Museum

Vol XXVIII, n 3, 1976

The modern museum:
requirements and problems
of a new approach; The
museum and the protection
of the cultural heritage of the
Maghreb; A Museum for an
African community












museum
Vol. XXVIII, NO. 3, I976
Museam, successor to Mouseion, is published
by the United Nations Educational,
Scientific and Cultural Organization in Paris.
Museum serves as a quarterly survey of
activities and means of research in the field
of museography.
Opinions expressed by individual
contributors are not necessarily those of
Unesco.
EDITOR: Anne Erds
ASSISTANT EDITOR: Y. Isar
EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD
Om Prakash Agrawal, India
Irina Antonova, Union of Soviet Socialist
Sid Ahmed Baghli, Algeria
Raymonde Frin, France
J an Jelinek, Czechoslovakia
Iker Larrauri, Mexico
Grace L. McCann Morley, Director,
ICOM Agency for South-East Asia
Paul Perrot. United States of America
Republics
Georges Henri Rivikre, Permanent Adviser
of ICOM
The Secretary-General of ICOM, e? oflcio
Each number: 17.50 F. Annual subscription
rate (&sues or corresponding double issues):
Go F.
Editorial and publishing offices:
United Nations Educational, Scientific
and Cultural Organization,
7 Place de Fontenoy, 75700 Paris (France)
0 Unesco 1976
Printed in Switzerland
Presses Centrales S.A., Lausanne
Hugues de Varine-Bohan
Mohamed Aziz Lahbabi
Kwasi Addai Myles
* Bernard J eannot-Vignes
Per-Uno Agren
Editorial I 29
The modern museum: requirements andproblems of a new approach
I 3 I
The mziseum and the protection of the cultzlral heritage of the Maghreb
141
A musez~z for an African commun@. An experiment in acquisition at the Ghana
National Museum I 1 3
Collecting material for an ethnographical exhibition. A n experiment conducted by the
EcomuseumY of the Urban Commun@ of Le Crezlsot-Montceau-les-Mtzes I 6 3
On the preparation of a new exhibit ir2 the regional museum of
Vsterbotten (Sweden) I 7 I
Museum notes
The mcaseum and the blind
176
Introduction (J ean Favire) I 76
Wly not science exhibitions for the blind? (Halina Duczmal-Pacowska) 176
A nzuseam for the blind: the Ryal Museums of Ar t and Histoy, Brussels
(S. Delevoy-Otlet) 178
Flevoho f I 8 o
ISSN 0027-3996 Murerim (U~IESCO, Parir), Vol. XXVIII, No. 3. 1976
- . . . . . . . . . . .
. . - . . . . . . . . .
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Editorial
Museums all over thq world are in a climate of change.
The museum as an institution is contested by some, upheld by others. There
are those who would do away with it altogether; while others call for its
adaptation and change. And there is the array of those, oblivious to these
stirrings, who are quite satisfied with things as they are.
I n this issue Mi presents a selection of articles dealing with this question
in a sequence running from the general to the particular.
I n the first article Hugues de Varine-Bohan argues for radical change in the
most general terms; his tone is assertive, vehement and full of the brilliance
we associate with the former Director of ICOM.
Mohamed Aziz Lahbabi is an academic who discusses next the notions of
the museum, protection and cultural heritage in the context of the Maghreb.
He too is an advocate of thorough change and suggests the means of achieving
this.
I n his article Kwasi Addai Myles rejects the colonial model and replaces it
with a specifically African model for a large museum of African arts and
techniques in a developing country which has recently become independent.,
He speaks from a position of authority, that of Director of the Ghana National
Museum, and his authentic testimony merits long reflection.
Bernard Jeannot-Vignes recounts the experiment he conducted in a village
within the Communaut Urbaine Le Creusot-Montceau-les-Mines. While the
field of application is a limited one, the results are far from slight, especially
as they are presented with a critical eye.
Finally, Per-Uno Agren presents the historical museum of a region of
Sweden. Here there are no display rooms but rather working groups made up
of schoolchildren who occupy the information areas enlivened by the use of I
audio-visual media.
We would like once again to put a question to our readers. Hence we request
all those who .have been stimulated by these articles, whether they are hostile
or favourable to the views expressed or simply sceptical about them, to let us
have their reactions. We will print some of these in a future issue.
The modern museum:
requirements and
problems of a new
approach
Hugues de Varine-Bohan
There are many ways of talking about museums, most of them pejorative,
t h i s being especially so when they enter into the conversation of young people,
writers and that vast majority of people who have never been able to get over
their childhood impressions: a forced visit on a rainy Sunday or an exhausting
tramp through a museum in a foreign country, recommended by the guidebook
as worth the journey, in the sweltering heat. Bethat as it may, it must be
admitted that the word museum automatically conjures up the ideas of
beautiful, antique, rare, curious, etc. I n the ordinary conversation of enlight-
ened museum-goers, the almost exclusive criterion for judging the value of
one museum as compared with others is the quality of the items on show.
This attitude has led museums such as the largest of those which abound in
the United States, particularly those in New York, Cleveland, Chicago, Boston
and Los Angeles, to engage in extremely costly rivalry with a view to acquiring
unique items at any price, even when these works have reached the sales-
rooms by dubious routes, attained completely exaggerated prices or had
ruinous consequences for the purchaser (such as the building of a new wing).
It has now been proved that this system leads nowhere except to the museums
becoming part of the system of the so-called consumer society, the market
economy and cultural tourism. An increasingly large proportion of the
population is barred from museums for the benefit of a cultured minority and
throngs of tourists who arrive stop-watch in hand. It is time that we made an
attempt to revise these conceptions and to display both common sense and a ,
certain imagination. I n our opinion, all the efforts that have so far been made
in this direction have failed because they have swum with the stream of history
and have in fact been aimed solely at improving an existing situation. We
should like here to suggest a method and to propose a solution. The method
is simple and may be adopted even if the solution is rejected; both derive from
research at present being conducted in various countries in different continents.
Let us first of all lay down a ground rule, based on premises which have
hitherto not been applied or not properly applied. Hitherto, as we have seen,
consideration has been given only to the heritage of objects, regarded as
ends in themselves. The museum was there for the objects and the public was
authorized, sometimes paying a high price for the privilege, to contemplate
these objects without touching them and often without understanding them.
We propose that the order of the factors be reversed and that the starting
point be the public, or rather t wo types of user-society and the individual.
Instead of being there for the objects, museums should be there for people.
Let us therefore try to analyse peoples needs, both as individuals and as
gorse; dwarf juniper and bfacken. 17. Mill-
course and site of mill. I 8. Royal fern.
19. Forest
land. 21. Common oak. 22-24. Toilets,
refreshment bar and sandwich stall-
areas and playground.
and river. 20.

I
Man and nature in space and time.
Ecomuse de la Grande Lande, Marquze :
(a) aerial view; (b) plan of the itinerary.
I. The resin tappers railway station.
2. Sharecroppers house. 3 . View over the
airial (local term for open space dotted
with trees, dwellings and out-houses).
4. Masters house known as the Maison
de Marquze. 5 . Pig-sty and stables.
6. Bread oven. 7. Sheep-pen. 8. Poultry-
house. 9. Well. I O. Masters house, known
as Maison du Mineur. I I. Sheep-pen.
12. Barn, 13. High barn. 14. Barn divided
into two compartments. 15. Flora: plants
used for animals litter; different types of
heather growing in the area. I 6. European
132 Hugues de Varin$-Bohan
2
The museum of the past exists also in the
present and the future tenses. (a) Victoria
and Albert Museum, London-external
view; (b) National Gallery, Berlin-external
view; (c) Centre Georges Pompidou,
Paris-model.
- --.Il
.. - . . .. . . .
members of a group. Naturally, we shall seek to dehe present, real needs,
even potential needs, and not what we think people need. Then we shall have
to ascertain how the museum, by virtue of its basic characteristics-those
which are not subject to change-can meet these needs and how it needs to
change in order to do so. This method is easy and everyone, or at least the
museum-goer, can apply himself2 according to Es opinions, preferences and
personal experience, to finding solutions. Research carried out over recent
years by dozens of museum professionals, educators, social and vocational
guidance workers, philosophers, architects, etc., in the four corners of the
world merits consideration in this respect.
Let us begin by taking a look at the needs of society (or at least some of
them, for it is not claimed that museums can also solve the world problems
of famine or war). Wenote from our everyday experience and from reading
newspapers that our modern societies devote considerable efforts to document-
ing their past, their present and even to a certain extent their future since they
reduce it to mathematical and sometimes physicd models or computer pro-
grammes for the purpose of forecasting, futures studies and even futurology.
This docmentation generally takes the form of archives consisting of written
material, visual images, film and sound recordings; substantial sums are thus
spent in every country on collecting, classifying, preserving and comunicating
an ever-growing mass of such documents. not extend this concept to
three-dimensional objects, to real things which, better and more trutMdly
than anything else, are capable of documenting the past, the present and the
imminent future? It would then be necessary to assemble, in all fields of
human activity, but also in the sphere of the natural sciences, the most repre-
sentative collections possible in accordance with perfectly objective and if
possible mathematical criteriaia, so as to guard against the influence of taste
09: subjective, individual judgement. This also means blithely overstepping
the boundaries of traditional disciplines; just as in Prance a copy of all forms
of printed matter has to be deposited with the National Library, so a collection
would be established of all three-dimensional objects or original specimens
corresponding to a number of preestablished criteria. A succession of repos-
itories for objects would thus come to be established at local, provincial and
iaational levels;-a soltion wdd have t Xie f d to knsre &at, in-each
country, the character and culture of other countries are represented, which
would undoubtedy be facilitated by the establishment of stocks of objects to
be exchanged, loaned, circulated and even given away.
By means of this system, documentation for the purposes of any research
The modern museum : requirements and problems of a new approach
I 33
could be provided in the form not only of written and visual materials but
also of objects. We all know how fallible written accounts are and how
observations can be mistaken. Students of archaeology are fully aware, from
their own experience of archaeological literature, that the most eminent
research workers overlook essential information, either through negligence or
inattention or because to notice it would hinder the advancement of their
particular line of research. How often such students must wish that Troy or
Pompeii were still buried in the earth so that they could excavate them them-
selves one day using modqn methods. This can easily be extended to all fields
of knowledge: written materials are merely second-hand information, whereas
objects are essentially a primary source-indeed, objects are information. Nor
does it make any difference that we are able now, thanks to computers, to
store all the information we may require: tapes, discs and punch-cards are
likewise only second-hand information, an aid to research, but not under any
circumstances an adequate reproduction of the original. The latter should not
be destroyed so long as it can provide useful information.
