The Minister of Education and Culture has appointed a Museum Council, in accordance with the new Museum Act that came into force on January 1st. The Museum Council's main role is to supervise museum activities, work on policy for museum work, discuss museum charters and accreditations, and provide opinions on grant applications from the museum fund. The Museum Council is composed as follows: Ólafur Kvaran, chairman, appointed by the Minister of Education and Culture without …

The FÍSOS board of directors announces a supplementary general meeting on Tuesday, February 5th at 8:00 PM. The meeting will be held in the Kornhús, Árbæjarsafn. Agenda: 1. Election of the chairman and secretary. 2. Increase in membership fees. 3. Newly published report of the working group on changes and reassessment of FÍSOS presented. Discussions. 4. FÍSOS Pre-School 2013 and 2014. 5. …

On December 6th, the 118th meeting of the Museum Council was held at the National Museum of Iceland. The meeting was open to all and included presentations on the activities of the Museum Council since 2001, the operation of museums and the changes that will occur in museum affairs at the turn of the year. The Museum Council had the presentations recorded and the recordings are available below: Meeting agenda: 15:00 Margrét …

The Museum Council announces the 118th meeting of the Council – the last meeting of the current Council. The meeting will be held in the lecture hall of the National Museum of Iceland on Thursday, December 6, from 3 pm to 5 pm and is open to all. Agenda for the meeting: 3:00 pm Margrét Hallgrímsdóttir, Chair of the Museum Council, welcomes guests. 3:10 pm Activities of the Museum Council from 2002-2012, Ágústa Kristófersdóttir, Director of the Museum Council 3:30 pm Operations of museums that receive funding from the Museum Fund. …

The Museum Council has compiled a summary of the allocations from the museum fund from the first allocation in 2002 to 2012. Here you can see an overview of allocations and reconciliations. In total, the Council has allocated almost 830 million in these ten years. The overview can be seen here.

In the winter of 2011-12, the Museum Council commissioned statistical data from the application data for 2011. The report was prepared by Þóra Björk Ólafsdóttir, a business graduate who was an intern at the Museum Council. The report can be accessed here.

58 organizations applied for grants from the Museum Fund for 2012. The total amount of grants awarded was ISK 110,320,000. ISK 47,700,000 was awarded in operating grants and ISK 62,720,000 in project grants. 44 museums received operating grants from the fund, but all operating grants were of the same amount. 53 museums received project grants from the fund. Information about the allocation can be found here.

The Museums' Mobile School will be held from September 19th to 21st in Akureyri. The school's program and registration form can be found here.

The Icelandic Museum Awards were presented at Bessastaðir last Sunday and it was the Þingeyingi Cultural Centre that received the award for the new permanent exhibition in the Museum House in Húsavík. The selection committee's comment states: The exhibition's layout is well thought out and attractive. The exhibition space is cleverly used so that the exhibits and texts arouse the curiosity of visitors. The special features of the area and the use of nature are well understood and on …

A bill on cultural heritage that has been in the works since 2005 has now become law. This law, along with the new Museums Act that will come into force at the turn of the year, will bring about various changes for museum work and heritage conservation in the country. In the last days of the 2012 spring session, a bill on the Fine Arts Act also became …