SPECIAL THEME: MUSEUM COMMUNICATION BETWEEN ENLIGHTENMENT AND EXPERIENCE 1 The Journal Nordic Museology Nordic The Journal USEOLOGI M ORDISK View from The Getty Museum, Los Angeles, 2017. Photo Dorte Skot-Hansen. N 2019 • 1 Indhold Nordic museology 2019 • 1 INDHOLD/PREFACE Forord 1 Forord Brita Brenna TEMA/SPECIAL THEME 5 Museum communication between enlightenment and Museer er tidsmaskiner. De skaper tider: Fortider og nåtider, men også dår- experience. An introduction lige tider, gode tider, opplysningstider og mørke tider. Gjennom gjenstander, Hans Dam Christensen & Michael Haldrup lyssetting, tekster og arkitektur lager de menneskegruppers ulike tider: Kvin- 11 Planetariums between experience and enlightenment ners eller barns tider, arbeideres eller minoriteters tider. Og ikke minst skaper Marianne Achiam, Line Bruun Nicolaisen & Tina Ibsen de naturtider: Dinosaurenes eller pungdyrenes tider, universets eller et enkelt 25 Questing authenticity minerals tid. Tilde Strandbygaard Jessen & Anette Warring Hva er museenes rolle i å skape tider som kommer? ”The future is now”, 39 Wall texts in collection exhibitions skriver ungdommene som demonstrerer og streiker for at politikerne skal ta Palmyre Pierroux & Anne Qvale trusler mot jordens klima på alvor. Museene følger opp med innsamling av 51 The museum as destination bilder og historier. De ønsker å dokumentere samtid. Og de ønsker å være re- Dorte Skot-Hansen levante for ungdommene og for klimaengasjementet de uttrykker. De ønsker med andre ord å bidra til at klimaengasjementet setter spor og får en varighet. Slik vil de også bidra til å endre, forme eller skape tider som kommer. ARTIKLER/ARTICLES I 2018 ble det etablert en ny arbeidsgruppe innen ICOM (International 65 Betragter, værk, verden Council of Museums) med tittelen Museums and Sustainability. Vår visjon, Christiane Finsen skriver gruppa, er at i en nær framtid vil museer bidra så konstruktivt og ef- 82 Værktøjskasse til atmosfæriske kunstrum fektivt som mulig til å møte de mange utfordringene klimaendringer og i en Line Brædder bredere forstand, bærekraftsproblematikk, skaper. Museer har en unik rolle å 100 The creation of a museum system spille, hevdes det videre. Vi er spent på resultatet når gruppen skal levere sin Susanne Krogh Jensen rapport ved slutten av dette året. Dette nummeret av Nordisk Museologi har et spesialtema: Museumskom- ANMELDELSER/REVIEWS munikasjon mellom opplysning og erfaring. De to redaktørene for temaet, Books Hans Dam Christensen og Michael Haldrup, er begge deltakere i forsknings- 115 Hege B. Huseby & Henrik Treimo (red.). Tingenes metode. prosjektet Vores Museum (se presentasjon i Nordisk Museologi 2/2017). Museene som tingsteder Artiklene stammer fra arbeidet i dette forskningsprosjektet, og utfordringen og problemstillingen de reiser er et av museenes evige dilemmaer: Hvordan Camilla Mordhorst håndtere og administrere forholdet mellom opplysning og erfaring i muse- ene? Det finnes ikke noe evig svar, men det er forfriskende å få stilt spørs- målet på nytt, fordi disse begrepene nå kan tematiseres som noe annet enn motpoler, snarere er det hvordan de arbeider sammen på ulike måter som blir tematisert. Utenfor tema har vi tre artikler. Christiane Finsen utforsker også alter- native måter å forstå museets rolle som kunnskapsformidler og erfarings- rom. Line Brædder etablerer en verktøykasse for atmosfæriske kunstrom – i et arbeid som nettopp utforsker museumserfaringen. Og til sist gir Susanne Forord Nordisk museologi 2019 • 1, s. 5–10 4 Krogh Jensen et instruktivt bilde av hvordan kulturpolitikken etablerer et dansk museumssystem fra 1950-tallet og fremover. Samlet viser de nett- Museum communication between opp det særegne tidssystemet som museer opererer innenfor: Den his- toriske dybden og institusjonens og samlingens varighet skaper spesi- fikke forutsetninger for hvordan museene kan agere i samtid og framtid. enlightenment and experience God lesning! An introduction Brita Brenna Hans Dam Christensen & Michael Haldrup I museum this special theme views elements In museum studies, the relation between of enlightenment and experience in the enlightenment and experience has often been museum as an entangled field, where the one seen as an antagonistic discourse. In a pell- is depending on the other; experience and mell, debates over museums as temples of enlightenment are intertwined concepts when knowledge and public memory institutions it comes to museum communication. This versus Disneyfication, commercialization and might not come as a surprise for committed adaptation to the experience economy might people in museum everyday life, but in indicate this dichotomous relation. Especially, prevalent ways of addressing museums, both under the influence of the hype emanating