City Museums As Centres of Civic Dialogue?
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city museums as centres of civic dialogue? Cty museums as centres of cvc dalogue? Proceedngs of the Fourth Conference of the Internatonal Assocaton of Cty Museums, Amsterdam, 3-5 November 2005 Amsterdam Historical Museum Amsterdam, 2006 © 2006 Amsterdam Hstorcal Museum No part of ths publcaton may be reproduced, stored n a retreval system or transmtted n any form or by any means, electronc, mechancal, photo-copyng, recordng or otherwse, wthout the pror wrtten permsson of the publsher. Amsterdam Hstorcal Museum Neuwezjds Voorburgwal 359 PO Box 3302, 1001 AC Amsterdam T +31(0)205231822 F +31(0)206207789 isbn 90-6984-488-5 The paper n ths publcaton meets the requrements of ∞ iso-norm 9706 (1994) for permanence. The edtors of ths volume have made every effort to trace rghtsholders to obtan per- msson for reproducton of llustratons. If any party should feel the reproducton of llustratons n ths book consttutes an nfrngement of rghts they have to the materal, they are nvted to contact the Amsterdam Hstorcal Museum. Editor Renée Kstemaker Editorial committee Mla Ernst and Annemare de Wldt Project assistance Eefje van der Wejden Reports on the discussions Emle Broekhuysen, Eva Geene, L Hoekstra and Dneke Stam English editing and Dutch-English translation Jean Vaughan and Kate Wllams French-English translation Vc Joseph Typesetting, Design & Production Edta-KNAW, publshng department of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Scences. Printer Krps Meppel v Contents v Preface 1 Welcome speech Paulne Kruseman 4 Introduction to the conference Renée Kstemaker 7 Word of welcome by Ms Hannah Belliot key notes 11 The urban mosaic. Townscapes and residential patterns in the Western world Mchel Wagenaar 22 Urban icons Vanessa R. Schwartz and Phlp J. Ethngon shaping the city 31 introduction The District Six Museum in Cape Town, South Africa Valmont Layne 36 Museums in the city: a multi-centred approach to policy and civic dialogue in Antwerp Steven Thelemans and Peter De Wlde 40 Capital City – changing the story Cathy Ross 45 discussion 47 Helsinki City Museum – documenting suburban life in Helsinki Tna Mersalo 55 Making history Zuidas: the long-term development of an ambitiously planned city district Hans Denjs 58 discussion 60 Permanent and temporary exhibitions, the many faces of Warsaw’s past. The reception of historical exhibitions by contemporary visitors Joanna Bojarska and Barbara Moszczyńska 67 City museum and city archives: who should collect what? Alce van Depen 72 discussion 73 The city museum and its environment: the contribution of archaeological collections Rachd Bouzd 78 The role of archaeological research and archaeological collections in the making of the Bruggemuseum Hubert De Wtte 83 discussion activating the city 87 introduction The economic significance of participation by city museums F.Ph. Bjdendjk 90 Towards a city museum as a centre of civic dialogue Jouetta van der Ploeg and Kees de Groot 97 ‘Cultural diversity in the middle of Berlin’ Rta Klages 102 discussion 103 Towards new target groups – Refugees and businessmen in Copenhagen Joergen Selmer 107 East Amsterdam, an outreach project Mla Ernst 113 discussion v 115 What kind of museum for the city of Beirut? Carla Mardn 123 The museum of Gadagne, a museum with many partners Smone Blazy 126 discussion 128 Addis Ababa Museum as a centre of public discussion Estfanos Admasu Jenbere 134 Museums as History Workshops – A case study from Skövde City Museum, Sweden Curry Hemann 141 discussion r�������������������epresenting the city 145 introduction The City – A Wondrous Place? Davd Flemng 147 153 Old Vienna. The city that never was – An exhibition to discuss the identity of a city Wolfgang Kos 156 National Museum of Archaeology of the City and the Lagoon, Venice – Work in progress for a museum featuring a living city Lug Fozzat and Federca Varoso 161 discussion 163 History’s role in revitalizing the City of Hartford Davd M. Kahn 169 A museum director must be a ballet dancer Dana Wnd 171 discussion 173 Red lights in the museum Annemare de Wldt 181 Liverpool: European capital of...the transatlantic slave trade Davd Flemng 188 discussion 190 Made in Bruges. A modern city threatened by its romanticized tourist image Jorjn Neyrnck and Ellen Vandenbulcke 192 Another view of St Petersburg Jula Demdenko 197 discussion 198 Eplogue 203 ����������������About the authors 210 Lst of partcpants 217 Web stes of partcpatng organsatons v Preface and acknowledgements The Amsterdam Hstorcal Museum hosted the Fourth Conference of the Internatonal Assocaton of Cty Museums from 3-5 November 2005. The conference was held n the Trppenhus, the home of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Scences n the medaeval heart of Amsterdam. Durng excursons, the more than 160 partcpants also had the opportunty to see parts of the cty datng from