Museum Re-Design: Cultural, Historical Relevance
Curators Must Rethink Exhibition & Interpretation Programs
Oct 5, 2009
Traditional museums and public galleries have their demise designed right into them. These are the sorts of display spaces where curators unveil history, environment, and culture in predictable patterns. Historical displays, for example, might devote the first section to geological samples and fossils, then move quickly along to stone age artifacts to reflect the progression of time prior to settlement, pushing everyone through a sequentially patterned lay-out of the galleries until visitors are dumped into the present day, then shunted out the museum shop doors.
Or, if a curator had a larger and more varied collection of materials to work with, they might choose a theme: The Roaring Twenties, Abstract Expressionist Sculpture, How to Find Petroleum and so on. This pattern became the template for curators in the 20th century. No touching! Hushed, sepulchral speaking voices only please! Visitors were guided around the space in a very dull, orderly manner. The experience was more like being in a church or temple than a thought-provoking, dynamic place for learning, enjoyment or enlightenment.
"Traditional methodologies encourage the placement of historical collections in chronological and/or culturally codified frameworks and 'isms'. What we are starting to see now in various museums and galleries in Europe and Canada is a non-chronological approach to presenting art and artifacts."
Deb Thompson, curator, ROW: Reflections on Water; Touchstones Museum, Nelson, BC, Canada, October, 2009.
Unfortunately, the ease and access of modern global travel, new online galleries, digitalized archives and libraries, even streaming video have destroyed such institutions' positions as prime access points for cultural experience and specialized knowledge. When those in charge of allocating funds to cultural venues, educational resources and productions see cavernous halls empty of visitors and books filled with red ink, they can't understand why it's so important to finance these institutions. Historical sites have closed their doors in droves forever and collections are being auctioned off, taking the local record of history along with them. Almost Darwinian laws of adaptation and survival of the fittest are in place.
Justifying the Costs of Maintaining a Public Space that the Public Doesn't Use
Before curators can innovate their techniques, they need to understand the forces working against them:
- Permanent shows create stagnant spaces. After visitors have seen such shows once, every subsequent visit is a rerun. It's especially bad when school kids treat a field trip to the local museum like a punishment instead of a break in their routine, especially since museums are in a symbiotic relationship with school boards as a major provider of funding.
- Visitors have likely seen a television documentary about the subject already with much flashier production values and broader social contexts. After the internet came along, such documentaries probably became available all the time. Libraries are shifting their archives online. Also, theme parks often recreate historical settings and experiences in a very dynamic and interactive fashion. These are direct competition.
"Edifice Wrecks: The Grand Forks Art Gallery and Boundary Museum Saga", 05 June, 2009.
- If an exhibition is being designed to bring the larger world to the local community, the ease and comfort of modern travel means that locals are now acquiring their cultural experiences abroad firsthand, or through touring companies. Travel guides have replaced the traditional interpretator.
- Other visitor accessibility issues which curators face are those with impaired vision and hearing, moving room for wheelchairs, places for the elderly to sit and make themselves comfortable, informing those whose language skills don't conform to the official language spoken at a particular venue. People who aren't able-bodied have been trying to go out in public for a long time now. It's about time that museums and galleries caught up.
- Somewhere else, there will be better examples of Modern sculpture, or a bigger and more brutal-looking Tyrannosaurus fossil, or a more diverse collection of pre-Columbian pottery fragments. Civic planners who intend to use their museums, galleries and archives as a means of attracting tourists have to critically appraise the cultural significance of their collections. If the collections aren't all that valuable in the larger global context, they need to use professional curators who know how to use those artifacts to create culturally significant displays.
Planning for the New Reality
In order to attract repeat visitors and community dollars, the traditional museum needs to be reinvented in a number of different ways:
- Boards of Directors need to hire professionally trained curators and staff, who are up-to-date with the latest innovations in exhibition design, even if the contract is on a temporary, guest status.
- Museums have to become dynamic, interactive, culturally relevant spaces which attract repeat visitors. They need to be fun or enlightening places where people want to go.
- They need to compete with films, television, the internet and multimedia experiences. They need to compete with theme parks and even shopping malls.
This is how our public museums and galleries will continue to survive in an age of significantly reduced public funding. For more on the subject, read Simone Keiran's articles, "Museums Face Financial Ruin & Collection Loss" and "Museum Re-Design: Engaging the Public."
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