Hello and welcome to my weekly podcast, a 5 minutes commentary on art & architecture in the news. My name is Robi and this is Art Tours with a Theme – ART wiT, where we explore art and architecture in London and beyond.
Today we discuss what is a museum. What do you think a museum should offer you, why should you pay a ticket to see an exhibition and why should a council sponsor museums with public money? Do museums still make sense as a physical experience? Are they still relevant today, do they represent our values, our identity in 2020? This episode is inspired by The New York Times, which has recently published an article discussing this topic. In the article it is explained that museums are having an identity crisis today with no solution in sight.
Maybe you are not aware, but there is a no-profit organization in Paris that aims to represent all museums in the world, called International Council of Museums. Recently some board members have resigned. Infact, the question “what is a museum” is currently very controversial and divisive.
On one side, some people say museums should exhibit artefacts and engage in an educational and entertaining way. On the other side, other people would like for museums to engage the audience around political and social issues too. For example, how should museums represent artists never included before? Some artists have never been represented in museums because they were different, coming from an ethnic minority (the black, the non-European), a different sexual orientation (LGBT) or they were women. Or they have been represented but as “oriental”, “exotic”, something not belonging to the prevailing and dominant culture.
We have also recently witnessed furious reactions against public statues portraying leaders of the past. Those statues have been vandalised, broken, removed. It has been suggested that those statues instead should be put in museums to create the right historical context, the full explanation on why they were created, what sort of values and society was there at that time. This would provide education as well as social and political challenge for the audience, but how?
Another reason of the museum crisis today is how to represent art made by the new media, or art that requires interaction with the public.
It is the first time since the 1970s that the definition of what is a museum is widely discussed. Four years ago in 2016 the International Council of Museums started to engage its 40 thousands museum members worldwide to reach a more up to date definition, to agree a better vision and purpose for global museums. It received 269 proposed definitions and we now understand why the discussion is so difficult.
The English "museum" word comes from the ancient Greek Μουσεῖον (Mouseion), which denotes a place or temple dedicated to the Muses the goddesses of the arts in Greek mythology, so a museum is building set apart for study and the arts. Today it is ideally a place where we reflect on our life and values through their representation in objects. It is at the same time a personal and a collective experience.
What is a museum for you? Is the online vision enough? Is it s a place for confrontation and challenge? Is it an opportunity for shopping, dining, meeting up? Let me know your thoughts! This is Robi from Art Tours with a Theme, you can find me in FB and Instagram. I hope you enjoyed my podcast, follow me on Spotify and other platforms and share my blogs with your friends. Thank you for listening and visit a museum! Bye!