the last part of the 20th century. Of partcular nterest was the vst to Imagne Identty and Culture, a new multcultural nsttute for the representaton of dentty and cultures n Southeast Amsterdam. And t was of course possble to vst the Amsterdam Hstorcal Museum and the Wllet- Holthuysen Museum. On the last day of the conference there were vsts to the cty mu- seums n Rotterdam and The Hague. The modern cty was the focal pont of the conference. Two keynote speakers from the Unversty of Amsterdam and the Unversty of Southern Calforna descrbed the huge physcal and socal changes ctes underwent n the 20th century, as well as pay- ng attenton to the mages of ctes and the creaton of these mages. Partcpants could then dscuss and analyse the relatonshp between cty museums and the modern cty, wthn the framework of three themes. How do museums record hstory and how do they present t? To what extent are they the platforms for or nstruments of certan ur- ban and socal change? Do museums contrbute to creatng the mage of a cty? These and many other questons were dealt wth durng the parallel workng groups whch were held for each of the three themes. Each theme opened and closed wth a short plenary sesson. The conference partcpants were predomnantly from cty museums. Other partc- pants ncluded specalsts from several unverstes, tourst offices, housng corpora- tons, developers, fundng organzatons and students. In total twenty-sx countres, manly n Western and Eastern Europe, Afrca, and North Amerca, were represented. Durng the conference five ntroductory plenary lectures were presented and twenty- three shorter speeches. The artcles n these proceedngs are the culmnaton of all the presentatons gven durng the conference. Moreover, the dscussons of all the workng groups are ncluded. Ths publcaton not only gves an excellent mpresson of the con- ference tself but also of the questons and ssues that concern and nterest nternaton- al cty museums. One of the objectves of the conference was to learn from each other’s experences. I hope that ths publcaton wll contrbute to ths. An edtoral board comprsng Mla Ernst, head of the educatonal servce of the Amsterdam Hstorcal Museum, and Annemare de Wldt, a curator at the museum, was formed to prepare ths publcaton. Renée Kstemaker, senor consultant research and development and former head of museum affars at the Amsterdam Hstorcal Museum, was edtor of the proceedngs. Eefje van der Wejden supported the edtor as project assstant. Kate Wllams and Jean Vaughan edted the Englsh texts. Vc Joseph translated the artcle by Rachd Bouzd from French nto Englsh. The publshng house of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Scences, Edta, was responsble for the producton of the book. Ellen Bouma of Edta was the graphc desgner. I would lke to thank them all for ther hard work over the last few months. A publcaton lke ths cannot be realzed wthout sufficent fundng. We have receved subsdes from the Internatonal Commttee for Museums and Collectons of Archaeology and Hstory (ICMAH) and from the Internatonal Assocaton of v Museums of Hstory (IAMH) specally for the conference reportng and part of the cost of the Englsh edtng of the contrbutons. My warm thanks to the presdent of ICMAH, Mare-Paule Jungblut, and the actng presdent of IAMH, Jean-Marc Lér, for ths financal support. I would also lke to thank the VSB Fund for ther contrbuton to financng the Englsh edtng and the Zudas project organzaton for ther financal contrbuton to realzng ths book. Paulne Kruseman Drector Amsterdam Hstorcal Museum v Welcome speech Pauline Kruseman Director Amsterdam Historical Museum Ladies and Gentlemen, A warm welcome to the Fourth Conference of the Internatonal Assocaton of Cty Museums. Our museum has been nvolved n ths organsaton from the very begn- nng. Durng the foundng meetng n London back n 1993, Max Hebdtch aptly ponted out that the museum organsng the conference benefits enormously from ts results: ‘You learn so much from t and can rase ssues and questons wth colleagues.’ Here at the Amsterdam Hstorcal Museum we have already learnt a lot! In 1999 and 2000 extensve changes were made to our permanent exhbton on the hstory of Amsterdam. These changes were nspred by several objectves, such as attractng a wder audence (famles wth chldren, youngsters, and a culturally more dverse publc), the expanson of the rooms on the recent hstory of the cty, stmulatng nteractvty durng vsts to the museum and workng wth other sorts of collectons: materal and mmateral. At the moment we are revampng the entrance area and the first room of the museum. There s also a plan to make changes to the rooms about the earler hstory of the cty on the bass of the same objectves mentoned above. More than ever, we really want the museum to be for all Amsterdammers. The prncples of the concept of social inclusion, partcularly popular n the Anglo Saxon countres, form the bass of all our exhbton programmes and educatonal work.