Society may thus be said to possess a right of ownership over all real things,
over every object which bears witness to the evolution of nature or man.
134 Hugues de Varine-Bohan
Mans heritage is far wider than a mere collection of masterpieces or unique
specimens. Society should take everything into consideration for it is upon
this vast inheritance that it will build its future.
Man as an individual also feels an immense need for real things, and even
more at the present time than in centuries gone by. He lives in a two-dimensional
world of comic strips and television, diagrams of instructions and the daily
newspaper. Even art is more accessible to him through cut-price editions than
in its original forms: advertising extols the merits of reproductions so much
that he sometimes prefers to decorate his house with a photo of a Van Gogh
rather than with his children9s drawings or his own holiday snaps. Practically
the only things that he sees are the stereotyped products of industry, three-
dimensional it is true but rendered so banal that they are no longer even noticed.
How many children in Paris, London or Tokyo have never seen a rabbit, a
horse or an ant, except in a schoolbook or in a photograph? This means that
man has no access to true knowledge, for such knowledge is, first and fore-
most, direct experience of the world and bife; and without knowledge how will
he be able to create, or, in other words, to promote culture?
Formal education is under fire frop all sides. Ivan Illich calls for the de-
~chooling of society; Mao Tse-tung wants to supplement traditional education
by real experience of work, of life in the fields, of social relations; our secondary-
schh001 pupils want to be responsible for their own curricula, their methods
of work, etc. Universities, for the same reasons, are being vigorously challenged
and are unsuccessfully seeking new alternatives. They are criticized for being
too theoretical, for turning out not free men but producers or unemployables.
So-called Melong education, the latest slogan of the times, is never, despite
the skill of its theorists, anything more than in-service vocational training,
closely bound up with the immediate needs ofthe economy and ofindustriahts.
FOP all this an antidote is needed which will enable us all to put up with
the world around us, our day-to-day activities, and with econorasic, social,
pofitical and culturd alienation. The obtrusive image, the all-powerful iduence
of words, bureaucracy, etc., must be counterbalanced. It is objects, real things,
which will provide this antidote: the growing success, in every country, of
nature resemes, the well-known popularity of zoos and botanical gardens and
even the universal taste for tourism and for escaping to countries which are
still authentic show that such things meet a genuine need.
earlier also appbies here: the man in the street is inundated with second-hand
idormation which has been processed, arranged and commercialized; he wants
not to be given but to be left free to choose for himself the first-hand informa-
tion that he wants for its knowledge content.
Of course, a91 these aspirations, whether on the part of society or of the
individual, seem to be quite umealistic and idealistic. The main thing is not
to identify the needs but to satisfy them to the best of our abilities, to determine
the boundaries between what can and what cannot be done and to apply to
&e problems the techical resources at our disposal. But let us first of all note
-
the principal handicaps; these relate, first, to quantity, then to representativity,
then to methods OB communication and, lastly, to those of participation. It is
impossible to collect millions of objects and to preserve them indehnitely
without running the risk 06 completely choking our already cluttered world.
A choice must therefore be made, and first of all a choice of the criteria govern-
ing selection. How can each point in evolution, each aspect of nature and of
masabe objectively and adequately represented? nce this has been achieved,
and assuming that the equally important problems of conservation have also
been solved, how can one ensure effective communication with a public which
c~nsists of the whole popdation, other words, which is composed of
extremely varied categories of users, each with its specifk needs, its own
cdt leve% and way of life? Lastly and above all, how can the participation
of this public be obtained in the choice and utilization of such objects and
also in permanent, spontaneous and free cultural creation?
__ - _ _ - . __ ___ - - - - __ - - - - - _._ - __ - _ _ - - ._ - - _ _ - - - - - -
The modern museum : requirements and problems 015 a new appToach
If we take the view that it is the museums function to collect and utilize
real things-objects-as it is the librarys function to assemble and permit
access to books and printed materials, then it is the museum which should
provide the answers to the foregoing questions. And this is not utopian.
Let us consider for instance the idea of the object bank. Natural history
museums have long served this purpose. I n Sweden, for many years, it has
been possible, thanks to museum collections, to study the effects of insecticides,
I DDT in particular, on animals.1 For this it was necessary to have series repre-
senting the same animal species over very long periods, if possible before and
after the introduction into agriculture of the insecticides studied. By means
of collections which had been patiently put together, sometimes covering a
period of more than a hundred years, and comprising birds and fish, it was
possible to note an increase in the concentration of mercury and other substances
in feathers or scales. I n America (both in the United States and in Mexico)
the universities have started to entrust to museums their research collections
consisting of millions of specimens of animals, plants and minerals, as only
museums possess the necessary equipment, staff and resources for the prepara-
tion, classification and preservation of such large quantities.
The same applies to ethnographical museums or anthropological museums
in general. Present-day research calls for a large number of series, and daily
discoveries and evermore advanced and complex theories oblige specialists
continually to check their ideas and hypotheses against reality, but all the
mechanical or electronic means of recording are not enough for t h i s purpose.
How can one be sure today, when a professor feeds into a computer informa-
tion concerning a set of phenomena relating to a particular culture, that in ten
years time, another professor, in another part of the world, will not require
a whole body of at present unforeseeable information? It will then be necessary
to turn back to the objects themselves, which in the meantime will probably
have vanished entirely from their culture of origin.
There is no need to go on endlessly with these examples which could easily
apply in the case of modern or ancient history museums, and even art museums,
since the history of art, too, is partly based on comparisons between a multi-
plicity of works, so as to reconstitute the diversity of the trends and styles of
a period, taking into account the styles of other periods or other cultural
regions which may have influenced them or been influenced by them. I n
practice, besides the national history museums already mentioned (those in
particular of Gteborg in Sweden, San Francisco in the United States, Mexico
City, etc.), reference should be made to the Muse National des Arts et Tradi-
3
Does the museum hold the secrets of
mans future? Naturhistoriska Riksmuseet,
Stockholm-storerooms.
I. Kjell Engsttm, Temporary and Travelling
Exhibitions: A Means of Providing Information on
Nature Conservation, Mllserrtn, Vol. XXV, No. 1-2,
1973, P* 89.
Hugues de Varine-Bohan
136
tions Populaires in Paris, a museum a d research centre devoted to the repre-
sentation and study of French ethnology which seeks, albeit belatedly, to
accumulate source material of all types, both first- and second-hand, on the
life of the French during the pre-industrial period. Mention may also be made
ofthe Regionai Museum of Moravia in Brno which has coUected and preserved,
for an increasing number of research workers, objects of every kind from the
earliest ages of the earth right up to the present time, overstepping the tradi-
tional boundaries of the natural and social sciences. In other regions of the
world, mention may be made, lastly, of the natural history or history museums
of Singapore and Osaka, Nairobi and Sydney, thanks to which the evolution
of nature and of man, to use an expression already employed here and invented
ivihre, the father of modern museology, can be traced back in all
its aspects.
As a result of this line of thought, a new form of museum has recently
come into being, the ecomu~eum~, or ecological museuni, devoted to the
environment, whether cultural or natural, and involving the participation of
man himself as an actor rather than as a visitor. Pn it all the disciplines are
represented, and the museum becomes a documentation centre available for
the purpose of research and education, not passively, receiving what others
find, but by itself seeking, with its own means, by inventing methods of
investigation adapted to the environment and local conditions, by working
out classification systems in line with a flexible theory and future needs as yet
lXlliCn0wn.
This new form of museum-the result of simple modernization or of a
revolution, as in the case of the ecomuseum-is, of course, bound to meet
with dificulties, especially when one considers the resources available for a
museum in a country like France where the staff themselves, whatever their
qualifications, are still victims of the nineteenth-century prejudice which held
that the curators of art museums should be well-to-do collectors. First of all,
a. considerable number of research and semice personnel are necessary, like
those countless specialists who have been hired by private hrms for data-
processing since the advent of computers and other advanced technologies.
If the future of the world hinges upon knowledge of its past and strict control
of the present (consider the problems of pollution and the documentation
established for the purpose of controlling it) as well as predicting the future
as accurately as possible, then it is not too much to ask of governments and
local authorities that they set aside in their budgets and development plans
the resources necessary for museums to fulfil their role in respect of the CO-
ordination of research and for them to seme as documentation centres. In
order for this to be possible, these institutions must be able permanently to
call on large numbers of specialists and technicians representing the various
disciplines and provided with the necessary modern equipment. The East
European countries assign as many as I o staff to a simple provincial museum;
in 1968 the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco had forty doctors
of science on its staE As against these figures, French provincial museums
generally have one curator, sometimes an assistant, rarely more.
There is also a problem of space: the internationally accepted principle that
there should be twice as much storage space as exhibition space is hardly ever
respected in terms of architectural design. Too many museums are still housed
in inconvenient historic monuments, too many collections are still split up and
scattered, and no account is taken of modern facilities for transport, reproduc-
tion and storage.
Lastly, there is an intellectual problem: how is the selection to be made?
G6odwifl &&ten COGS To giii5-f hZic fki ciiituiies of abScil&- diEtito9shifJ
by the curator over his collection, a dictatorship which he justified either by
hiis taste, or by his curiosity or by his scientific speciality, no one wants to
come to grips with the only real problem faced by the museum of today and
which, it is worth noting, is not a problem of money. It is patently obvious
The modern museum : requirements and problems of a new approach
I37
that the museum curator alone, irrespective of his qualities in other respects, 4
his intellectual qualifications and the resources at his disposal, is incapable of ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ e ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ t ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
solving this problem. He alone will never possess the knowledge required to of the exhibition 17J years g ~ t b ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ p b
establish by himself the necessary criteria of selection in all the fields which at Nezichtel. Ethnographic Museum,
should be covered by the museum. It is here that imagination must be shown
and the courage to carry through innovations-to break down the divisions
established over the years between museums and research institutions, and
also to break down the psychological and hierarchical barriers between
museums themselves. Co-operation must be systematically organized at all
levels.
There must be co-operation at all levels, close and permanent. Though
institutionalized, it must be on a man-to-man, voluntary basis. The criteria of
selection, which determine once and for all what documentation on man and
nature will comprise, should be the fruit of collective efforts and social
responsibility. One must also be sufficiently modest to accept that one might
be wrong and seek ways of attenuating the effects of possible errors. An
increasing number of museums throughout the world are engaging university
lecturers as scientific consultants. Why not make a point of requesting these
lecturers, and research workers in general, when they meet by disciplines, on
the occasion of major international congresses all too often devoted to washing
their clean linen in public, to join in the search for criteria of museum quality
which could then be adopted by museums?
