Opinion
Don’t ever be afraid to make a fuss – just make sure it’s a big fuss
In January 2009, a campaign began in the Stourbridge area of the west Midlands. An award-winning museum set in a Grade II-listed building, with a hot glass studio, was under threat of closure. Staff had been told that the museum would be closed by March 2010 and they would be deployed somewhere else in the …
What lies at the heart of creative curatorial practice?
Are museums and galleries palaces of things, or resorts for people? When I was a museum studies student in Leicester in the 1990s, this was the almost endlessly debated question. A satisfactory, if unexciting, conclusion that we often reached held that the two were inseparable – people in museums could best be reached through things. …
Letters: December 2009
Dark ages at the Darwin Centre For blind visitors, the sloping voyage down the egg-shell shaped Darwin Centre at the Natural History Museum is a descent into pervasive barriers. None of the dozens of flat touchscreens have been designed with blind people in mind. Nowhere are tactile models and verbal descriptions to be found. Neither …
Creating a museum of the Troubles would be messy and complex, but is that an argument for not doing it?
The idea of a museum dedicated to the Troubles in Northern Ireland is something that continues to unsettle me. I have previously written that we need a shared space in which we can explore our histories and experiences and that museums should represent the conflict in our galleries. But was I right? In April I …
The object is not enough
Sara Hilton says that objects are not the only way of telling stories in museums
Balancing Act
Charles Saumarez Smith, the outgoing president of the MA, reflects on his time in office and looks to the future