York Castle Museum

Community Projects

We aim to involve members of the community in all our activities, but have a particular focus on Community Art and Community Archaeology in two major projects

Community Art

Our Territories project works with community groups to help local people to get to know our works of art. Events and workshops are held in York Art Gallery's Studio.

Groups come to the gallery for one or more sessions, taking inspiration from the gallery's paintings, drawings and pottery, and often have the chance to work with professional artists.

The artwork produced by participants can be included in the annual celebration event in the Studio.

We have worked with over 30 community groups during the last two years and have involved more than 2,000 local residents.

These groups have ranged from young mums and children to elderly people with mental health problems, and from blind and partially sighted groups to homeless people and women's refuge residents.

The project is funded by the Arts Council.

If you would like to find out more, contact Griselda Goldsbrough on 01904 697974 or email griselda.goldsbrough@ymt.org.uk

Community Archaeology

This Roman hairpiece with two jet pins was found in a gypsum burial

We are helping co-ordinate four exciting new community archaeology projects across Yorkshire from 2007.

At the Yorkshire Museum in York we are working with modern experts to give us fresh insights into how objects in our collections were made and used in the past. In the first two projects we are working with hair and make-up specialists to look hair and hair-styling items, and then with butchers to examine ancient animal bones and tools.

At Scarborough, the focus is on their extremely important prehistoric collection. We will be running a variety of workshops, training sessions and public events on objects in the collection, including special sessions for children. These will build up to a celebration at a festive prehistory fair with fun activities for everyone.

Castleford people will be joining in investigations into their significant Roman remains. Castleford was a major fort on the Roman road from Lincoln to York. The first activities will hopefully focus around the return to Castleford of a unique Roman milestone, and will be hands-on sessions for everyone.

Meanwhile in our fourth project primary schools from across North Yorkshire will be taking a closer look at their local areas, combining archaeology with the maps, photos and written records from the North Yorkshire County Records Office in Northallerton.

All these projects are being funded by Renaissance in the Regions, a partnership of museums, libraries and archives services in Yorkshire.

For more information, contact Dave Evans on 01904 687666 or email david.evans@ymt.org.uk