If this gamble comes off, it will at last be possible not only to contribute
effectively to research and to preparing for the future, and not only to provide
many young people with work corresponding to their tastes (consider the
excessive number of university graduates in the humanities at present without
?38 Hugues de Varine-Bohan
J
A museum, objects, animals, houses,
music and men. . .9 but also a literacy
centre, a vocational school and an export
sales centre for quality handicraft products.
MusCede Niamey, Niger-aerial view.
jobs), but above all to go on to the second phase of the museums work, its
true purpose, communication or, rather, community activities. Here, too,
ideas need to be formulated; experiments are under way, fairly few in number
but fidl of promise, which must be studied and turned to account in order to
give a new direction to the work of museums.
What then are the current trends in the work of museums? First, a trend
towards universality. As at the museuna of Moravia already referred to, although
the initial research work is founded on a division by fields of study, the
museums public activities form an integrated whole. Nothing of interest to
man is considered to be foreign to it: it caters equally for all categories of users.
men one considers these museums, when one studies the publics reactions
to them, one realizes more fully just how obsolete the traditional museum-
the museum of fine arts or achaeology, zoology or malacology-has become,
belonging as it does to that Clitist nineteenth century in which everything was
classified into categories neatly labelled with scientific names. J ust as in France
after 11968 the universities had to become multidisciplinary2 just as the sciences
long before that time had to exchange methods and results and even reseakch
workers, so museums must comply with the basic laws of nature and life,
where complexity and diversity hold sway. There is nothing intrinsically wrong
in collections being physically separated and placed in different buildings to
facilitate classification or to meet local needs, but let the topics dealt with by
the museum in its activities which reach out to the general public, that is to
say the community, relate to real life and introduce all the objects and elements
of information necessary.
Let us consider a very common example, the errhibitions which go from
country to country, with the backing ~f government ministries, showing
IO,OOO years of one countrys art, the treasures of another, etc. Automaticdy,
several hundred square metres of gallery space are filled up with objects,
beautiful and not so beautifid, curious and not so curious, admirably presented
by the best designers and specialists and offered up to the wide-eyed and
unquestioning admiration of densely packed crowds who sometimes do not
even how where exactly the country in question is, how its inhabitants live,
what their religion is and so many other things which are of so much more
iGpZZanC fZth&&lebrated GdGiGnding among geopl&3. Why not rekbve
some of the masterpieces prized by the experts and add a few notices, display-
cases or even whole sections devoted to the people, the life, the geography,
economy, beliefs and spiritual values, to the present problems of development
and other details which are of major importance for that far-off country which
-
The modern museum :. requirements and problems of a new approach
I39
has sent us the pick of its national treasures, often incomprehensible, out of
context. At a time when in every school modern mathematics is being taught
to our children, why are homogeneous sets being destroyed for reasons of
taste or taxonomy?
A second current trend is to facilitate access to museums and to the docu-
mentation which they contain, in other words, in general, to decentralize, if
not collections, at least the museums programme of activities. Those respon-
sible for the Museum of Science and Industry in Calcutta were not satisfied
with having created the first museum of this type in India for the benefit of
their compatriots; they discovered that their public numbered j o million and
that for most of them a visit to the museum was out of the question. They
therefore organized, with the means at hand, a netwokk of local museums and
a fleet of buses transporting mobile exhibitions which are gradually covering
the whole of Bengal. These constitute travelling documentation centres,
drawing on the three-dimensional resources of the central museum, taking
advantage of the facilities offered by local schools and working ceaselessly to
introduce the population to the modern world.
It is also desirable that this form of education and cultural activity should
be free. I n this connexion, it is interesting to note that the trends in the English-
speaking countries and on the continent of Europe are in opposite directions.
I n the former, where, previously, admission to museums was always free, a
crisis of financial origin, both at government level and in the field of private
financing as in the United States, resulted in the imposition of an admission
charge, despite protests. It is to be noted, however, that in the United States
this charge is discretionary and the average amount paid is relatively small as
compared with the facilities offered. I n France and in other countries where
there has always been an admission charge, increasing pressure is being brought
to bear in favour of free admission. But this is merely by the way: what is
important is the fact and the principle of free cultural services as a whole.
There is no occasion to make people pay for culture if education is free. In
France itself, this principle is already being applied in some places, in Le Mans
in particular, where the remodelled museum stopped charging admission at
the very time when it was increasing both its research activities and those
aimed at the public. There will undoubtedly need to be further discussion on
this point, about which we have no doubts: the considerations of profit and
price fluctuation should not be applied to museums. Prices are generally fixed
in accordance with supply and demand, but what is the present demand for
museums, what is the quality of the supply? If admission tickets were sold to
the highest bidder, who would bid for them? If the museum is really to become
a place where todays culture and that of the future are worked out, if it
belongs to the people, why should people have to pay to see something which
belongs to them? Should one have to buy a ticket every time one goes into a
public library?
We would further plead that the museum should be selective and client-
centred. All too often present-day museums are regarded by their curators as
providing lessonsJ for a homogeneous but perhaps non-existent public, a
public which exists mainly in the curators mind: a group of well-bred, culture-
hungry, beauty-loving, logically ,minded people with plenty of time to spare,
inexhaustible physical stamina and, above all, at least an arts degree. To
improve the museum, an educational service is set up with the task of attending
to those categories of visitors who do not fit the foregoing definition: school-
children, the precious 0.1 per cent of workers who visit museums on Sunday
afternoons, etc. The short-comings and excesses of this system are well known
and have led those of a more innovative turn of mind to ask, first, that there
should be no discrimination between types of users on the grounds of alleged
cultural standard and, second, that everyone should be able to find in the
museum a reflection of himself, his concerns and cultural needs. For this to
be possible, the following three different steps must be taken: activities must
6
Information on wheels. (a) Museobus of
the Birla Industrial and Technological
Museum, Calcutta; (b) Museobus of the
Muse des Beaux-Arts, Marseille.
140 Hugues de Varine-Bohan
7
The
Anti
of P
language
:apologa,
rimitive A
Of
M
Lrt>
objet
[exico
New
ts. (a) Museo
City; (b) Mu
York.
de
seu
be intensified and diversified; all the collections must be made accessible (in
accordance with the principle applied in libraries or documentation centres)
through different channels or by means of different forms of reference service;
lastly, users must participate in the definition of activities and the evaluation
of results. I n answer to the too facile objection that might be made by those
whose idea of museums is standing in rapt admiration before h e objects, let
us say merely that there is no question of abandoning them on a populist
pretext; they too are entitled to calm and meditation in the museum, just as
research workers are entitled to reference facilities separate from those provided
for the general public. But there is no question either of abandoning children,
cdtnral illiterates,, immigrants, in a word ordinary people who are loo&ng
f o ~ something else and whose daily problems are clearly circumscribed.
A specific example may be mentioned here, that of the museums in Mexico
City. Set up, in their new form, in 1964, they cater primarily for the bdk of
the population, generally illiterate or at all events newly literate, and school-
children. To this effect, a highly original approach has been adopted towards
&splay, activities and the educational service. Objects are exhibited for instance
without written notices or labels, but with drawings and pictograms com-
prehensible to everyone. Now, after ten years, those who actually designed
the museums established in 1964 are themselves challenging the whole concept
again. The fact that they are located in the centre of the town is criticized,
the fact that they do not relate to the real lives of citizens is pointed out and
thhe ZiG5iisiVd~icietific character -if -&e ci d cohtknt of e%liibitins- and-
activities is contested. As a result, new ideas are being tried out: a school
museum created by the children themselves so as to provide them with the
necessary intrroduction to objects; a neighbourhood or shanty-town museum
to foster the autonomous development of those newly arrived from rural
The modern museum : requirements and problems of a new approach 141
areas to the town and their adaptation to urban living conditions;l a village
or small-town museum entrusted to the inhabitants themselves so as to develop
their sense of cultural identity and their sense of ownership of and responsibility
for the historical and present environment.
This brings us to our last plea or last demand, for open-mindedness or
receptiveness. We are accustomed to considering the museum as an institution
whose purpose is to exhibit its collections, whereas in reality we should regard
it as an intelligent instrument which provides us with answers to our questions
and problems or at least helps us to find such answers for ourselves. If we
have questions concerning town planning and the future of the neighbourhood
in which we live, a museum should in its own way provide answers to these
questions by supplying us with the required documentation or by presenting
Werent theories and projects alongside each other; if a country is in the news
on account of a war, a discovery or a natural catastrophe, what is to stop a
museum from immediately making it the subject of an exhibition? Examples
of this are afforded by the Havana Science Museum in Cuba and the Museum
of Man and Industry of the urban community of Le Creusot-Montceau-les-
Mines in France. Indeed this is the most obvious use of the museum as an
object bank: a question is asked and the bank replies. But this necessarily
implies a single object bank, consisting of every collection existing in every
museum, and we come back to what we said earlier concerning the need to
overstep the boundaries of the different disciplines and to integrate all museums
into a single service network.
The approach we have just described obviously raises problems. Three
principal ones emerge. First, that of space; a museum as defined here cannot
make do with a conventional building, even if it is the work of a very good
architect. Its boundaries are the community which it serves, the national
I Ikher Larrauri, The School MuseumProgramme
in hexiCO,, N14Jel,m, vol. xxw, No. =, 1971,
~ ~ ~ e ~ ~ ~ x i ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ b ~ ~ ~ i ~ ~ ~ h e
Museumto the People, ibid., p. 70-7.
142 Hugues de Varine-Bohan
community in the case of the Louvre or the U&zi (apart from the tourists),
the regional community in the case of a museurrain a provincial centre and
the local community in the case of a small-town museum. But within the
territorial boundaries thus defined, everything is part of the museum: a site,
a monument, a theatre hall or class-room, a public square, etco Naturally there
exist places which lend themselves particularly to museum use-places where
objects are stored, premises used for administrative o91technical purposess
exhibition rooms distributed throughout the area, even mobile museums.
The second problem is that of ~ollections: the range of the museum's new
functions may dill some with alarm. The utilization of the collections of all
museums combined in the form of an object bank may constitute the beginning
of a solution, but it will certainly not be enough. At most, it will provide a
means of easily finding those elements required for any particdar purposes
those which must be ' prew" as part of the heritage. But this can easily be
supplemented by considering each object widin the community as belonging
to the museum, not in the legal sense but in the moral and historical sinse.
Thus, if the need arises and without there being any change in its legal status,
the object will be able to be used for the purpose of community activities.
The museum will thus increasingly become a tool for the co-ordination of
collections which it does not actually own but concerning which it possesses
the relevant information.
