The Role of Today's Museum
The Role of Today's Museum

Author: Clive Gray

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2020-04-07

Total Pages: 186

ISBN-13: 1000059324

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The Role of Today’s Museum provides a thorough investigation of what museums do and why. Arguing that museums are multifunctional institutions, the book examines the consequences of this for the services that museums provide, the publics to whom they are provided and the providers themselves. Adopting a wide perspective on understandings of the roles of museums and considering the different environments within which museums operate, Gray and McCall provide a new perspective on how transformations, as well as the gaps between intended policies and the actual work that is undertaken within museums, can be both identified and understood. By differentiating between social, economic and political visions and expectations of museums, the analysis in this book allows for a fuller understanding of what these organisations do and provide for their societies and the struggles and negotiations that surround their existence. The Role of Today’s Museum takes a critical, interdisciplinary approach to studying museums and museum policy. As a result, the book will be of interest to academics and students engaged in the study of museums, cultural policy, social policy, cultural sociology, public policy and cultural and political economy. Highlighting the gaps that exist between policy ideals and museum practices, the book also provides valuable insights to policy-makers and practitioners.

Multiculturalism in Art Museums Today
Multiculturalism in Art Museums Today

Author: Joni Boyd Acuff

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2014-07-08

Total Pages: 381

ISBN-13: 0759124116

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Aimed at museum educators, Multiculturalism in Art Museums Today seeks to marry museum and multicultural education theories. It reveals how the union of these theories yields more equitable educational practices and guides museum educators to address misrepresentation, exclusivity, accessibility, and educational inequality. This contemporary text is directive; it encourages museum educators to consider the critical multicultural education theoretical framework in their day-to-day functions in order to illuminate and combat shortcomings at the crux of museum education: Museum Educators as Change Agents Inclusion versus Exclusion Collaboration with Diverse Audiences Responsive Pedagogy This book adopts a broad definition of multiculturalism, which names not only race and ethnicity as concerns, but also gender, sexual orientation, religion, ability, age, and class. While focusing on these various facets of identity, the authors demonstrate how museums are social systems that should offer comprehensive, diverse educational experiences not only through exhibitions but through other educational activities. The authors pull from their own research and practical experiences which exemplify how museums have been and can be attentive to these areas of identity. Multiculturalism in Art Museums Today is hopeful and inspiring, as it identifies and commends the positive and effective practices that some museum educators have enacted in an effort to be inclusive. Museum educators are at the front-line interacting with the public on a daily basis. Thus, these educators can be the real vanguard of change, modeling critical multicultural behavior and practices.

Museum of the Future
Museum of the Future

Author: Cristina Bechtler

Publisher: Jrp Ringier

Published: 2014

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9783037643839

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Museums of contemporary art are expanding and in crisis. They attract ever-larger audiences, architects constantly redesign them, and the growing number of artists is producing more massively than ever; at the same time museum funds are dwindling in the economic crisis and an overheated art market. This text gathers together interviews with international artists, architects and curators of the contemporary art world.

Museum Activism
Museum Activism

Author: Robert R. Janes

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2019-01-10

Total Pages: 527

ISBN-13: 1351251023

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Only a decade ago, the notion that museums, galleries and heritage organisations might engage in activist practice, with explicit intent to act upon inequalities, injustices and environmental crises, was met with scepticism and often derision. Seeking to purposefully bring about social change was viewed by many within and beyond the museum community as inappropriately political and antithetical to fundamental professional values. Today, although the idea remains controversial, the way we think about the roles and responsibilities of museums as knowledge based, social institutions is changing. Museum Activism examines the increasing significance of this activist trend in thinking and practice. At this crucial time in the evolution of museum thinking and practice, this ground-breaking volume brings together more than fifty contributors working across six continents to explore, analyse and critically reflect upon the museum’s relationship to activism. Including contributions from practitioners, artists, activists and researchers, this wide-ranging examination of new and divergent expressions of the inherent power of museums as forces for good, and as activists in civil society, aims to encourage further experimentation and enrich the debate in this nascent and uncertain field of museum practice. Museum Activism elucidates the largely untapped potential for museums as key intellectual and civic resources to address inequalities, injustice and environmental challenges. This makes the book essential reading for scholars and students of museum and heritage studies, gallery studies, arts and heritage management, and politics. It will be a source of inspiration to museum practitioners and museum leaders around the globe.

Culture Strike
Culture Strike

Author: Laura Raicovich

Publisher: Verso Books

Published: 2021-12-14

Total Pages: 225

ISBN-13: 1839760524

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A leading activist museum director explains why museums are at the center of a political storm In an age of protest, cultural institutions have come under fire. Protestors have mobilized against sources of museum funding, as happened at the Metropolitan Museum, and against board appointments, forcing tear gas manufacturer Warren Kanders to resign at the Whitney. That is to say nothing of demonstrations against exhibitions and artworks. Protests have roiled institutions across the world, from the Abu Dhabi Guggenheim to the Akron Art Museum. A popular expectation has grown that galleries and museums should work for social change. As Director of the Queens Museum, Laura Raicovich helped turn that New York muni- cipal institution into a public commons for art and activism, organizing high-powered exhibitions that doubled as political protests. Then in January 2018, she resigned, after a dispute with the Queens Museum board and city officials. This public controversy followed the museum’s responses to Donald Trump’s election, including her objections to the Israeli government using the museum for an event featuring Vice President Mike Pence. In this lucid and accessible book, Raicovich examines some of the key museum flashpoints and provides historical context for the current controversies. She shows how art museums arose as colonial institutions bearing an ideology of neutrality that masks their role in upholding conservative, capitalist values. And she suggests ways museums can be reinvented to serve better, public ends.

