Donia Conn
Donia Conn Conservation
315-396-3326
[email protected]
Doniaconn.com

• Disaster Preparedness Planning
• Environmental Monitoring and Controls
• Integrated Pest Management
• General Site Assessment
• Collection Storage Assessment
• Experience working with small museums/sites (under $99K/year budget)
• Artwork on paper
• Photographs
• Books

Donia Conn has worked in the field of preservation and conservation for over 20 years. She teaches and consults on the full spectrum of collections care topics for cultural heritage institutions. Donia earned her BA in Mathematics from St. Olaf College and her MLIS with Advanced Certificate in Conservation from the University of Texas-Austin. Past employers include the Northeast Document Conservation Center, Northwestern University, Syracuse University, The Folger Shakespeare Library, and the University of Kentucky. Donia is also a Professional Associate of the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works (AIC) and member of AIC’s National Heritage Responders. As an independent consultant, Donia has worked for such institutions as the Saratoga County Historical Society, Lake Placid Olympic Museum, Skidmore College, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, the Greater Hudson Heritage Network, University of Rochester, the State of Alaska, Henry Whitfield State Museum, Vanderbilt University, The Knights of Columbus Museum, Washington University, and many small and mid-sized institutions of all types.

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Michelle Henry
Historian/Archivist
814-572-0206 
[email protected]

• Disaster Preparedness Planning
• Environmental Monitoring and Controls
• Museum Policies & Procedures
• Archaeological and Ethnographic Objects
• Collection Storage Solutions
• General Site Assessment
• Curator
• Experience working with small museums/sites (under $99K/year budget)

With another museum professional, Michelle Henry implemented a training program for a consortium of seven small historical museums in Chautauqua County. With $26,000 in grant funds, she offered collection management instruction, policy development, and hands-on training in accessioning, cataloging, collection storage and preservation, and Past Perfect software. Archival supplies, environmental monitoring equipment, software and shelving were purchased and we worked along side the consortium members to develop/improve storage areas, rehouse collections, and improve collection management practices. This project is ongoing and has proven to be very beneficial to participating museums.


Geneva Ikle
West Lake Art Conservation Center
315-685-8534
[email protected]
www.westlakeconservators.com

• Environmental Monitoring and Controls
• Integrated Pest Management
• Museum Policies & Procedures
• Collection Storage Solutions
• General Site Assessment
• Experience working with small museums/sites (under $99K/year budget)
• Artwork on paper
• Photographs

Geneva earned a Master of Art Conservation (MAC 2016) degree from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario with a specialization in Works on Paper. Geneva has long been interested in photographs, so while at Queen’s she was able to get hands-on experience with photograph conservation in addition to conservation of works on paper. During her studies, she completed internships at the National Archives and Records Administration and at the Library of Congress. After graduating from Queen’s, Geneva briefly started up her own private practice in Wilmington, NC before being hired at ECS Conservation in Greensboro, NC as a Paper Conservator. Geneva has experience treating a wide variety of objects including documents, art on paper, maps, posters, and photographic materials. She is also an Associate member of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC).


​Joanna Jennings 
Independent Museum Professional
315-728-9119
[email protected]​
linkedin.com/in/joannajennings​

• Environmental Monitoring and Controls
• Museum Policies & Procedures
• Decorative Objects 
• Collection Storage Solutions
• General Site Assessment
• Experience working with small museums/sites (under $99K/year budget)
• Lighting
• Curator
• Preventive Conservation