The third problem, to be solved in the same way, is that of staff. Alongside
a permanent and professional nucleus, composed for the greater part of
scFeiiiiits WkkFig fk%hi Gbjecdbank and of khnicins, Il-of them Conscios-
of working for the public, it is the users, or at least those of them who are
most committed to the idea of the museum, who ensure its development,
stimulate community interest in it and provide a link between the objects and
the ordinary users. There will thus be intermediaries at village or neighbour-
. . . _ _
8
Improving the
as to have greater freedom in one's cultural
choices: Muse du Tess, Le Mans.
Exhibition: Le Prodzh' Nozlveau.
Of Observation so
The modern museum : requirements and problems of a new approach
I43
hood level, voluntary or part-time associate curators, trainee community
activity organizers and many others, serving in a more or less spontaneous
and voluntary capacity or as the appointed representatives of their social
groups.
Conceived in this way, the museum is so closely linked to the population
that it no longer fits into the traditional, hierarchical structures. The all-
powerful curator, reigning over his collection, answerable only to an admin-
istrative or political authority, no longer fills the bill. The possibility of
involving users associations, of letting them be represented in the museums
decision-making organs, must be envisaged. British municipal museums have
long practised a system similar to this, albeit an imperfect one; the so-called
neighbourhood museums in the major American cities (Anacostia in Washing-
ton, Muse in New York) have gone further in this direction. There seems to
us to be a need to envisage tripartite representation in the decision-making
bodies: users (for the programme and for evaluation), scientists and museum
professionals (for planning and implementation), representatives of administra-
tive, political and financial bodies (for management).
To conclude this attempt to reflect upon an institution that some consider
to be outdated, others believe to be undergoing a crisis, and others again
would like to burn down, we should like to clarify a few secondary points
which could lead to confusion or to misunderstanding.
Whatever ones view of the foregoing, there is one thing which we consider
to be essential in order for the museum to have a future in our society: it should
not at any price be party to the treatment of culture as a market commodity;
for this reason, it must refrain from commercial practices and from collusion
with the world of finance-influencing the market prices of objects, publicizing
their insurance value, purchasing objects which have been acquired illegally
or at least without the proper documents, giving valuations disguised as expert
opinions, selling off or trading in collections under the pretext of a change in
taste, giving undue publicity to exhibitions and recent acquisitions stressing
the market value of works, etc. This also applies to modern art museums and
perhaps particularly to them as they are more closely implicated with specula-
tion: a body of documentation may be incomplete but a document does not
lose its value just because it is no longer in fashion. At worst, it bears witness
to a bygone fashion. Care must be taken not to adopt the attitude of the
archivist who would destroy or sell the original text of a diplomatic treaty
on the grounds that it has never been applied or that he is not in favour of
the clauses.
The museum, as an object bank, as a university which dispenses knowledge
through objects, will become a public meeting-place and a particularly pro-
pitious place for the creation of new cultural forms, new social relations and
new solutions to the most down-to-earth problems of individuals and social
groups. Art, the cornerstone of the traditional museum, will not lose in the
process, far from it: safe from those who would make of the museum a house
of merchandise, it will thus be able to renew itself, and with its roots firmly
planted in life will again, with nature, become an element in the human
environment.
[Tramlated. from Fretzch]
9
Mohamed ,biz Lahbabi
The museum and the protection of
the cultural heritage
of the Maghreb
The aim of this article is not to say anything new of archaeological or historical
interest but merely to present a few thoughts which have been prompted by
the concepts museum, protection and cultural heritage, with particular
reference to North Africa.
The Arabic word for museum is matha$ Etymologically, this means a place
where tahaf (beautiful, rare, precious objects) are assembled (the verbs tahafa,
to beautify, and athafa, to make a gift, come from the same root).
I n Fez, the cultural capital of Morocco, the national museum is called DHr
Aslh (the armoury). Similarly, in the famous capital of southern Morocco,
Marrakesh, the former name of the museum also had a martial ring: Dar al-
Bard (the house of gunpowder), and it was here that were kept the ancient
rifles and guns acquired by Morocco from the sixteenth century right up to
the beginning of the twentieth.
Does the true role of the museum consist in collecting together and displaying
tahaf and weapons?
To answer this question, certain concepts must be more precisely defined.
First of all, is museology a science or an art?
What is museology?
In order for it to be possible to concede the title of science to museology,
its subject-matter must first of all be circumscribed and the criteria governing
the choice of its functions and activities must be standardized. One of these
functions would seem to be that of enabling the museum to provide a living
testimony to national history through the ages. This history would epitomize
the nations dreams, hopes, reverses and aspirations as they are embodied in
the vestiges of the past and the achievements of the present. I t is thus the
museumJ s task to offer both to the eye and to the mind a concrete and scientific
representation of national culture. It is a medium of cultural information which
rescues from oblivion and safeguards the foundations of a nations culture,
but without detracting from their authenticity as other media such as the press
and cinema are liable to do-for it lets the objects speak for themselves.
By means of the objects which it exhibits, the museum presents an over-all
view of the Werent stages in the evolution of a peoples thinking and achieve-
ments so as to evoke memories and create a new awareness of the past.
The history of mankind begins the moment that man makes his presence
felt on the earth. This he does at two levels: he transforms nature so as to
9
Volubilis, general view. To visit and
appreciate this renowned Roman city one
has to have not only the means to get
there but also a relatively advanced level
of knowledge. It is significant that to this
day the people of the region call the
ancient city the Palace of the Pharaoh,
the term Roman (rozmzk) meaning
foreigner in general. It is the duty of
museologists and guides to counter such
errors and better inform the public.
146 Mohamed Aaia Eahbabi
impress upon it an artificial and human character and he reorganizes the
cultural resdts obtained so that they may serve for the purpose of observation
and comunication. It is at the second level that museology begins as a science
of the re-presentation of the national past in t he individual and collective
consciousness.
On the other hand, owing to the fact that it continually brings the genera-
tions face to face with other and in the process engages several of mans senses,
museology might be considered an art: it teaches man to see, hear and
communicate with objects and to appreciate their vital qualities. It has a
formative effect on the development of the aesthetic sense and it takes beauty
as a point of reference.
This being SO, museology would appear to be a scientific art in the service
of culture and, in so far as its purpose is to set standards, it seeks to provide
a condensed representation of the past and to make us ask: This is what ou;
ancestors did-what are we capable of achieving in our turn?
contribution be?
One of the fmctions of the museum is to throw out this challenge and
obtain our emotional involvement: everyone feels that his roots go back to a
particular past, a particular region, that he is linked to a given c o m ~v ,
heir to a specific cultural heritage.
Culture may be defined as all of mans acquisitions in the scientific, technical
and artistic fields by means of which he takes over &e raw mated of nature,
transforms it and uses it for his own purposes. Thus, the invention of the
ploughshare, whose importance for mans evolution was greater than that of
the Pyramids, the P O~C U ~ OP the Coliseum, forms part of the cultural heritage
of mankind. Human cdme is the ody culture there is and each national
cultme is an expression of man9s presence in a specific natural enviroment
and his response to that environment. It is an expression of that patrimony
within us which is part of our daily fives. It is the function of museums-and
in this particular case North African museums-to be the living memory of
the people and for the people.
This being so, the museum should contain not only paintings, sculptures,
weapons and ornaments, but dso everything that binds man to this native
soil and to his ancestors.
A majof part of the North African dturd heritage has come down to us
by way of oral tradition. Music, song md poetq, for instmce, are to a great
extent anonymous and are passed on in oral form during family or seasonal
celebrationso It would be desirable for a university research centre to be set
upg which, with the help of the regional museums, would be responsible for
all oral arts and oral fiterature. A healthy and militant North African culture
cannot be envisaged unless the ground work is laid in this way. The utmost
efforts must be made to prevail QVCX the general indXerence towards museums,
for if museums do not appeal to the masses, it is because they have not yet
found a form which is in line with-peoples tastes and temperament.
Museologists will have to develop their social and educational knowledge
in order to draw certain conclusions from the situation.
The man of the Maghreb belongs to an agricultural, earthbound culture
and every fibre of his being connects h h to the soil, to the jagged contours
and echoing spaces of the mountains. Striding through the desert, he is in
his element. Por him, everything that has rhythm and appeals to his sensibility
forms part of his Ccu1mre9, i.e. his life. However, mbseums seem to set a
barrier between Meand culture, appearing as places of contemplative silence.
In North African museums, as things stand at present, a culture which enjoys
G%&l apl p~o~~l - ana~r~srti ~e- (bkcace- it ishErmetic nfi&above the-general-
level) tends to coexist with a cdture which belongs more or less to the people.
This coexktence is peaceful and neutral and there is neither complementariity
nor interaction bemeen the culmes.
By and large, in the Arab world, people are more receptive to gesture and
IO
TETUAN MUSEUM, Tetuan. Reconstruction
of the Iiving-room in a traditional
house.
-
- _ - _. -
-
The museum and the protection of the cultural heritage of the Maghreb
I47
IO
148 Mohamed Aaia Lahbgbi
expression than to the manufactured objecte A page of calligraphy is more
appreciated than the h e gilt binding of a book; writing possesses a mysterious
and holy quality; the arabesque is not merely an ornamental art but a con-
tinuously moving gesture. The musicality and rhythm of a poem are a source
of greater delight than the actual content of the verses. Our museums, how-
ever, rarely exhibit manuscripts and are not provided with auditoria. They
excel in creating an impression of immobility.
A furt-her remark needs to be made here: monuments are restored, chased
c~pper, plaster casts and wood carvings are placed on display, but nothing is
shown to illustrate the history of the many varieties of tents which have, after
all, played an essential role in the lives of nomads and semi-nomads, Arabs
and Berbers.
Perhaps one day soon the prevailing conception of museums and their
functions will be reconsidered in all its aspects and precise criteria laid down
for choosing between that which is doomed to vanish and that which is
destined to g b on Eving or to be brought back to life.
We now come to the problem of who benefits from the museum as a national
and cultural hstiktion.
In the Arab world ody the big cities, and not all of them, possess musems.
.
I n addition, in t he capital cities, ody 'educate#initiates who are able to pay
the admission go to museums. Although entrance to many museums is free,
this has, mfortuhately, also proved i o be an inadequate allurement as ar as
the general public is concerned, and in actual fact, going to museums remains
a privilege of the most cultivated chss.
The musems of North Africa were established during the colonial era for
the benefit of foreign tourists. One 0f the results 0f .this is that the museu
guides are written in French (poor French at that) and not in the national
e, Arabic. This creates yet another barrier between the museum and
the native public who rarely visit musems. The statistics dearly show this
since they reveal that the number of museum visitors is in direct proportion
to the number of tourists visiting the region. The off-season for tourists is
&e 0Z-seion Tf Ei i seGi . It is tlierEfore nekssary fog the functins-of
"kol ogy to be redefined, particularly in North Africa, where museums have
been designed and run by foreign research workers concerned primarily with
ethnography and ethology, with no thought at all or the education of the
people or for the future. Out of an alleged respect for tradition, the tendency
_. - _ _ ._ - I --
The museum and the protection of thecultural heritage of the Maghreb

I49
was to see the indigenous culture in terms of fixed tastes and structures, forms
devoid of living substance. The structures of a vanished past cannot, however,
help to overcome underdevelopment. Colonial domination took objectivity
away from science and dispossessed the people of its authenticity.
