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Open air museums - in the service of collections or in the service of society? INTERCOM i Shanghai 2010 My belief is that they can and will change; it just takes longer than in more modern museums and ‘theme museums’. If they do not change, the public spending on maintaining the open air museums for the purpose of tourism and cosy family gatherings, can no longer be justified. They will not then be professional museums (as defined by ICOM), but may continue as privately sponsored theme parks and history lands in the more commercial market. All museums and open air museums too, are first and foremost institutions for learning. Our collections and exhibitions, audience programmes and scientific knowledge must be directed towards that task: to contribute to the good of the community and the good of the individual. In Scandinavia, open air museums have been important institutions in their communities for more than a century, in an era where national unity and the creation of a shared identity was important political and cultural ambitions. Through activities such as collecting and preservation of cultural heritage, and as learning arenas for arts and culture on national and local level, they have been the keepers of shared values in communities, or what someone wanted to be the shared values. Today’s society does not demand the same type of national identity creation. Assimilation into an ethnic and cultural unity is no longer a goal, rather we strive to achieve acceptance of differences and cultural multitude. This is also important for many museums: they want to take up their responsibility to the community and play a role in improving individuals’ lives, and promoting social change at the macro level. (See for example Sandell 2002; INTERCOM 2006, Janes 2009) The question is how this can be done within the confines of the open air museum. The mere concept of open air museum has a scent of mothballs to it. Both in public and private discussions, one can sense an understanding of the term as something outdated. In Scandinavia at least, the name evokes old-fashioned and static images of timber houses; rose painting and traditional knitting appear automatically before our inner eye. Should we therefore abandon the concept of open air museums? Should they change their names to something more “post-modern” and immediately catchy? History Park? Cultural Park? Or adopt any new name that is not encumbered with the negative associations. Will this kind of museums then still, as Shakespeare’s rose, “smell the same”? Open air museum: the inclusive museum The term open air museum and the equivalent folk museum, were created in Scandinavia towards the end of the 19th century. The concept soon spread throughout Europe and North America and this type of museums may also be known as skansen, museums of buildings and living history museums. Looking back in history there are strong resemblance between open air museums and the newer Eco-museums, but also differences due to the different historical and cultural contexts they originate from. As with the more recent Eco-museum ideology – the open air museums were part of a democratization process in the Scandinavian societies. Museums used to belong culturally to the ruling classes, the educated and powerful (Mellemsether 2009). Both with the selection of topics they chose to re-present and the way they did it – it was for, by and about – the elites. The terms and concept were created in a time of great cultural, political and economic changes. Open air museums were in their beginning social actors in their communities with a more or less clear political sting. The focus then was on democratization and inclusion: - Inclusion of ordinary people’s history in the museums - Including everybody in a common national/regional/local identity. - Utilizing the past (knowledge, skills, arts and craft, technology etc) to the benefit of the present. But in the ca 100 years that has passed since then, open air museums became stagnant. It became hard to distinguish one museum from the other. They all presented a generalized and remote past, as a static and constructed artificial image. “Folk museums became introverted and isolated institutions, with no relevance for the time they exist in,” the Norwegian museologist Gjestrum writes. (Gjestrum 2001). During 1960s and -70s, which were characterized by radicalization and democratization in the universities, and with pervasive socio-cultural changes in the western world, the open air museums continued as if nothing had happened. The onset of globalization and the environmental movement did not materialize itself in the open air museums. The shift towards social history, workers’ and women’s perspectives in social research in general, did not upset the museums. Instead, concept museums were formed; workers museums, industrial museums, museum of immigrants and women’s museum, and also the eco-museum movement started in this context. (Davis 2004). By and by, the open air museums became something for the specially interested only. The aim was to show the residents and tourists what and who the regional identities are (or should be), how valuable the old culture and its cultural expressions are, and how laborious, frugal, innovative, creative the people were. In the old days. With a positivistic and linear understanding of history, the progress of modernity and the nation’s growth were told in tableaux, interiors and exhibitions. Open air