A graduate of the University of Leicester and the University of Northumbria at Newcastle’s (UK) post-graduate certificate programs in Museum Studies and Preventive Conservation, Ms. Jennings has been a tour guide, museum associate, curatorial assistant, administrator, asst. director, and consultant for several small museums and historical societies throughout the Northeast. She also acquired a broader perspective of the field from the temporary government contracts she held reviewing Army Museum regulations and cataloging military artifacts with the National Guard Bureau (NGB) and Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC), as well as a senior-level appointment as museum manager for the American Red Cross, an NGO. More recently, she joined the AIC/FAIC Collections Assessment for Preservation (CAP) and AAM Museum Assessment Program (MAP) as a collections assessor conducting preservation assessments and consultations. Her decade of experience working almost exclusively for small museums and historical societies throughout the region uniquely qualifies her for site assessments. She understands the challenges of $50-$150k operating budgets, limited administrative and volunteer-run organizations, as well as those of impoverished and rural communities. Having herself worn every hat as a museum worker, she is very committed to researching innovative cost-saving and cost-sharing solutions.


Chiara Kuhns
West Lake Art Conservation Center
315-685-8534
[email protected]
westlakeconservators.com

• Disaster Preparedness Planning
• Environmental Monitoring and Controls
• Museum Policies & Procedures
• Paintings
• General Site Assessment
• Collection Storage Assessment
• Experience working with small museums/sites (under $99K/year budget)

Chiara is an artist, an art historian, and a paintings and fresco conservator. She is an ardent advocate of the arts and believes in the importance of exposing, educating and preserving the primary sources of our world’s history. Born in Florence, Italy, Chiara has taken advantage of the resources that this “mecca” of the art world has to offer. In Florence, she received a BA in Art History and completed a dual Masters degree in Museology and Conservation of Paintings and Frescoes. In 2002 Chiara taught a course on “The History and Art History of Florence” at Gonzaga University in Florence. Chiara has served on conservation teams in Florence, New York City, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. In 1999 she joined the team at West Lake Conservators in Skaneateles. She has been a dynamic member of the West Lake Art Conservation Center, assisting with the organization and hosting of workshops. She is a liaison to our colleagues in Italy and our resident expert on Italian Renaissance and European paintings.


Emily Phillips
Phillips Art Conservation Studio, LLC
518-963-4555
[email protected]
www.phillipsconservation.com

• Disaster Preparedness Planning
• Environmental Monitoring and Controls
• Integrated Pest Management
• Paintings
• Collection Storage Solutions
• Experience working with small museums/sites (under $99K/year budget)

Erin Richardson
Frank and Glory 
518.577.0186
[email protected]
www.frankandglory.com/

• Museum Policies & Procedures
• Collection Storage Solutions
• General Site Assessment
• Curator
• Experience working with small museums/sites (under $99K/year budget)
• Database selection/implementation

Erin has been working in museums since 1992. She’s witty, fun, smart, ethical, and deadly serious about museum collections as educational and cultural assets with high opportunity costs. It is not free to keep an artifact, artwork, manuscript, or publication forever. She challenges museums and libraries to think carefully about investing resources in collections that are relevant for, and representative of, their current and future audiences so that they may support the museum’s mission.


Nathan Sutton
West Lake Art Conservation Center
315-685-8534
[email protected]
westlakeconservators.com

• Paintings

Nathan’s work in paintings conservation has focused primarily on 19th and 20th Century American and European art, ranging from easel paintings, panel paintings, murals and frames, with treatments ranging from in-depth structural processes to cosmetic or aesthetic repairs, and from short, localized projects to multi-month, multi-painting or multi-mural work as a project manager, conservator or as a team member among collaborating conservators. He has worked as a paintings conservator at West Lake Conservators since 2017, providing service for private collectors, museums, universities, religious organizations, historical societies and historical collections. He is a graduate of the Buffalo State College Graduate Program in Art Conservation, specializing in the conservation of paintings and completed internships with Whitten and Proctor Fine Art and the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art before owing and operating his own painting conservation business from 2010 to 2016.


Heidi Ziemer
​Archivist/Outreach & Member Services
716-989-8037
[email protected]

• Disaster Preparedness Planning
• Environmental Monitoring and Controls
• Museum Policies & Procedures
• General Site Assessment,
• Experience working with small museums/sites (under $99K/year budget)
• Archival Collections