I n order for the countries of the Arab world and the Third World in general
to regain their national identities, their cultures must be safeguarded. The
museum may be instrumental in this respect if it avoids inspiring such baneful
feelings as chauvinism or claims to any form of ethnic superiority. What is
needed is to open mens minds to universal values and to learn from the
humanists who urge us to love man through his works with a love based on
esteem.
The new approach to the museum would be based first of all on a recognition
of the continuity of that part of a peoples activity which consists in invention
and creation and consequently on the possibility of approaching the present
through the past and seeing continuity in discontinuity. This will help to
integrate different regional or national values into the universal heritage.
The museum, as an objective eye-witness of a continuity which advances
spasmodically through-and in spite of-time, should be able to affirm and
confirm progress.
Until such time as the museum manages to reflect the progress of continuity
(and the continuify of progress), its existence will not be justified; it will
remain no more than a simple math& an armoury, and the objects which it
contains will remain mere museum pieces.
Does not the problem of the environment and of pollution-the negative
aspect of progress-relate to that of the protection of the cultural heritage
(culture being nature reshaped by human labour)? The answer is obvious.
People should therefore be educated, from the time they go to school, to love
nature, to appreciate the open spaces and the Mediterranean light. I n a world
of concrete and steel, they must learn to value a tree in blossom and a free-
flowing brook anew, so that poetry enters into life and leads the struggle
against ugliness and the dangers besetting mankind. Otherwise, no one will
be capable of responding to the call of the wind and waves or of living close
to the soil, mans natural environment.
Cleansing the earth and protecting it means, ultimately, cleansing mens
hearts and bringing men and nations closer together. In its own way, town
planning, too, brings forth monsters.
MUSEE AL-BATHA, Fez. (a) Interior
courtyard; (b) exhibition of
armoury.
and
150 Mohamed Azis Lahbabi
Ida), ( b)
CRAFTS MUSEUM,
Moroccan crafts.
Rabat: Exhibitioi n of
Another aspect of the new approach to museums in North Africa would
be to organize museums not far from schools and in the country-side in
particular, since between 70 and 75 per cent of the population inhabit rural
areas. A culture is not protected when it is put in a glass case, between four
walls. It is protected when it is allowed to breathe. A cultural heritage is hale
and hearty when those to whom it belongs take an interest in it. I t then serves
to promote awareness, particularly among the young, of the possibilities and
prospects open to them.
There is already talk of specialized museums. I n view of the situation
described above, we consider specialisation ill-fitted to our present require-
ments. For the Arab world, which is still developing, museums should initially
offer the greatest possible diversity. The history of science can easily be com-
bined with>for instance, the history of dechnology and the evolution of handi-
crafts.
Moreover, the conception of the non-specialized museum needs to be revised:
how can the habitants of the big cities of the Maghreb be drawn to museums
where they will find Littlemore than carpets, earthenware pots, musical instm-
ments and craft items, in other words, things such as they are surrounded by
in ThZr daily EViS? Renie ihe need tci make f th; dnusemSmZihi-ng more
than simply a place for storing the products of craft activities.
It is worth while pointing out here how valuable it would beif the works
and archives now in the possession of European museums could be returned.
Lastly, it would be desirable for museums in the Third World countries to
The museum and the protection of the cultural heritage of the Maghreb
151
be presented in the form of a spectacley, thereby fulfilling their dual function
as places of instruction and entertainment.
What should these spectaclesy teach in those Third World countries which
are gravely beset by cultural underdevelopment and material hardship?
First of all, it should teach that nature in its raw state should not be regarded
as sovereign and that mans initiatives and prerogatives in the universe should
be safeguarded. Next, it should teach us to note the successive advances made
by our ancestors and to face up to the mysteries of nature without retreating
into myths and shrinking from the unknown. The Third World man will then
shoulder his responsibility for continuing the history of the community and
will become aware of his at once glorious and fkightening human condition.
Thus reconsidered and redefined, the museum will become an institution
for combating underdevelopment. Information, that human heritage which
circulates and accumulates, changes attitudes and brings men nearer to each
other.
Thus the dual role-national and international-of the museum takes shape,
with all its implications for the human adventure and the protection of the
cultural heritage in its infinite variety. Against such a background, prehistory,
archaeology and history in general will assume a practical significance, capable
of exerting an irresistible attraction for the Third World. The awe-inspiring
goal which will loom before us will be the definite possibility of radically
transforming mankind. An immoderate ambition, but one commensurate with
mans capacities once he is bent on mastering and controlling his destiny on
earth. Is not the earth itself being ever more searchingly investigated by man
and more and more adapted to his needs and interests? Mans vaulting ambition
aims to do the impossible and nothing, in the long run, can withstand it.
Such is the faith to be instilled into the men of the Third World, who must
still triumph over their complexes and their mythologies in order to be able,
as members of the fraternity of man, to look the inhabitants of the other
Thirds of the world in the face. [Tradated from French]
'3
A museum for an
frican community
Kwasi Addai Myles
An experiment in acquisition at the Ghana
National Museum
I n discussing a topic of this naturel it is important to mention at the start
that museums first developed in Europe, in a period and an environment
totally different from the conditions in which museums are evolving in Africa.
The experiment which will be described here came into being as a result of
the British tradition of museum organization. Whilst in the United Kingdom
a large number of public museums were founded in the second half of the
13
A museum official explaining photographs
activities in the
countryside to Nana Anowuo, in charge
of the Bonsam shine at P at ah in
Ashanti.
nineteenth century by municipal councils, many of the original collections of
these museums had been made by private learned societies whose members
further added to the collections, often through bequest. The collections were
often in the first instance meant for the learned, the rich or the specialist, and
were made accessible to the public only later. Secondly, their purpose was
primarily formal education and research rather than general information. If
one looks at museum development in some parts of Africa today one finds
that the museum began as an element in the affirmation of national conscious-
ness, and it was in part a refutation of the claim that Africa had no history
before its contact with Europe in the late mediaeval period.
I n some ways the National Museum of Ghana reflects the characteristics
of African museum development. Although a museum was founded at Achi-
mota College as early as 1927, its use was restricted to the staff and students.
Another museum, established early during British rule, was that of the Depart-
ment of Geological Survey, which more or less followed the early British
pattern of collecting specimens whose use again was restricted to the members
of the department and other individuals who shared their specialist interest.
The National Museum was founded in 1951 in the wake of agitation for
political independence; nevertheless its beginnings showed that it was meant
to fit into the pattern of formal education. I t was established jointly with the
University Department of Archaeology whose head directed it. The nuclei of
its collections were donated by the Achimota College Museum.
By 19 j 7 many collections-mainly ethnographical and partly historical and
archaeological-had been made in the country. Ethnographical collections from
eastern and southern Africa, and some Egyptian antiquities had also been
acquired through purchase and donations from British museums and enabled
the National Museum to acquire its own status separate from the Archaeology
Department.
The National Museum had new premises built for itself to house these
collections in a more central and accessible site than the university. The fact
that the National Museum had grown out of the university was significant
because it offered its co"uni ty a better opportunity of seeing and learning
I. MS. received in Nol rember
Kwasi Addai Myles
about its cultural heritage. Another important factor was that the National
Museum was tied to the elics and Monuments Commission under the Ghana
Museums and Monuments Board which had been given the responsibility of
restoring the chain of European trading forts and castles along the sea coast.
Thus a beginning had been made in attempting to present the major aspects
of the cultural heritage of the country.
A brief review of the main methods of acquiring exhibits during the period
195 1-65 will give useful background to the acquisition experiment under
discussion. This period was marked by the great popularity of the country
because of the fact that it was the hrst country mder BritTsh domination to
attain political independence by gradual constitutional process. As a result a
number of exhibitions were held by some government and semi-governmefit
institutions during which traditional handicrafts (e.g. col~urful textiles like
the kettte and copies of wooden carvings of everyday as well as ceremonial
use) were made and put on show. Competitions in craftsmanship were
organized, and some of the winning items were acquired by the museum.
I n addition to acquiring the exhibits, the names and addresses of some of the
craftsmen were recorded in order to get in touch with them easily.
Another favourable wind of change that was blowing during the period
was the growing idea of the 'African Personality. This meant going back to
some of the authentic African ways of fife; and one way of expressing this
was by means of dressing. Many iduential citizens began to wear traditional
dress at public and oficial functions, instead of the conventional European
suit. Another aspect of this movement was the increasing use of traditional
furniture not as curios as was the case earlier, but as purely functional objects.
One element in the policy ofthe National Museum was also the encouragement
of contemporary art, and many works were acquired by purchase as a result.
Some of these had traditional themes which were often representational; others
were in the traditional media of wood and clay. There were also works in
other media such as canvas, cardboard and mosaics with local themes.
The National Museum participated in a number of these exhibitions,
including agricultural shows, with the sole a h of presenting the cultural
heritage of the cobaataaudaity.
Another significant feature of the period mder discussion was the organiza-
tion of numerous durbars by traditional rulers. These were official and cere-
monial occasions bringing together the local community including the trac&
tional rulers, influential citi2ens and high government officials and might be
convened for the inauguration of development projects and the like. These
durbars brought on display .the rich regalia of the chiefs: all the gold ornaments
and paraphernalia of an institution which has been aptly described as the
custodian of our culture. Por the retinue of the chief comprised not only his
chief advisers and elders but also all his minor officials with their different
tokens of office: staff, czxemonial swords, headgear, sandals, etc. This was a
great show of pomp, beauty and dignity. Traditional dance, music and song
naturally accompanied these occasions. As there .are clifTetent types of musical
groups, this was an opportunity to see the range of musical instruments and
how they were combined to produce many varied sounds and rhythms.
Traditional festivals also afforded similar opportunity for appreciating some
of the aspects of the cultural heritage. Por example there are a number of
hawest festivals which are celebrated in many parts of the country between
J uly and October. The religious beliefs underlying basic occupations such as
farming, fishing and craftwork; the type of ritual food that is offered-mashed
yam and corn meal-for example, all these added up to the picture of the
cultural heritage of %he-community. -One result-of all thi s -pageantry -was -that
most of the traditional rulers and leading citizens were willing later to talk
about and to donate exhibits to the museum without asking for anything in
return. A large number of collections, mainly ethnographical, were made in
this way. Soon, however, some donors began to appreciate some small gXtS
-
A museum for an African community
157
I
in return for their objects; and this saw the beginnings of the activities of I 4
A museum oficial receiving an exhibit
donated by the Queen Mother of Patakro,
By 1965 the National Museum through its main activities outlined above in Ashanti.
antique dealers.
had established many and a variety of contacts in the country. These included
school-teachers and pupils in some of the remote parts of the country, tradi-
tional rulers, their elders and entourage, some leading citizens, traditional
craftsmen, contemporary artists and some other members of the general public.
