Malissa Abdul Kadir

Biography

Malissa works as a Curator at the Sarawak Museum Department, Malaysia. Her responsibilities at the museum include research, managing the museum’s library and developing content for exhibitions. Malissa is in charge of developing narratives and stories for the permanent displays at the museum. This includes conducting research, running workshops on creating an exhibition storyline, selecting objects for display, installation, and finally giving gallery tours to the public. Malissa’s most recent work is managing the museum’s library, which has a collection of over 16,000 books.

At the Borneo Cultures Museum, Malissa curated galleries about Sarawak’s archaeology and history. This project started in 2015, and the museum opened in 2022. In 2023, Malissa worked as a content developer for three projects: The Rumah Sri Aman Gallery, the Mighty Forts of Sarawak Trails, and the Malay Heritage Museum at Dural Hana.

At the British Museum
During Malissa’s time on the International Training Programme she was based in the Asia Department and her UK partner placement was spent at Tyne and Wear Archives and Museums, Newcastle.

As an ongoing project throughout the six-week programme, fellows were asked to use their existing skills and experience, and the knowledge gained throughout the annual programme, to create, develop, and propose a new interpretation for an object currently on display in the British Museum. Working in her departmental group, Malissa used their object, a Bencharong bowl, to explore the history of the object through cross cultural exchange.

Malissa’s participation on the International Training Programme was generously supported by the Marie-Louise von Motesiczky Charitable Trust.