museums had become introverted and static, they struggled to manage large collections and failed to find there relevance for the society they exist in. The old wooden house and the rose painted bowl burdened the museum workers shoulders, and limited their work with their constant demand for care and space. Whether we call it eco-museum, folk museum, open air museum, living museum or community museum, we face the same dilemma: the focus on local monoculture, the connection to a defined territory or space and the effort to create a common identity and pride in a common future that has been the implicit or explicit focus for open air museums, also make us vulnerable to being exclusive. We then perpetuate an understanding of one group’s belonging versus other groups who do not belong in the territory, the space, the culture or the common past. Whose identity do we want to strengthen/build? The joint ownership that is a feature of many eco-museums, does not guarantee an even representation in the museum. In all societies there are always someone who represent others, who are given/or have taken the power to interpret cultural meaning – being religious or political power. Misrepresentation is therefore a risk even for eco-museums – as well as in the traditional open air museums. Can old open air museums be modern? To some ‘modern’ mean widespread use of the latest and most expensive technology, and to some it means that the exhibition objects, artefacts, are not ‘old fashioned’. If that is what it takes to change the negative connotations to the term open air museum we can see in media and politics, we are fighting a losing battle. With really old buildings and objects as our main area of responsibility, and with large and numerous exhibitions on very tight budgets, old museums cannot always implement the latest in technology (nothing gets old as fast as new technology). Fortunately, technology and expensive installations does not define modern museums. Modern museums are museums that are topical and relevant and developing quality programmes for an ever wider audience, they are arenas for lifelong learning with relevance for our lives – they contribute towards a better society for all. Old open air museums, with large collections and many vintage buildings are hard to change – much harder than the more flexible theme museums and exhibitions. The largeness and the oldness of it all puts constraints on both the public’s expectations of what they will face when they visit us, and it also limits (implicitly or explicitly) the museum’s internal development. My own museum, Trøndelag Folk Museum has in recent years worked with educational projects against sexual abuse, victims of war, and a new museum of deaf history and culture. But this has mainly been either projects that take place outside the museum, or short term programs with no link to the vintage buildings, collections or to the open-air museum as a whole. Many open air museums have opted for living history as a way to make themselves interesting to the audience, were the visitors are transported “back in time” by good actors. While this is an interesting and fun way to present the past, it must not become the main focus for the museums. If all open air museums develop in the same way, there is a danger that we end up as expensive but “authentic” theatre set for tourism and businesses. That is a dim view of the future of open air museums: “Perhaps the open air museums will be left destitute and abandoned, and slowly sinks down into the soil. Turned into spectacular ruins, fascinating traces of a lost past. An invented history”, as Niklas Ingmarssons provocatively writes in his review of Sten Rentzhog’s book on the history of open air museums. (Ingemarsson 2008). Whereas I agree with much of the critic of the open air museums as static and romantic places for especially interested public, I do not agree that they will, or should, die a slow death as cultural institutions. As a museum worker, as a historian and as a member of my community, I believe there are potential in museums for real dialogue, for developing open air museums as an arena where meaning is constructed, debated, contested; where prejudices are put under debate and where attitudes are changed. (Sandell 2006). To do that, we need to make museums into something more than a quest for local identity making. We should look at the possibility for movement and inclusiveness in the past and in the present. We must re-present the past in a way that engages and communicates with the community which we exist to serve. A museum is not for museum employees, for the collections, for the educators or the businesses – not even for the culture politicians. The collection, the preserving and categorisation of objects is not the aim, but the means through which we perform our role as stewards of cultural heritage on society’s behalf. Museums must manage this stewardship, in order to affect social development in the direction of a good society. (Cameron 2007). The founders of the earliest open air museums believed in change, education and empowerment of new groups in the society – in their times it was integration of the lower classes into the history of the nation. Our contemporary society consists of individuals with different cultural identities, who need to find their place in a narrative that is relevant and important in their lives - they must “find themselves in history.” More and more people who visit the museum live in urban areas. The part of our