All these groups have contributed in one way or the other to the national
collections.
The origins of trading in cultural objects can be traced to some foreign
residents who realized the financial value of these exhibits overseas. Some of
them started buying cheaply from people who were in financial difficulties
and soon established as their agents local people in the districts.
There was by that time a growing trade in antiquities, and those involved
in this trade were in keen competition with the National Museum. Many of
them were not interested in the ,specimens as objects of study and cultural
education, but purely as commodities for sale and profit. They did not therefore
bother about obtaining the correct information on the exhibit; what is more,
they were encouraged by certain foreign antique dealers to export these
illegally.
The main objective of the National Museum was to help its community to
become aware of, and to respect its cultural heritage. The community consisted
of a number of groups of people who had lived together for some hundreds
of years under foreign rule, and therefore were made to see more of their
differences than their common features. There are many ways of looking at
the cultural heritage of these peoples, but for the purpose of our discussion
the following are relevant. First, the communities along a coastline of about
three hundred miles had been in contact with Western, European, or countries
-
Kwasi Addai Myles
such as Portugal, Holland, Denmark, England, and France since the fifteenth
century. Along the coast European merchants had first established trade con-
tacts, but later others arrived as missionaries and administrators. Their influence
on the indigenous culture had started from the coast and extended inland; it
could be seen in the coastal region generally but particularly in the urban
areas, whether in architecture, household furniture, fashions or dress.
Further inland, in the heavily forested midde part of the country were the
Akan traditional kingdoms, prominent among them being the Akyem and
Asante. Many aspects of Akan culture have been preserved in this area which, in
spite ofits recent contact with European culture from along the coast, kept its pre-
European relations with the north. This was evidenced particularly in archi-
tecture. Further inland still was the northern savannah, virtually out of reach
of European cultural influence. Communication with the coastal south was
not frequent, and with the exception of the urban centres, the culture of the
rural communities was not influenced very much by European culture. This
was in general terms the position at the beginning of the experiment.
To assist the communities to become aware of their culturd heritage the
ational Museum chose some specific areas. Here it communicated with the
traditional rulers and the central goverment officials, particularly the educa-
tional institutions from primary to secondary and teacher-training schools.
To show the work of the museum to its community an intensive tour was
made with selected museum exhibits illustrating aspects of life in these com-
munities, photographs o objects that could not be carried, and also of monu-
ments of all types.
To each area, a visit was made from one town to the other showing the
material and discussing them first with the adult communities. Later on, the
same exercise was gone through in all the schools in the town. In this way
the National Museum outlined the main principles of its cultural activities and
the part that members of the comuni ty can play in preserving some elements
of the culture, and assist the younger generation in appreciating these.
e follow-up of the exercise, the local councils which saw
ational Musen in cultural education as important were
requested to norrainate candidates who would be interviewed to fiIl the post
of collector for each area. Qualifications for applicants were spelt out: these
were mainly that the candidate should either come from or have resided in
the area long enough to be acquainted with and keenly interested in the local
traditions and culture of the comunity. There was not the usual himitation
on age, and the ability to read and write English. Initially, seven CQlleCtOfs
were appointed to different districts and given a briefing course in the museum.
t were the methods adopted in the practical work? These collectors
en an initial briehg course for a fortnight. During this period, they
were taught general knowledge of the museum, its purpose, and how important
the activities of the collectors are to the institution. This briefing covered
theoretical as well as practical matters about collecting. Por example, what
and how to collect, what basic information to ask about collections and how
t?i s inormation is to be presented, how objects are to be packed for transpor-
to the museum and how they are to be stored prior to being transported.
the collectors begin work in their districts, a curatorial officer visits
them periodically to see how they are getting on. I n addition to these super-
visory visits, refresher courses for collectors are organized twice every year
in the museum.
One of the most important practical points is the technique for eliciting
idormation on objects from their owners. Collectors are advised to be very
--ptimt -iid--listed t- wlit6vEf tLe wnef%s to say-aEoGt th-obj3zt. TEE -
points made by the donor may be irrelevant for OUT purpose, but it is necessary
and proper to see those aspects which interest him, before the collector asks
his own questions. Often an enthusiastic donor whose knowledge about a
specimen is good might even demonstrate how the object was used.
*
. . _ _
A museum for an African community
I57
L ,
As has been pointed out earlier, collectors soon found that they were in
keen competition with antique dealers.
The dealers were prepared and able to pay by far higher prices for the
specimens; but because they did not have the opportunity of seeing larger
collections and a variety of exhibits their prices were not in relation to the
aesthetic or research value of the object. Collectors were strongly advised to
concentrate the attention of the owner of the exhibit on the information that
the object provided, and so treat the object as a source of information. Thus
the collector did not start off bargaining for the price but rather discussed the
specimen with the owner. This in a way slightly offsets the disadvantageous
position of the collector whose financial standpoint was weak.
Documentation was another important practical consideration. A form was
designed for the collector so that in submitting the list of exhibits collected
he provided all the essential information such as the name of the person from
whom the object was acquired, the origins of the exhibit and any special
historical information. Very often many of the objects known in our collections
did not present any problem; and the collector was available to answer questions
on the exhibits he had collected. I t should be added that the collector was not
only to collect exhibits but was to act as the eyes and ears of the National
Museum in the field: he was to report on anything of cultural interest that was
found in his area. Whenever necessary he is to visit a site where an archaeo-
logical object has been found or arrange for a member of the curatorial staff
to visit such a site. He is also to provide a calendar of significant cultural :
events that would take place in this given area, so that the National Museum
would be able to decide which ones are sufficiently interesting for attention
and documentation.
The collector was expected to be mobile in his area and therefore in close
touch with a number of relevant organizations and people, particularly tradi-
tional craftsmen such as wood carvers, potters and goldsmiths. Some of these
craftsmen continued to make the objects which were being collected, and the
collectors were requested to search for such skilful craftsmen so that their
works could be acquired and so that they could also be asked to make copies
of specimens which were too valuable to be acquired. I n this way not only
handicrafts of high quality were encouraged but also up-and-coming craftsmen
were put in touch with experienced and competent craftsmen and their works.
The functions performed by the collectors in the rural areas are so important
for making the presence of the institution felt there that in one instance a
known agent of an antique dealer was converted and given official recognition
to work for the National Museum.
An attempt has been made to describe the basic principles underlying this
experimental system of collecting as well as the practical methods adopted by
the personnel involved. I t should be made clear that it is important to assess
the results of the experiment. First, it should be pointed out that after some
time the collector appears to have exhausted the resources in his district. NO
new types of exhibit come in, and the old and familiar types dwindle in number.
Another factor is that the collector himself feels that he would like to have
a change of area; but our experience showed that transfers were not useful as
the collector was regarded as a stranger if he were transferred. Where exhibits
were not easy to come by, one possible reason could be that the antique dealers
I had infiltrated and were using their superior bargaining power to offset the
work of the collectors.
When the experiment began, some of the collectors were part-timers, but
later they were employed as full-timers. Effective supervision demanded
regular visits by curatorial staff to these districts preferably in the company
of the collectors; but owing to other engagements in the museum it was
impossible to make regular trips to the districts of the collectors. Oneinteresting
point that emerged was that the elderly collectors were more successful than
the younger ones whom it was thought stood a better chance of working for
,
158 Kwasi Addai Myles
I6
I
the National Museum for a longer period. These elderly ones commanded
more respect in the community, and were believed to be more reliable and
were able to persuade people to donate objects 09: give them on loan.
Nevertheless, the contacts which had already been established continue to
be useful though the experiment has been modified. The younger collectors,
though keen, ound that the pay and prospects for promotion were not bright,
but the older ones with the same amount of interest were willing to propagate
the activities of the National Museum in their communities. The National
Museum soon realized that its former method of sending out a team of staff
to show exhibits and talk about them in the rural areas has to be intensified
and extended to as many districts as possible.
lmsome ways this experiment has enabled us to present the Museum idea
to communities in an unorthodox ashion. I n taking coUections to adult
populations away from the urban areas it was realized that they were interested
in discussing them as a means of remembering some aspects of the past. Thus
they entertained themselves, learned about other things they did not know
about themselves, and about other people. For them the method of seeing,
handling and talking about exhibits was more effective though d8erent from
a formal museum exhibition.
Often the exhibits were shown and discussed in the palace of the chief,
where many residents of the village assembled, or in an open place in the
central part o the town. There were no showcases or traditional museum
atmosphere in this exercise; add for most of these people who did not read,
this method was very direct and effective.
ith educational institutions the method of presentation was slightly
modifled, though nothing near the formal musen exhibition. Exhibits in
three-dimensional form were handed out as discussions went on, and photo-
graphs were easily mounted on card boards. Por primary and secondary schools
the exhibits were so selected and presented as to be relevant to some of the
subjects such as history and environmental stuclies being studied by the pupils.
At the same time some emphasis was laid on the pupils collecting or assisting
to collect exhibits. In the case of the secondary and teacher-training colleges,
where facilities were better, these talks were illustrated with lantern slides.
Some of-t&-tGach<G invi?&l i ntere~ed- ~~~mi i - and- ~u~eb.s tth sXhls-
to demonstrate their skills to pupils. This enabled the children not only to
enjoy their cultural heritage but also to have the opportunity o learning
themselves to participate in creating the heritage.
Today most museum workers accept that the function ofa museum is to collect,
-
A museum for an African community
I j 9
study, preserve and present for the information and enjoyment of the com-
munity. So far the experiment has been described in that sphere where it is
concerned with collecting material, but the other activities related to collecting,
that the complete function of a museum, should also be given attention. I n
our situation in Africa where most of the communities have not had a formal
European type of education, important information-historical, technical,
medical, etc.-has always been passed on orally as traditions from one
generation to another. Most of the exhibits that we collect are therefore known
by some elderly members of the community, some of whom have a mine of
information and are therefore a wonderful source of research material provided
we can learn to tap them.
Thus in discussing exhibits and the role of the museum in the community
we often learn more from them than thev from us. As far as ethnographic
Museum officials explaining the use of
exhibits to Na Asidua Ya, chief of
Basondje, near Bawku in the Upper
Region.
