Alaa Bakeer

Biography

Alaa is passionate about finding creative ways to improve learning processes in museums, and the relationship between museums and children. After the ITP Alaa became Head of the Education Department at the Royal Carriages Museum where she is gaining new experiences and applying what she learnt during the ITP summer programme. In her current role Alaa has organised workshops, events, lectures, guided tours and other activities for museum visitors in a variety of topics. Through these activities Alaa aims to engage the local community with the work of her institution. Alaa has taken on other responsibilities including organising exhibitions and working with the scientific research department, also she plays a role in the marketing process of the museum, preparing monthly achievement reports and maintaining the museum’s webpage.

Alaa joined the ITP in 2014 as a curator at the Islamic Art Museum in Cairo. In 2014 the museum was undergoing major recovery and renovation after an explosion in January, which destroyed the interior of the museum. Alaa took the ITP as an opportunity to learn about new developments in museum display, databasing, storage and fundraising which the Islamic Art Museum were working on in the aftermath of the explosion. Alaa was also interested in marketing the ‘new’ Islamic Art Museum as a world class museum.

Alaa is a Masters scholar in Islamic art, and also engaged in conducting research projects, publishing her first paper on Silver Hallmarks as Archaeological Presumptions for Dating and Attributing Silver Artifacts, which she presented at the international conference of Arab archaeologists in 2018.

Alaa participated in a museology scholarship in Germany organized by the Deutsch Archaeological Institute in Cairo in 2015. She also participated in the annual meeting of the American Alliance of Museums held in May 2018 Phoenix, Arizona.

At the British Museum
During her time on the International Training Programme in 2014, Alaa was based in the Department of Egypt and Sudan and her partner placement was spent at Birmingham Museums Trust.

In 2014 participants were asked to prepare a project outlining an exhibition proposal based on the Asahi Shimbun Displays – a temporary exhibition in Room 3 at the British Museum.  Alaa’s exhibition project proposal was entitled Revealing the Mystery of Amulets in the Islamic World.

Alaa’s place on the programme was generously supported by the Barakat Trust.