Practice · Private capital and collections · Glossary
Acquisition policy
An acquisition policy is a written statement of what a collection will and will not acquire, who approves each acquisition and on what evidence. In UK museum accreditation it is called a collections development policy. The governing body approves it, and it covers disposals as well as acquisitions.
Published by ArtisDomus, written by Polina Surina.
For a museum the document is compulsory, and the UK Accreditation Standard of November 2018 sets out what it must contain.
What the standard requires
Requirement 4.2 lists six things the policy must include.
- Purpose
- The museum’s statement of purpose.
- Holdings
- An overview of current collections.
- Collecting
- Themes and priorities for future collecting.
- Disposal
- Themes and priorities for rationalisation and disposal.
- Framework
- Information about the legal and ethical framework for acquiring and disposing of items.
- Review
- The date the museum will next review the policy.
The governing body must approve the policy, which covers developing the collections, including acquisitions and disposals.
The review item asks for a date and sets no number of years. The museum chooses the period. So a policy is current if it names its next review date, and overdue once that date has passed.
What the code adds
ICOM requires title and provenance checks before the purchase.
ICOM, the International Council of Museums, sets its rules in the ICOM Code of Ethics for Museums. Each museum’s governing body should adopt and publish a written collections policy (para. 2.1). It covers the acquisition, care and use of collections. It should also make clear the position of any material that will not be catalogued, conserved or exhibited.
A museum should acquire an object by purchase, gift, loan, bequest or exchange only if it is satisfied that valid title is held (para. 2.2). The code adds a warning worth keeping: evidence of lawful ownership in a country is not necessarily valid title.
Before acquiring, the museum must make every effort to confirm the object was not illegally obtained in, or exported from, its country of origin. The same goes for any country along the way where it might have been owned legally, including the museum’s own (para. 2.3). Due diligence should establish the item’s full history since it was found or made.
For a private collection
Private owners have no standard to meet, so they should set their own.
None of this applies to a private collection or a family office. There is no governing body to approve the document, no assessor to see it and no accreditation to lose.
The practice borrows the shape of the museum document. A usable private policy states the purpose the collection serves and what is in and out of scope. It names who approves a purchase and who cannot. It sets the evidence required before payment, the price above which a second opinion is bought, and the date the document is next read.
For the evidence, see what to check before you pay and provenance. For disposals, and why the museum term does not fit a private owner, see deaccession.
Sources
- Accreditation Scheme for Museums and Galleries in the United Kingdom, Accreditation Standard, November 2018, requirement 4.2
- ICOM Code of Ethics for Museums, paras. 2.1, 2.2 and 2.3