16
u,.
specimens are concerned some of these pkople of the older generation who
are fast dying are most helpful. Even in subjects like archaeology, if it is
A
bangle being donated by Gandawoni
B ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ , local headman of ~ ~ ~ i ~ , near va
Oficia' taking about a
suitably presented to them, they are able to indicate what is often the secondary
use of an object; a function which may be quite different from the original
one, but nevertheless interesting. What is even more useful is that sometimes
they are able to offer help in the types of vegetation and soil which indicate
in the Upper Region.
guseum officials recorded a musical
performance featuring the xylophone at
Kaleo near Wain the Upper Region.
,
that a village had been sited on that land in the past. Some of the farmers are
very knowledgeable about these matters and can be a most useful aid to the
field archaeologist.
Preservation in tropical regions is another subject which has not received
adequate attention. Most of the conservation work on African exhibits has
-been done on those objects which were taken away from Africa to Europe.
Thus the physical environmental conditions these objects have been subjected
to in course of transportation to temperate regions and the storage conditions
(usually air-conditioning) are not the same as they have been in their natural
surroundings. Secondly the conservation treatment of these objects in their
traditional setting has not been studied by European restorers and conservators;
and so far no serious studies have been made from the traditional African angle.
Thus, though some useful work has been started in a few European museum
laboratories a great deal of useful technical information has been ignored.
Unless we learn from the traditional carver the way he treats his wood before
and after carving, and from the chief's attendants the way they curate regalia
in wood and metal, we shall unconsciously and in the long run be doing a
I Go Kwasi Addai Myles
considerable amount of damage to very valuable collections.
abhorrent things, to my mind, is storing and exhibiting tropical exhibits made
of wood, skin and other vegetable and animal materials under air-conditioning.
I n the tropical regions where these objects are found it would seem unwise
to create this unnecessary artificial climate for the exhibits not only because
it is unsuitable for the remainin of the exhibit but also because it is
expensive to install and to run. we should be doing is to learn the
traditional methods of treating exhibits and improve upon them where this
is possible or use those methods and chemicals as a basis upon which to
formulate modern ones and experiment.
Presentation is one of the matters that engages the attention of many museum
workers today. Everybody wants to get away from the dull, silent and dead
atmosphere of the museum which people must visit in order to get enlightened
by the Muses. I n addition to brightening up the museum and using modern
audio-visual techniques, the question of labels is very important for a com-
munity many of whose members cannot read. Ideally the museum object must
be so displayed as to be able to draw the visitor to it and then stimulate him
to ask fundamental questions such as what it is used for; when was it made,
and how? This interesting and complementary information must be written
clearly and concisely by the object. I n our context where there are six main
local languages, the oficial language which is English has to be used. To
solve this problem our museum guides are always available in the galleries to
assist people who visit the museu. These o%ceas speak one of the main
vernacular languages and therefore are able to satisfy the visitor.
But what is even more important is the mounting of the exhibits itself.
Today even in the developed countries, pictorial signs are gradually replacing
written directions in such important matters as trafic instructions. Television
is beconing more and more popular and the general impression is that news-
papers with wider distribution among sections of the community with average
education are becoming more and more pictorial. It is therefore not surprising
that museurns are being affected by these methods used in other forms of mass
communication. One of the methods we find particularly useful applies to the
exhibition of regalia and objects of adorment used on ceremonial occasions.
It is most appropriate to have beside the object or group of spechens the
enlarged or even normal-size colour photograph showing the object being
used in its natural setting. This is often very impressive for the visitor who
cannot read the label which in any case is deliberately very brief. He may be
familiar already with the specimens and their use, and to see them in the musem
presented in such a simple but authentic manner is often very pleasing for him.
It enhances the importance of the exhibit. This type of display is equally
impressive to the visitor who can read and for whom the exhibits may not be
familiar. He looks at the exhibits and sees photographs of them in use in real
situations. He therefore has ample opportunity to observe the details of
the exhibits and the other exhibits which are associated with them. Thus
the presentation is livehier and makes a better visual impression than reading
about it.
Another significant thing about the mounting of exhibitions in our situation
is that where one is dealing with objects of ceremonial, occasional or festive
~ use, these are often in colour and have to be provided with the requisite
background in order that they show up well. By convention many museums
prefer such natural and soft colours as light blue, grey and green, and omit
bold colours like red and yellow as background. I t should also be remembered
that in the tropics where the sun is very bright, the vegetation green almost
Th5uihciut &E yef-and the skies 5fte ble, people ipprciate Colobr very
much, and would often like to see some of these colours they see outside the
musem inside too. So one has to be very careful with the creation of decors.
Por an African community a museum is the place where one goes to get
his cultural identity. POS: people of the older generation, this is no problem
-_ _ _ _ --
A museum.for an African communitv IGI
at all, since it is an opportunity for them to have concrete memories of the
past. I t is useful to make a distinction between the recent and the distant past;
and in dealing with the latter especially early prehistoric material, care should
be taken to relate them as much as possible to human beings or human activity
in order to make them credible and appreciated. For exhibits illustrating the
recent past, these are easily recognized even by children; for often some of
these are still in use in the rural parts of the country. One example is the
grinding stone which was used in prehistoric times in many parts of the world
for preparing maize and other food items; this is still in use in many parts of
this country for preparing vegetables, etc. Thus it could be said that some
exhibits gathered in museums are still in use and in this way the museum does
not appear to be as distant in time as it may seem in other respects.
I n some European countries a distinction is made between the arts centres
which deal with the living or performing arts and the museums which
concentrate on the dead arts. But in many ways some of our African visitors
expect to see a blending of the living or performing arts with the dead arts.
They consider the museums as a cultural centre where they not only see,
touch and talk about objects but also listen and enjoy music and watch per-
formances relating to some of the objects. Some African museums which were
built on the traditional European principle of illustrating the dead arts are
gradually coming round to this idea of accompanying it with living activity.
962
18
163
Collecting material for
an ethnographical
exhibition
Bernard Jeannot-Vignes
An experiment conducted by the IEcomuseum
of the Urban Community of Le Creusot-
Montceau-les-Mines
A few weeks ago, a senior French museum official said to me: A museum?
It consists of a collection and reserves. Although the restrictive implications
of such a statement may be queried,l it nevertheless brings into sharp focus the
problem of how to build up the display and reserve collections when creating a
museum. If a new museum does not have the advantage of being able to
draw on a store of items collected over many years, or even centuries, as was
18
Visitors leaving for the exhibition. The
fact that visitors start out by crossing the
village, together with the local population
and the organizers, does away with the
impression of a reserved space like an
exhibition room. pouiuoux, 1974.
the case for quite a number of European museums, what can it do to acquire
them?
The article by IC. A. Myles describes in detail an experiment in the acquisi-
tion of objects in an African country, namely, Ghana. I find his experiment
particularly interesting and instructive, inasmuch as it is bound up with the
awakening of a sense of national identity. Indeed, the desire to encourage
such awareness, which has much in common with the desire to foster a com-
munity spirit in a village, town, district or region, is becoming more and
more prevalent among people who are responsible for cultural and educational
activities in many fields.
As far as museums are concerned, I believe that this trend is strikingly
illustrated by ecological museums, and that we have a particularly good example
in the one belonging to the Communaut Urbaine Le Creusot-Montceau-les-
Mines.2 It is a museum housed in a mansion surrounded by forty hectares of
parkland and situated in the heart of the town of Le Creusot. The museum was
established there after the departure of the last descendant of a deeply religious
family of building contractors who had shaped the development of their
town and the surrounding region throughout the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries. Some time before the town of Le Creusot and its neighbour
Montceau-les-Mines ten kilometres away had decided, in the interests of sound
economic management, to combine with fourteen other adjacent communes
to form an Urban Community. The ecological museum of the Urban Com-
munity of Le Creusot-Montceau-les-Mines was destined to become the
Historical Museum of this new human community.
For those in charge of the Ecomuseum, two main objectives had to be
attained: they had to create a permanent exhibition dealing with the history
of the area included in the Urban Community, this being necessary as the hrst
step to enlisting the support both of the government departments concerned
and of the local authorities and official services; at the same the, they had
to see to it that the Ecomuseum found its place within the economic, social
and human context of the sixteen communes involved.
To attain these two objectives, the quest for evidence proved beyond doubt
I. Seethe dehnition given by ICOM, StuttiteJ,
2. cf.
Section II, Article 3.
Museum: the Museumof Man and Industry,
LeCreusot-Montceau-les-Mines, Mllseuni, Vol. XXV,
de Vaibe-Bohan, A Fragmented
No. 4, 1973.
Bernard Jeannot-Vignes
I. The term document is used to mean any item
existing prior to the collection (e.g. a photograph
donated by a peasant woman). The term documentary
instrument is used to mean any document produced
by a museumspecialist (e.g. a photograph taken
by the latter of the interior of a farm-house).
**
to be the best way of gaining an insight into the technical and human aspects
of the history of this comunity. The evidence does not only consist of objects;
it includes descriptions of their significance and of such behaviour patterns
as may be connected with them, which are collected in the area covered by
the exhibition or produced by the personnel of the Ecomuseum, following a
systematic programe and applying suitable methods, for the purpose of
building up both the display and the reserve collections of documents and
documentary instruments 1 needed for the activity of the new museum.
e therefore set up a working team composed of three groups working
along different and yet complementary lines.
The hrst group which consisted of the official in charge of the permanent but
ever-renewed exhibition of the Le Creusot museum, various specialists, and
some local people who were particularly qualified and strongly motivated,
undertook to compile the programe for this exhibition. The programme
was to contain, inter uliu, a list of the items constituting the evidence which
the ecomuseum wished to acquire.
The second group was made up of the persons responsible for fitting the
ecomuseum into its local context. They held a series of meetings with the
local inhabitants, some being organized according to their place of residence
(at town, neighbourhood or village level), and others around a topic of
corr~blon interest (fishing, agriculture, wine-growing, trees, animals, schools,
pottery, tile-making, etc.). These activities nearly always led the participants
to mount a local exhibition.
The third group formed the indispensable link between the &st two. It
included the persons responsible for the documentation centre and for the
inventory of the collections.
A local exhibition is usually the tangible result of the efforts made by the
person or persons responsible for local public relations. The purpose of this
article is to take the example of one such exhibition and describe the lessons
we learned from it as well as the follow-up action they led to. I n J anuary 1974,
when H was in charge of the rural sector of the Ecomuseum of the Uxban
Comudty of Le Creusot-Montceau-les-n%ines, my functions consisted in
keeping the elected representatives and leading actors of every individual
comuni ty informed about the museums projects, setting up networks of
voluntary helpers and seeking out suitable places for held work. One of these
places was a small village of about 700 inhabitants which holds no pedal
interest for historians, archaeologists or ethologists. It is just one of the
hundreds of similar rural comunities which exist in France. It possesses no
distinguishing features apart from an ageing population (people over 3 j
account for more than 90 per cent of the total), which is dwindling virtually
from year to year, and more than 60 per cent of the farms have vanished in
the last twenty years without being replaced by any other means of making
a living. Hnshort, it is oraeof those villages often said to be dying.
