At the Museums Association, we’ve been thinking about how we can respond to current events, support the sector to be relevant and maintain the momentum for change.
For the past three years, we have run the Festival of Change alongside our conference and exhibition. This groundbreaking event has incorporated interventions from Museum Detox with its Check Your White Privilege Clinic, and Charlie Craggs’ Transphobia Nail Bar, as well as Drag Kings and Queens, an escape room, the Vagina Museum and much more. We’ve been challenged, entertained and provoked – and it has been brilliant.
The theme for this year’s conference is Sustainable and Ethical Museums in a Globalised World. It couldn’t be more timely to be discussing the issues of climate crisis and museum ethics, and what we can do to meet these challenges.
We know we need to do more than just talk, so we will be working with Culture Declares Emergency, a group of arts and culture organisations and individuals that have come together to declare a climate and ecological emergency and to campaign for change.
Culture Declares plans to get delegates and visitors thinking about how we can become more sustainable and lessen our impact on the environment. We are encouraging individuals and organisations to sign up to Culture Declares before conference, to create maximum impact in Brighton.