from within and outside the museum domain, the the latter concept, museum practices have been antagonism still exists and produces very real conceived of as a tension between a historical effects and tensions commitment to the values of “enlightenment” For example, as part of the Bildung project and more contemporary demands for of modern European societies, enlightenment producing entertaining “experiences” (Skot- was embedded in the conceptualization of Hansen 2008). This special theme of Nordic content, form and objectives of museum Museology has had its outset in discussions communication; and museums are still connected with the large Danish research and conceived as institutions of enlightenment for development project, Our museum (2016– their visitors and the public at large. However, 2020). In this project, a central objective is to alongside this understanding, attention to examine the antagonistic discourse in question experience has been present all the time, here: how well-documented is this antithetical from early transnational antiquarians’ and relationship between enlightenment and private collectors’ museum and acquisition experience when discourses are critically practices on to current mediation practices examined? Or, rather, how many discourses and spectacular museum buildings, and with contradict and even falsify this antagonism? attention being variously paid to the collector, (For a general introduction to Our museum, the owner, the communicator, the visitor, and see Drotner 2017). even the architect. In line with the propositions of Our Admittedly, this claim of an entangled Hans Dam Christensen & Michael Haldrup Museum communication between enlightenment and experience 6 field – or the opposite – is stated almost scientific knowledge and enlightenment [Almen- air museum, which opened in a park in objects without value at all or, more modest, 7 without consequences as the two concepts, oplysning]. The objects are acquired in order to be central Copenhagen in 1897, but was very fast value for just a very limited number of people. experience and enlightenment, can be defined preserved and to be part of a comprehensive whole removed to the outskirts of the city. It should be noted that Müller is not blind to and explained in an abundance of ways which in which each section is equally established. The More ferociously, Müller attacks the socalled the importance of museum communication. might make them both interrelated and objects are scientifically ordered and processed. “interior”-principle, which he pigeon-holes On the one hand, he approves decoration and separated. On the one hand, this confusion They are on display in order to be seen, studied and as “Interiør-Exteriører” [Interior-Exterior] art as a frame and background for authentic makes the concepts awkward to use in an appreciated (Müller 1897:684, all translations by the (Müller 1897:689). His criticism is, among museum objects as long as the objects academic context. On the other hand, the tense authors.) other things, directed towards their use of are not subjugated to the former (Müller field between enlightenment and experience covert copies, their need for insignificant 1897:698). On the other hand, objects might might make them productive notions when From a bird’s perspective, this definition might objects in exhibitions, the lack of comparability be acquired due to their scholarly interest museum communication is looked at through today be considered old-fashioned, but not between items within the same category, the as well as their communicative potential this lens from various analytic perspectives. entirely unrecognizable. At closer inspection, narrowness of specialized collections, and the (Müller 1897:690). Müller’s scientific-orderly however, obsolete hierarchies between risk of destroying significant museum objects. exhibition principle, however, disqualifies the enlightenment and experience, between Thus, the primary aim of “Interiør-Exteriører” “Interiør-Exteriør” in which scientific order II human and nature, between authenticity is not to display original artefacts, for example, is subjugated to the impression of illusive A specific example of the antagonistic and imitation, and between significance authentic interiors, but to create illusive spaces entirety. Obviously, his notion of preservation discourse in the history of Danish museum and insignificance, become visible. For – comparable to panoramas and panopticons – and protection also calls the interior principle communication, often referred to, is Sophus example, human-made and human-treated in which copies and the like complete missing into question. The museum objects should Müller’s harsh critique of experience- objects draw, according to Müller, a distinct