The Art Museum in Modern Times
The Art Museum in Modern Times

Author: Charles Saumarez Smith

Publisher: National Geographic Books

Published: 2021-04-13

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 0500022437

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A compelling examination of the art museum from a renowned director, this sweeping book explores how architecture, vision, and funding have transformed art museums around the world over the past eighty years. How have art museums changed in the past century? Where are they headed in the future? Charles Saumarez Smith is uniquely qualified to answer these questions, having been at the helm of three major institutions over the course of his distinguished career. For The Art Museum in Modern Times, Saumarez Smith has undertaken an odyssey, visiting art museums across the globe and examining how the experience of art is shaped by the buildings that house it. His story starts with the Museum of Modern Art in New York, one of the first museums to focus squarely on the art of the present rather than the past. When it opened in 1939, MoMA’s boldly modernist building represented a stark riposte to the neoclassicism of most earlier art museums. From there, Saumarez Smith investigates dozens of other museums, including the Tate Modern in London, the Getty Center in Los Angeles, the West Bund Museum in Shanghai, and the Centre Pompidou in Paris. He explores our shifting reasons for visiting museums, changes to the way exhibits are organized and displayed, and the spectacular new architectural landmarks that have become destinations in their own right. Global in scope yet full of personal insight, this fully illustrated celebration of the modern art museum will appeal to art lovers, museum professionals, and museum goers alike.

The Brutish Museums
The Brutish Museums

Author: Dan Hicks

Publisher:

Published: 2020

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781786806833

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Walk into any European museum today and you will see the curated spoils of Empire. They sit behind plate glass: dignified, tastefully lit. Accompanying pieces of card offer a name, date and place of origin. They do not mention that the objectsare all stolen. Few artefacts embody this history of rapacious and extractive colonialism better than the Benin Bronzes - a collection of thousands of brass plaques and carved ivory tusks depicting the history of the Royal Court of the Obas of BeninCity, Nigeria. Pillaged during a British naval attack in 1897, the loot was passed on to Queen Victoria, the British Museum and countless private collections. The story of the Benin Bronzes sits at the heart of a heated debate about cultural restitution, repatriation and the decolonisation of museums. In The Brutish Museums, Dan Hicks makes a powerful case for the urgent return of such objects, as part of a wider project of addressing the outstanding debt of colonialism.

The Educational Role of the Museum
The Educational Role of the Museum

Author: Eilean Hooper-Greenhill

Publisher: Psychology Press

Published: 1999

Total Pages: 366

ISBN-13: 9780415198264

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Grounded in the strengths of its first edition, this book has been restructured to include new papers and recent articles, and presents front-running theory and practice as it addresses the relationships of museums and galleries to their audiences.

Museum Innovation
Museum Innovation

Author: Haitham Eid

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-07-18

Total Pages: 252

ISBN-13: 1000402649

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Museum Innovation encourages museums to critically reflect upon current practices and adopt new approaches to their civic responsibilities. Arguing that museums have a moral duty to perform, the book shows how social innovation can make them more equitable, relevant and impactful institutions. Including contributions from a diverse group of international scholars, practitioners and researchers, the book investigates the innovative approaches museums are taking to address contemporary social issues. The volume focuses on the concept of social innovation and individual chapters address a range of crucial issues, such as climate change; the COVID-19 pandemic; diversity and inclusion; the travel ban; and the repatriation of museum collections. Exploring the impact that organizational structures have on museums’ aspirations to act as agents for social change, the book also unpacks how museums can establish sustainable relationships with minority communities. Proposing steps that museums can take to affirm their relevance as viable community partners, the book breaks down silos and connects ideas across different areas of museum work. Museum Innovation explores the role of contemporary museums in society. It is essential reading for academics, students and practitioners working in the museum and heritage studies field. The book’s interdisciplinary nature makes it also an interesting read for those working in business studies, digital humanities, visual culture, arts administration and political science fields.

Museum Education for Today's Audiences
Museum Education for Today's Audiences

Author: Jason L. Porter

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2022-02-15

Total Pages: 350

ISBN-13: 1538148617

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Today’s museum educators are tackling urgent social issues, addressing historic inequalities of museum collections, innovating for accessibility, leveraging technology for new in-person and virtual learning experiences, and cultivating partnerships with schools, businesses, elders, scientists, and other social services to build relationships and be of service to their communities. Despite the physical distance the pandemic placed between museums and their visitors, museum educators have remained essential -- sustaining connections with the public through virtual or modified programming, content development, and conversations that they are uniquely qualified to execute. Educators require updated resources to guide their efforts in navigating these new challenges and building upon the opportunities presented by current events and changing audiences. This book and its accompanying on-line resource share lessons from innovators in the field to support ongoing professional development efforts with essays about current issues. Additionally, it provides new models and tools to guide individual or group reflection on how today’s museum educators can adapt and thrive in a dynamic and ever-changing cultural sector. The additional resources include discussion prompts and adaptable templates to allow readers to customize the content based on current events, institutional discipline, size, budget, and staffing scenario of their organization. The book’s essays are divided into three sections: Changing expectations of visitors - inclusion, participation, and technology Training and preparation for responsive, resourceful educators Models for the future While a book can share ideas in the hope of inspiring change, the accompanying online resource (www.EvolveMuseumEd.com) provides a more flexible and responsive forum for sharing ongoing and evolving resources to encourage professional development for museum educators as they respond to the changing needs of today’s audiences.