With a PhD in American art history and a background in filmmaking, curation and art criticism, Nancy Proctor is Co-Chair of Museums and the Web and she is about to join the team of the Baltimore Museum of Art as Deputy Director for Digital Experience.

karola riegler photography/CC BY-ND 2.0/Flickr

Mobile engagement, crowd sourcing, accessibility, digital collaboration. These are just some of the themes that form Nancy’s expertise and interests. She worked for 6 years at the Smithsonian Institution, most recently defining and building its mobile strategy around the motto “Recruit the world” to increase and diffuse knowledge. By making use of the potential of mobile technology to establish two-way conversations, personal devices become microphones through which visitors can collaborate with the institution, enhancing accessibility and interpretation of collections.

You can look at more mobile-inspirations on the MuseumMobile.info, its wiki and podcast series, that Nancy manages.
While waiting to meet her during the conference (Btw, if you haven’t done it yet, you can register here) as well as during the pre-conference Mobile Summit, we asked her three questions about MWF:

– Why did Museums and the Web select Florence?
Storytelling, digital access and engagement, participation, are amongst the innovative approaches to connecting society and communities with cultural heritage. Such approaches require museums to re-invent the way they communicate with the public, extending their reach far beyond the institution’s walls. Florence, like so many European cities, is an “open museum” par excellence and therefore is the perfect place from which to reflect upon smart cities and the integrated role that culture plays in their creation.

–  What do you expect from this conference?
To expand the MW community and discussions about technology and cultural heritage to include new colleagues who have not been able to attend MW in North America or Asia before. We are also looking forward to learning about new projects and from new colleagues at the Florence meeting.

–  What is the paper/project that will be presented that you are more curious about?
I can’t pick favorites! But I’m very excited about the Mobile Summit on 18th February as it’s the first time that we’ve been able to bring together such a large group of mobile practitioners to address common issues and solutions. Hopefully this will lead to new kinds of collaborations and better mobile experiences for cultural heritage visitors.