Thinking about museums (and beyond)

    Artifacts on display… that is the most common thought when people are confronted with the word “museum”. And yes, once upon a time it was so, but as new media approaches the museum new ideas and possibilities open up (Henning).

NFT Exhibition in the Moco Museum. Video by Erick Vázquez 2022

    The first possibility is, of course the idea of how information can be spread around more easily. The digitalization of catalogues and the easy access to them is definitively a process of democratization of knowledge. Taking into account that there is no such thing as “one size fits all”, the possibility of accessing information relevant to each case is important and fundamental. (Hooper-Greenhill)

    Interactivity is one upgrade that can be created by new mediums entering exhibitions. There are two ways that interactivity can be achieved in exhibitions and museums. Hands on vs Mind on, the former can be a mechanical gesture from the visitor (pressing buttons will create a reaction in the artifact), while the other one requires a more intellectual collaboration between the artifact and the visitor. (Witcomb)

    Another possibility is the use of other media such as movies in the museum space. Can films be experienced in the museum? Exhibitions tend to be lived by the audience at their own pace and time. What happens with the inherent time of film? In this issue lies another layer of complexity that can be exploited by the museum and artists. (Mondloch). Which in turn brings us to read the museum in cinematographic terms. For example, to think of the curatorial effort as the editing part and the way the visitor decides to spend his/her time can be understood as the montage. This notion brings us to the importance of the museum’s space. For in it there are layers of narration going on: the building itself, the artifact’s stories, the reading of the artifacts, the curatorial effort and of course the information provided inside the venue. (Penz)

    How does the narrative come forward? It can be achieved in two ways and both of them have to do with the layout of the museum and the interconnections between spaces. The path that doesn’t allow wandering is the way a curator might choose to show a sequence of artifacts. On the other side a more laid-back form is to let the visitor wander to his/her leisure. In this case the narrative is left to be constructed by the user, thus creating a social experience, a space of the mind. (Hillier)

    Not just the layout is important, dark and light must be present to better appreciate artifacts. A painting needs light, but a movie needs darkness. The sensorial rhetoric needs to be clear in order to let the visitors gather the correct information from the exhibition. (Nash)

The Straat Museum in Amsterdam. Photo by Erick Vazquez, 2022.

    The spacial part of the museum seems to be constrained by a building. Nonetheless, when exhibitions are driven outside and are accompanied by performances, does that mean that the museum has ceased to exist? (Hogben) Or, maybe, the true soul of the museum lies in the knowledge that can be acquired or enjoyed and the building with its set up are just the tools that can help humanity tells its stories through artifacts.

    As you can see by introducing new media into the museum’s realm forces a rethinking about the storytelling techniques and the importance of democratizing knowledge.

Literature:

Andrea Witcomb, 'Interactivity: Thinking Beyond', in: Sharon MacDonald ed., A Companion to Museum Studies (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011), pp. 353-361.

Bill Hillier, Kali Tzortzi, 'Space Syntax: The Language of Museum Space', in: Sharon MacDonald ed, A Companion to Museum Studies (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011), pp. pp. 283-301

Eilean Hooper-Greenhill, 'Studying Visitors', in: Sharon MacDonald ed., A Companion to Museum Studies (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011), pp. 362-376

François Penz, 'Museums as Laboratories of Change: The Case for the Moving Image', in: Angela Dalle Vacche ed., Film, Art, New Media: Museum Without Walls?, Houndsmills/New York, Palgrave MacMillan, 2012, pp. 278-

Gavin Hogben, 'Right Here... Right Now... Art Gone Live!', in: Angela Dalle Vacche ed., Film, Art, New Media: Museum Without Walls?, Houndsmills/New York, Palgrave MacMillan, 2012, pp. 301-320.

Kate Mondloch, ‘Installing Time: Spatialized Time and Exploratory Duration’, Screens: Viewing Media Installation Art (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2010), pp. 40-59.

Mark Nash, 'Questions of Practice', in: Paula Marincola ed., What Makes a Great Exhibition? (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Exhibitions Initiative, 2006), pp. 142-153.

Michelle Henning, 'New Media', in: Sharon MacDonald ed, A Companion to Museum Studies (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011), pp. 302-318.