Kia ora koutou
Many of you will have noticed that Cantage, originally formed in around 2004, has been languishing for the past few years. Some of us have recently been discussing whether there was still a place in the region for such a group in the community. After an initial discussion at the last NDF meeting (at the end of 2022) a core group of five of us have now met and formed the next Cantage Committee and we are on our way to getting the group up and running again. The committee is currently made up of myself, Amanda Brown (Christchurch City Libraries), Sally O’Connell (Waimakariri Libraries), Damian Cairns (Macmillan Brown Librarian) and Nick Wotton (Archives NZ, Christchurch Regional Office).
Our purpose of the group remains the same – Cantage is a place to share common issues regarding documentary heritage collections in the Canterbury region, to increase knowledge sharing, communication, and collaboration between collections, both large and small.
As a reminder the word ‘Cantage’ is amalgamated from ‘Canterbury’ and ‘Heritage’ and is an informal group of people involved in heritage organisations such as libraries, archives, museums, and local government institutions. Membership is open to anyone interested within the Canterbury region to foster local networking amongst members, collection development assistance, and collaboration. The group provides a place to discuss relevant topics such as: storage, preservation, digitisation, exhibitions, events, training and professional development, and collaborative opportunities.
We initially had a well-established list-serv as a way to ask questions and communicate but that has proved too difficult to re-establish as list-servs are no longer supported by most large institutions. We are beginning with the WordPress blog again and a simple email distribution list but hope to have a social media presence in the near future.
The blog remains a great way to share new content acquisitions to your collection, new digitised resources, promote events and exhibitions, really anything you think may be of interest to the community. If you have any content to share please initially share with cantagegroup@gmail.com and we will make sure it gets posted to the blog – please include any photos you may have to help illustrate the post. We will also be organising a couple of events and tours during the year as a way to network and meet together. Please stay tuned for the first event which is in currently in the planning stages!
If you have any questions, suggestions or comments please do let us know!
Thanks
Annabel Armstrong-Clarke
Archivist, Christchurch City Council
Christchurch Drainage Board, Sewer Construction East End of Tuam St, c1905. Source:Christchurch City Council Archives, CH659/100
Cantage - Canterbury Heritage 