society that remembers a time were houses were build from round timber, before electricity, before cars are getting smaller –the memory-work in museums will have to address new publics with new memories. For 100 years old open air museums this is a huge challenge. Our society is not a homogenous one. We do not share a common culture in the same degree as we did 100 years ago, when information about politics and culture came from local or regional sources, when long distant communication between people cities and countries were slow and expensive. In order to be in dialogue with our communities – we need to know who they are. Identify what is important in their everyday life, who is ‘the community’ and what are important in their lives? The community we live in is a complex and uncertain world full of choices. Media, advertising, government information, researchers, people’s own experiences, declaration, and internet - all contribute to different interpretations and recommendations for attitudes and actions. Museums are trustworthy learning institutions with great potential for lifelong learning. If the collection of cultural heritage – whether in the form of buildings and collections, or as memories, myths and knowhow from the past, are going to have a purpose and meaning in the lives of people in our time, it must be as part of a story that communicate to as many as possible – in the dialogue rather than the elitist monologue. By daring to detach ourselves from the "material determinism" of the collections, we can create something new in an open air museum. Simultaneously, the material objects visualize the more theoretical knowledge in a very good way – transforming knowledge into everyday action. Changing museum tradition: environmental learning in open-air museums Of all the topics and issues that occupy people in today's society are environmental and climate issue one of the most important. Issues connected to and focus on environment will not disappear within the nearest future, the struggle for and against, doubts and beliefs related to climate change, discussions and action plans will require our (individual as well as political) attention for a long time to come. If museums take their duties towards society seriously - as we are supposed to - this is one of the issues where museums must take an active position: should we be fighting greenhouse gas emissions and environmental problems by contributing to change, or should we be traditional and pretend that nothing is wrong and hope that the technology solves all problems? Environmental learning is about creating connections between material realities, science, political goals, collective and individual values and their everyday patterns of action. If we are to achieve sustainable development, measures must be rooted in everyday life and everyday experiences. There is no lack of knowledge about pollution and climate change in our society. The amount of information is so huge and the problem seems unsolvable or unrelated to our practise. Our task must be to encourage action based on knowledge, inclusion and dialogue, to break down theories and global problems to something local, concrete and useful. A visit to a museum whose buildings, interiors and exhibitions are based on environmental history would show the museum as relevant in their own life, whether they are old or young, local or tourists, urban or rural. Environment history encourages understanding of the environment and nature as more than just the physical background of human activities. Environmental history is the story of human exploitation of the natural world around us. It is about the influence of agriculture and animal husbandry on soil and landscape, the exploitation of forests, deforestation and climate. It is also about the environmental impact of mining and transport routes, urbanization and industrialization. The environmental approach to learning in museum gives us many possible, multilayered stories to tell, and many different ways of creating dialogue with our visitors/users. As an open air museum we have must use our unique collections and buildings in new ways to visualize the material effect of environmental history and connecting the past with the present, to the benefit of our community. Litteraturliste: Cameron, Fiona: ”Moral lessons and reforming agendas: history museums, science museums, contentious topics and contemporary societies,” in Museum revolutions: How museums change and are changed. Eds: Simon J.Knell, Suzanne MacLeod and Sheila Watson. Routledge, 2007 Davis, Peter, “Places, 'cultural touchstones' and the ecomuseum,” in Heritage, Museums and Galleries: An Introductory Reader, Routledge, 2004. Gjestrum, John Åge: “Fra folkemuseum til økomuseum,” Nordisk Museologi 2001, no. 1-2. ICOM: New roles and missions of museums. INTERCOM 2006 symposium . Taipei: ICOM – INTERCOM/Council for cultural affairs, Taiwan Ingmarsson, Niklas: “Recensioner,” RIG: Föreningen för svensk kulturhistoria tidsskrift 3 2008. Janes, Robert R.: Museums in a troubled world: renewal, irrelevance or collapse? Routledge, 2009. Mellemsether, Hanna: ”Folkemuseum – vår tids museum for vår tids folk,” i ”En Smuk Fremtid”. Trøndelag Folkemuseum Sverresborg 100 år. Vol.1 Museene i Sør-Trøndelags skriftserie. Tapir Akademisk Forlag, 2009 Sandell, Richard: Museums, Society, Inequality. Routledge, 2002 Sandell, Richard: Museums, prejudice and the reframing of difference. Routledge, 2007. |
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