Tiffany Noyce | Senior Registrar, Exhibitions
By The Last Word
Artlines | 4-2021 | December 2021
Every issue, Artlines invites an artist, curator or friend of the Gallery to share their practice and passions with us. Here, Artlines spoke with Tiffany Noyce, QAGOMA’s Senior Registrar, Exhibitions, whose work with the Registration team has seen her involved in presenting nine iterations of the APT.
What is the role of a QAGOMA Registrar?
Registrars perform the largely unseen work of managing the physical and legal risk to the 19 660 objects in the Gallery’s Collection, and those included in temporary exhibitions. Our team of 17 works behind the scenes to complete the documentation, storage, safe handling, digitisation, accessioning, stocktaking, packing, insurance and transportation of artworks to ensure that they can be enjoyed by future generations.
Describe your studio or work area.
A lot of the planning and loan coordination happens at my desk. However, if I am overseeing the unpacking or repacking and despatch of an exhibition, I’m either in the gallery spaces, at the cargo warehouse or on the tarmac — and sometimes in the open nose-cone of a cargo plane as we load our precious crated cultural objects.
What work do you most enjoy doing?
I love managing and problem-solving challenging, logistically complex and high-value art shipments. It’s rewarding to work with colleagues from major collecting institutions both here and overseas, and just as satisfying to be in contact with artists living in remote, under-resourced areas to plan the safe packing of their work using local materials.
Tiffany Noyce at home among the artwork crates, 2021 / Photograph: J Ruckli, QAGOMA
What are you working on now?
The current focus for our team is APT10. Each APT is a challenging and rewarding project that extends our knowledge as registrars. Our team works directly with artists to complete loan agreements, arrange bespoke packing solutions and undertake a range of logistics to facilitate the timely and safe arrival of artworks for the exhibition. Many APT10 artists make work that expands the boundaries of contemporary art, incorporating a broad range of non-traditional materials: bagasse, oyster shell, cow dung, taro, dried fish, cow bone, coral, seeds and jute — not to mention the beautiful landscapes of Adeela Suleman, who has used meat cleavers as her canvas. We work with the artists to make applications for cultural, materials and weapons permits to enable an object’s inclusion in the exhibition. These exchanges take place over many months and allow our team to build wonderful relationships that foster future cultural exchange.
What international art destination do you most want to visit?
Mauritshuis, the Hague, Netherlands, to view Johannes Vermeer’s Girl with a pearl earring 1665, Diana and her nymphs c.1653–54 and View of Delft c.1660–61. I’d also like to continue my quest to view all 35 paintings currently attributed to Vermeer, which has already taken me to The Met and the Frick Collection in New York, and the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.
Where are you happiest?
Travelling the world with my family. Some fond memories of past trips include visits to major art museums, being charged by a baby elephant, hearing an evocative call to prayer in the mountains of Oman, kayaking between seal-laden icebergs, bush camping in the Serengeti, and glacial white-water rafting. This is ‘living’ to me.
Tiffany Noyce is Senior Registrar, Exhibitions, and has held Registration positions at QAGOMA since 1994. She has taken the lead role on major exhibitions including ‘European Masterpieces from The Metropolitan Museum of Art’ (2021) and the Asia Pacific Triennial exhibition series.
