The Museum of Perth chronicles the social, cultural, political and architectural history of Perth.
Board of Directors
Reece Harley - Chair
Reece is a City of Perth resident with an abiding interest and passion for the history of his City. He holds a Bachelor of Communication Majoring in Political and International Studies and Media Studies from Murdoch University. He is a founding member of the Rotary Club of Crawley.
Prior to his election as a Councillor of the City of Perth, Reece ran history and small bar walking tours of the City sharing his knowledge with residents and visitors alike. He prides himself on knowing every alleyway and street, arcade and building like the back of his hand. Reece founded the Perth History Association Inc. and Museum of Perth in 2015 to foster a better understanding of the City in a historic context.
e: reece@museumofperth.com.au
Ryan Mossny - Secretary
Ryan Mossny is a co-founder, Director and Chief Financial Officer of Two Feet & a Heartbeat. His specialties include tourism product development, tourism product planning, heritage/historical/cultural interpretation, tour guide training, financial sourcing/management, place making and grant application management.
Ryan grew up and was formally educated in Canada and attended the University of Saskatchewan studying Chemistry and Commerce. In 2007 together with Ryan Zaknich, he founded Two Feet & a Heartbeat. An organisation dedicated to interpreting history, heritage and culture.
Ryan Zaknich - Treasurer
Ryan Zaknich is a co-founder of Two Feet & a Heartbeat. Ryan completed studies in Conservation and Land Management aiming to become a parks ranger but instead gained employment in a specialised branch of the Western Australian Planning Commission, implementing the Metropolitan Region Scheme, the legislation which dictates how the city should grow.
Ryan is a qualified Tour guide, FACET Golden Guide finalist and has a Diploma in Tourism Studies and Conservation and Land Management and Training and Assessment.
Diana Warnock OAM - Director
Diana Warnock is a former Newspaper and Radio Journalist who also served as a State Member of Parliament between 1993 and 2001 for the electorate of Perth.
Brought up in the bush, she has lived in the inner city since she graduated from university in 1960. She is the widow of playwright and novelist Bill Warnock who was co-founder of the urban thinktank CityVision.
In 1999, she was awarded the Australian Humanist of the Year for her work on behalf of women. She was also made a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour by the French Government in 2007. Diana is a Patron of many community groups and has sat on a number of national boards.
Emma Kenton - Director
Emma Kenton has over 15 years of experience in leading and managing all areas of a business including but not limited to operations, human resources, marketing & events, business development, logistics, financials and production.
She is the founder and editor of Oh Hello Beaufort magazine, sits on the Beaufort Street Network Executive team and consults to Muscular Dystrophy WA, giving her a decent range of experience working across community groups, not-for-profit organisations and with small businesses.
Richard Offen - Advisor
Richard Offen is Executive Director of Heritage Perth. He joined the staff of the UK National Trust in 1989 and from 1992 until 2003 was responsible for the Trust’s famous Neptune Coastline Campaign.
Before moving to Australia, Richard was a founding partner of the heritage management consultancy Solutions for Heritage. Richard is a popular lecturer and broadcaster on both radio and television. Richard was co-author of the National Trust book ‘The Living Coast’ and wrote the extended captions for a book of aerial photographs of the British coast entitled ‘Coastline UK’.
In his spare time, Richard is a member of WA Committee for Museums Australia, a Member of the Council of the Anglican Schools Commission, Deputy Chairman of the Swan Bells Foundation, a Board Director of the Young Australia League, Secretary of the Sharpe Trust and a Churchwarden at Christ Church, Claremont.
Staff
Janki Tailor arrived in Australia from Gujarat State in India with her husband Maulik in 2015, and shortly afterwards joined the team at the Museum of Perth as a volunteer.
Proving an invaluable asset to the Museum's operations she joined staff in 2016, and has since been leading various projects and overseeing the administration of the Museum's administrative operations. Janki leads the recruitment, induction and supervision of Museum volunteers while managing Museum of Perth projects and exhibitions.
She has a background as a scientific researcher; previously employed at a research facility at Anand Agricultural University. Janki has a Bachelor Degree in Science majoring in Bioinfomatics, with a Masters by research specialising in Oral Cancer.
Janki loves photography and has developed a passion for the history of the city.
Jo Darbyshire – Project Leader
Jo Darbyshire is a West Australian visual artist and social history curator. She graduated with a Master of Creative Arts in Cultural Heritage from Curtin University of Technology in 2004 and worked as Memorabilia and Social History Curator at the City of Perth for ten years (2005 – 2016).
She is passionate about telling stories about the people of Perth and has a special interest in ‘lowlife’ history - the history of the forgotten, difficult, colourful, marginalised and uncollected aspects of West Australian history.
In 2003 she was artist in residence at the WA Museum and curated the Gay Museum, a history of Lesbian and Gay people in WA, using strategies from the visual arts and ‘new museology’ to bring alive a history that had not been collected or acknowledged before.
She loves mysterious objects and a good story.
Marina White – Project Leader
Marina is a lawyer at Tenancy WA.
Growing up in a creative family, Marina has always been immersed in the Perth arts scene. She facilitates craft workshops at festivals and enjoys sewing and listening to live music.
This background has sparked Marina’s interest in the relationship between law and the arts, and how the two professions can develop a positive working relationship. She has helped television corporations with defamation matters, and has assisted arts organisations and Indigenous musicians and artists protect their intellectual property.
Marina is co-coordinating the Museum of Perth’s upcoming Crime and Justice exhibition with Nicholas van Hattem.
Natalie James - Project Leader
Natalie James is a museum geek and lover of vintage design. She turned her passion into profession, and now has over 10 years experience in the Perth cultural sector as a tour guide, Museum Curator and consultant.
Natalie has a degree in Cultural Heritage & History from Curtin University and has recently returned from working in the UK, strengthening her knowledge of collections management, documentation standards and collections digitisation.
She knows the social history of Perth through the objects, stories and memories of its people and is forever pursuing creative new ways of sharing this with the community. She enjoys getting involved with all aspects of the thriving arts scene in Perth and now consults within the museum sector to help develop sustainable and engaging collections.
Nicholas van Hattem - Project Leader
Nicholas is a lawyer and Founding Convenor of the Piddington Society.
Nick began his career as associate to the Hon Justice of Appeal Miller. After completing articles at Freehills, Nick joined the Aboriginal Legal Service, working in the civil, human rights and criminal law.au
In 2015, Nick launched the Piddington Justice Project, an initiative to connect law graduates with community legal centres (www.pjp.org.au).
Nick is coordinating the Museum of Perth's upcoming Crime and Justice exhibition.
Shannon Lovelady - Project Leader, Historian & Archivist
Shannon Lovelady is a Perth-born research historian and writer. She is also an archivist, fine art and small museum curator experienced in handling and exhibiting myriad items, from old to new and fragile to robust.
She is also an experienced WWI researcher, having founded the Gallipoli (2013) and Western Front Dead from Western Australia (2016) projects, which have and will determine the number of West Australians killed in those theatres of war.
In 2014-2015 Shannon wrote a popular weekly newspaper column 'Gallipoli Remembered', for which she was a WA Media Award finalist for Best Columnist (the Matt Price Award). The book of the same name is soon to be published, with foreword by former Governor General Sir Michael Jeffery AC CVO MC.