The Activist Museum?

The notion of the ‘activist museum’ has popped up in several conversations I’ve had over recent months.

Initially, I celebrated the concept without thinking much about it. In my last museum job, in Germany, visitor focus, community participation and power-sharing were met with forceful resistance. In comparison, hearing any museum described as ‘activist’ is surely cause for celebration.

Today, however, I’d like to look at the idea of the activist museum a bit more critically.  

 Definitions

Activism (noun)
The use of direct and noticeable action to achieve a result, usually a political or social one.

Cambridge Online Dictionary

For the purpose of considering the activist museum, I think it’s worth noting that the actions referred to in the above always rely on resources of some kind. The question to ask is who owns those resources, and on what grounds.

Museum Activism
‘Museum activism refers to, ‘museum practice, shaped out of ethically-informed values, that is intended to bring about political, social and environmental change.’’ [1]

The University of Leicester

The list of winners of the University of Leicester’s Activist Museum Award since 2019 give a good indication of what this activist museum practice may look like: community-led approaches, shifting power dynamics, challenging dominant narratives, valuing local knowledges, decolonial work, fostering a sense of togetherness…

The list goes on, and every celebrated practice is inspirational.

So what is there to be concerned about?

I’d like to turn to Jennie Carvill Schellenbacher’s excellent article on the Museum-ID website, in which she presents initial criteria for activism in museums. It’s her fourth criteria which illustrates the conflict.

‘Activist museums,’ she writes, ‘offer space to oppositional opinions.‘ These opinions can, of course, run contrary to the museum’s activist goal, and so, as Schellenbacher immediately owns, this is ‘probably the most difficult’. Nevertheless, Schellenbacher insists, ‘The museum must be a place for multiple perspectives, experiences and opinions.’ Again she immediately qualifies: ‘Not every opinion has a place in the museum (…)’ The approach she advocates in this article is to ‘[acknowledge] other views in context (…)’ (ibid, my emphasis) to provide greater nuance than excluding them altogether.

I get what Schellenbacher argues: of course racist views (one of her examples) have no place anywhere in our society and a museum must illuminate their systemic context. But at the same time, this focus on extremist views hides the conflict inherent in the activist approach: that ultimately, any views in opposition to the museum’s activist agenda will be presented through the museum’s own perspective. While we may be convinced that this is for the better of society, the activist approach likely leads us to mute or even dismiss some views, some opinions, some experiences.

In my view, the activist museum as it emerges from the above runs the very real danger of being an exclusive space. This danger seems heightened by the moral belief in the good that is being done. Rather than encourage us to reflect on our own structures, the activist approach can lead us to cement them.

This brings me back to my earlier point about resources. The activist museum uses resources that one could argue belong to everyone: through funding supplied by taxpayers and collections borrowed from heritage communities. Using these resources for an exclusive activist goal means to exercise control.

That is also the reason why I am wary of conflating co-creative, decolonising, power-sharing museum practice with the notion of activism in museums. These practices are intended to open up our structures and expand our perspectives, and yet defined in activist terms they can be exploited in service of our own agendas.

Conclusion

I’m sure the intention behind the notion of activism in museums is to move away from passivity, to own our agency and to be the change. I’m all for that. I, too, want museums to be relevant in our societies, to play a role politically and socially. I’m just not convinced the concept of activism leads us down the right path.

Notes

[1] The quote within the quote is, I believe, from Janes, R. and Sandell, R. (2019) Museum Activism. Routledge, which is mentioned just before this sentence.