits Curator
- Museum Curator
- Photography Curator
- Vertebrate Zoology Curator
Education and Training of Curator
Curator is categorized in Job Zone Five: Extensive Preparation Needed
Experience Required for Curator
Extensive skill, knowledge, and experience are needed for these occupations. Many require more than five years of experience. For example, surgeons must complete four years of college and an additional five to seven years of specialized medical training to be able to do their job.
Education Required for Curator
Most of these occupations require graduate school. For example, they may require a master's degree, and some require a Ph.D., M.D., or J.D. (law degree).
Degrees Related to Curator
- Bachelor in Museology/Museum Studies
- Associate Degree Courses in Museology/Museum Studies
- Masters Degree Courses in Museology/Museum Studies
- Bachelor in Digital Humanities and Textual Studies, General
- Associate Degree Courses in Digital Humanities and Textual Studies, General
- Masters Degree Courses in Digital Humanities and Textual Studies, General
- Bachelor in Digital Humanities
- Associate Degree Courses in Digital Humanities
- Masters Degree Courses in Digital Humanities
- Bachelor in Textual Studies
- Associate Degree Courses in Textual Studies
- Masters Degree Courses in Textual Studies
- Bachelor in Art History, Criticism and Conservation
- Associate Degree Courses in Art History, Criticism and Conservation
- Masters Degree Courses in Art History, Criticism and Conservation
- Bachelor in Public/Applied History
- Associate Degree Courses in Public/Applied History
- Masters Degree Courses in Public/Applied History
Training Required for Curator
Employees may need some on-the-job training, but most of these occupations assume that the person will already have the required skills, knowledge, work-related experience, and/or training.
Related Ocuupations
Some Ocuupations related to Curator in different industries are
- Archivists
- Historians
- Museum Technicians and Conservators
- Anthropology and Archeology Teachers, Postsecondary
- Librarians and Media Collections Specialists
- Anthropologists and Archeologists
- Art Directors
- History Teachers, Postsecondary
- Library Science Teachers, Postsecondary
- Set and Exhibit Designers
- Library Technicians
- Art, Drama, and Music Teachers, Postsecondary
- Area, Ethnic, and Cultural Studies Teachers, Postsecondary
- English Language and Literature Teachers, Postsecondary
- Architecture Teachers, Postsecondary
- Instructional Coordinators
- Library Assistants, Clerical
- Social Science Research Assistants
- Editors
- Public Relations Specialists
What Do Curator do?
- Develop and maintain an institution's registration, cataloging, and basic record-keeping systems, using computer databases.
- Provide information from the institution's holdings to other curators and to the public.
- Inspect premises to assess the need for repairs and to ensure that climate and pest control issues are addressed.
- Train and supervise curatorial, fiscal, technical, research, and clerical staff, as well as volunteers or interns.
- Negotiate and authorize purchase, sale, exchange, or loan of collections.
- Plan and conduct special research projects in area of interest or expertise.
- Confer with the board of directors to formulate and interpret policies, to determine budget requirements, and to plan overall operations.
- Attend meetings, conventions, and civic events to promote use of institution's services, to seek financing, and to maintain community alliances.
- Schedule events and organize details, including refreshment, entertainment, decorations, and the collection of any fees.
- Write and review grant proposals, journal articles, institutional reports, and publicity materials.
- Study, examine, and test acquisitions to authenticate their origin, composition, history, and to assess their current value.
- Arrange insurance coverage for objects on loan or for special exhibits and recommend changes in coverage for the entire collection.
- Establish specifications for reproductions and oversee their manufacture or select items from commercially available replica sources.
- Plan and organize the acquisition, storage, and exhibition of collections and related materials, including the selection of exhibition themes and designs, and develop or install exhibit materials.
- Design, organize, or conduct tours, workshops, and instructional or educational sessions to acquaint individuals with an institution's facilities and materials.
Qualities of Good Curator
- Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
- Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
- Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
- Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
- Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
- Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
- Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
- Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
- Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
- Problem Sensitivity: The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
- Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
- Originality: The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
- Information Ordering: The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
- Fluency of Ideas: The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
- Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
- Flexibility of Closure: The ability to identify or detect a known pattern (a figure, object, word, or sound) that is hidden in other distracting material.
- Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
- Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
- Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
- Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
- Time Sharing: The ability to shift back and forth between two or more activities or sources of information (such as speech, sounds, touch, or other sources).
- Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
- Perceptual Speed: The ability to quickly and accurately compare similarities and differences among sets of letters, numbers, objects, pictures, or patterns. The things to be compared may be presented at the same time or one after the other. This ability also includes comparing a presented object with a remembered object.
- Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
- Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
- Arm-Hand Steadiness: The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
- Trunk Strength: The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without "giving out" or fatiguing.
- Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
- Finger Dexterity: The ability to make precisely coordinated movements of the fingers of one or both hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble very small objects.
- Manual Dexterity: The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
- Depth Perception: The ability to judge which of several objects is closer or farther away from you, or to judge the distance between you and an object.
- Multilimb Coordination: The ability to coordinate two or more limbs (for example, two arms, two legs, or one leg and one arm) while sitting, standing, or lying down. It does not involve performing the activities while the whole body is in motion.
- Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
- Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
- Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
- Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
- Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
- Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
- Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
- Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
- Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
- Response Orientation: The ability to choose quickly between two or more movements in response to two or more different signals (lights, sounds, pictures). It includes the speed with which the correct response is started with the hand, foot, or other body part.
- Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
- Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
- Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.
- Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
- Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
- Rate Control: The ability to time your movements or the movement of a piece of equipment in anticipation of changes in the speed and/or direction of a moving object or scene.
- Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
- Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
Tools Used by Curator
- Claw hammers
- Desktop computers
- Digital cameras
- Digitizers
- Handheld digital thermometers
- Laptop computers
- Light meters
- Mat cutters
- Paint brushes
- Personal computers
- Power drills
- Precision knives
- Precision levels
- Precision rulers
- Scanners
- Slotted screwdrivers
- T squares
- Two way radios
- Utility knives
Technology Skills required for Curator
- Adobe Acrobat
- Adobe Creative Suite
- Adobe FreeHand MX
- Adobe Illustrator
- Adobe InDesign
- Adobe Photoshop
- Apple macOS
- Artsystems Collections
- Autodesk AutoCAD
- Corel WordPerfect Office Suite
- Cuadra Associates STAR/Museums
- Database software
- Desktop publishing software
- Eloquent Systems Eloquent
- Ex Libris Group DigiTool
- Extensible markup language XML
- FileMaker Pro
- Gallery Systems EmbARK
- Gallery Systems The Museum System
- Graphics software
- KE Software EMu
- Linux
- Microsoft Access
- Microsoft Excel
- Microsoft Office software
- Microsoft Outlook
- Microsoft Paint
- Microsoft PowerPoint
- Microsoft Visual Studio
- Microsoft Word
- MINISIS MINT
- PastPerfect Software PastPerfect
- Perl
- Python
- Questor Systems ARGUS
- R
- Re:discovery Software Proficio
- SAS
- Scheduling software
- Social media sites
- Structure query language SQL
- Vernon Systems Limited Vernon CMS
- Web browser software
- Willoughby Associates MIMSY XG
- Word processing software