Having met the mayor, a few town-councillors, the priest, the schooL
teacher, etc., H suggested that a meeting should be held one evening with the
local people to talk about this museum of a new type which, although twenty-
five kilometres away, was none the less their museum, too. Some ofthe notables
1 consulted were sceptical; 1 was even told that whenever a meeting was called
by a trade association to discuss the price of meat, for example (it is a cattle-
breeding region), it was never attended by more than four or five people.
Others were less so, like the school-teacher, who asked me to come and explain
to the children what a museum was, and this I did.
The invitations were conveyed through three different channels: by post;
by the children, in the case of the parents of children at the village school,
or their neighbours; and by the municipal officials responsible for the distribu-
tion of administrative documents, who personally contacted particularly well-
known individuals.
Contrary to all expectations, the meeting was a success: more than sixty

Collecting material for an ethnographical exhibition
I 6j
people took the trouble to come. The next day an article in the local news-
paper, illustrated by a photograph, brought this initial meeting to the notice
of quite a wide public and invested it with special importance.
From J anuary to J une 1974, a meeting of this kind was held every month.
Very soon, the participants felt the need to mount an exhibition: they agreed
that they could not go on meeting just to talk; they had to do something
together. The inhabitants themselves decided that if an exhibition was organized
it would have to be about the history of their village.
The whole period was devoted to preparing for the exhibition, which was
to open on 4 August, the date of the annual village festival. A secondary-
school teacher living in the village took on the task of searching or documents
in the archives of the dpurtemeizzf; a list of elderly inhabitants of the village was
drawn up in order to visit them and ask them to talk about life in the old days;
the schoolchildren worked on a collectively produced fresco depicting the .
activities of their community on a roll of paper two metres wide and fifteen
metres long, and, individually, they wrote short essays describing how each
of them visualized his village in a hundred years time; other people set them-
selves to looking for any documents they might have kept among their
belongings (photographs, postcards and old objects).
It should be pointed out that, while it is desirable to enlist the help of one
or more groups of children in tracking down and collecting material objects
of cultural interest, it is quite another matter to entrust them with the more
delicate task of collecting peoples life stories, testimony and beliefs.
Indeed, the investigation of the non-material aspects of the cultural heritage
is much more hazardous. They compose an extremely fragile cultural stratum
which, if clumsily approached, could be irrevocably destroyed. In order to
venture into this field, it is necessary to have prior knowledge of the subject
and some experience of recording methods (written notes, sketches, the use
of sound-hunting, photographic and film-making equipment). The assistance
which young people could be asked to give should consist chiefly in discovering
and reporting sources of information. The utilization of the sources should
be left to specialists, who should, however, associate the young discoverers
with their technical tasks provided that certain practical and ethnical conditions
are fulfilled.
At meeting after meeting, everyone reported his discoveries, each of which
helped the other participants to find fresh material. An old person would bring
along an object, describe it and explain how it was used; gradually the fear of
displaying a humble object disappeared; people came to know more about
each other; an old pottery worker described his life when he was 15, and so
forth.
Meanwhile, an extremely simple type of catalogue card was distributed to
everyone. On that card (acard for each object or document) everyone was asked
to identify an object in his possession, describe it in a few words, and ascribe
a date to it. The school-teacher was made responsible for the distribution,
collection and filing of all the cards. I n this way we obtained full particulars
about the objects owned by all the inhabitants. When the time came to draw
up the programine for the exhibition, we therefore knew which items were
available and which were lacking. Similarly, the search for material for the
permanent exhibition gallery was facilitated by our method; we often found,
moreover, that the owners of the desired objects were prepared to give them
to us, or to lend them (on a short-term or long-term basis) according to
whether they were still in use or not or were relics of the past to which they
attached great sentimental importance or attributed a potential commercial
value. So, after six months work, virtually all the necessary conditions existed
for the organization of the exhibition: we had obtained the consent and
participation of a large section of the population, ranging from the children
to the oldest inhabitants and.including the majority of the best sources of
information in the community premises measuring approximately IOO square
Bernard Teannot-Vignes 166
metres had been placed at our disposal for two months by the village priest;
some 500 catalogue cards identiying objects had been collected; we had
acquired a fairly thorough knowledge of the history of this village-in any
case, enough to recount its life from the end of the eighteenth century to the
present day.
The last three weeks were taken up with mounting the exhibition itself;
the exhibition room was given a fresh coat of paint by the local teenagers,
who also undertook, in collaboration with the ecomuseum technicians, to unload
and put into position the showcases and display panels, and to install the entire
lighting system for the showcases; the posters for the exhibition were produced
with the help of a decorator living in the village; another gzoup distributed
the posters to shopkeepers in the area and pasted them up in the appointed
places, and also laid a trail of arrows leading through the village from the
. main crossroads. The question of the security of the exhibits in this preparatory
phase and throughout the duration of the exhibition, was raised because a
local inhabitant had seen a second-hand dealer taking an interest in the objects
and was planning to buy them. This important problem was solved in the
following manner: all the doors and windows of.the exhibition room were
carefully locked, a neighbour was the only person to have a key, and during
the night a watch-dog was chained up near the main entrance.
Meanwhile, a metal-worker born and bred in the village agreed to accompany
us every day for a week, although he worked on the night shift from 8 p.m.
to 4 a.m., and with his help we collected objects from the inhabitants: this
meant climbing up to the attic, searching a shed, opening a cupboard o e e a
dialogue would begin e o . we might then hear about the existence of other
interesting objects, or be told that a neighbour still spun wool. e e It was not
a week that we should have allowed ourselves, but several months.
Collecting material for an ethnographical exhibition
167
As soon as it had been collected, each object was entered in an inventory
book, its registration number was immediately marked on the object itself,
and the date of its collection, the owners name and his consent to give or
lend it to the ecomuseum were also recorded. In the case of a loan, it was
specified whether it had been made on a short-term or long-term basis.
When the objects had been listed and numbered, a group of village children
(it was the holiday period) dusted them, brushed them, polished them, etc.
At the last minute, women came to clean the showcases and sweep the floor.
On the opening day, the dignitaries of the village were driven in an old-
time barouche (drawn by the last horse in the village) from the mairie to the
exhibition room, watched by a large crowd of local people. Throughout the
day, rides in the barouche were organized both for children and for adults.
Some of the village men, dressed in the smocks which used to be worn at
country fairs, welcomed visitors with a glass of wine, and the exhibition was
presided over by an old lady of 80, engaged in spinning wool.
In a way, we felt that the important achievement was not simply to have
brought together objects illustrating the folk art and traditions which flourished
during the nineteenth century and at the beginning of the twentieth: the people
themselves had been brought together, in the mi dst of things belonging to
them, for a sort of festival whose theme was their own history.
The exhibition was open every week-end for two months, and was visited
by over z,ooo people, chiefly from neighbouring communities. I n the space
of one day all the items on show (there were more than 300) were returned
to their owners.
As regards the objects themselves, what conclusions should be drawn from
this experiment and from similar experiments in neighbouring villages?
The original idea was to build up the display collection for the permanent
exhibition gallery and the museum reserves. However, we thought that it
was not absolutely necessary to aim at purchasing every item, since one of
the purposes of .the ecomuseum, as stated in its statutes, was precisely to
give the inhabitants of the urban community an opportunity to see their
3
A team of young people preparing the
premises for a display. The exhibition is
not only the concern of the museum
people but is a collective venture-
every one takes part in the various
phases according to their capacities, their
knowledge and the time they have to
spare. Montchanin, 1973.
Views of parts of the exhibition. The
introduction was a panel bearing the
following inscription in capital letters:
The life of men and of things on local soil:
this is our village. To show the stages
of this life so as to know and understand
it, so as to judge our own and let our
children invent theirs. Pouilloux, I 974.
da), ( b) , (6)
168 Bernard J eamot-Vignes
21
Spinner of wool at work as part of the
exhibition. The exhibition is not a
showcase for the outsider but a meeting
place for the villagers and those .+om
neighbouring villages. The objects mediate
on behalf of the visit paid to others, which
means really to oneself. The spinner is not
a woman-object at her spinning wheel
but a neighbour with whom we have the
time to talk. Pouilloux, 1974.
cultural heritage in a new light. We wanted to dZerentiate between obtaining
ownership of an object and holding it in usufruct. Some items were left in
the inhabitants homes, on the understanding that the ecomuseum could
use them, when required, for another exhibition.
We learned from experience that: (a) one of the drawbacks to this system
is that one can never be sure of finding the objects again when they are
needed; (b) the mere fact that an object has been taken out of an attic,
cleaned and displayed ina showcase gives it a market value; (c) when the
object is returned to its owners, they do not undastand why we should tell
them to take care of it and keep it in good conation in case it should be
needed again for future exhibitions; as they see it, if an object interests the
museum people9>the latter should want to buy it and conversely, if they do
not, the object is of no interest.
In the light of the foregoing observations, we feel that anyone who is respon-
sible for a museum and is wrestling with the probkm of building up collec-
tions, must set about collecting this material as systematically as possible,
without attempting, initially2 to change the attitudes of the owners of
desirable items. Or else he should know that he is taking risks. Having
made this clear, we believe that the risks are worth taking in so far as the
items in question are simply replicas of those already in the museum. The
most important point here is that the museum should not deal yet another
mortal blow to certain traditional communities by acquiring objects still in
use9 from this point of view9 perhaps the museums approach should be the
opposite of the one we took, and it ought to obtain ownership of the object
while allowing its former owner to continue using it.
Collecting material for an ethnographical exhibition
169
22
Disappearance of traditional techniques,
the abandonment of old machines. Is it
not more satisfying to re-create the villag-
ers memories, the collective memory,
rather than shut up these objects and
evidence of the past in a museum? Is not
this creation of an encounter between
generations, between branches of know-
ledge, between different visions of anxiety
and utopia a means of placing the cultural
heritage, whose loss we are just beginning
to measure, squarely within the daily life
of a community? (a) Locals explaining the
functioning of an ancient manual fire
pump. Perry les Forges, 1973; (b) A rope
maker demonstrating his technique.
Toulon-sur-Arroux, I 973.
The after-effects of this kind of exhibition cannot be ignored: the communitys
feeling of pride and its desire to go on to get something ready for next year,
puts the ecomuseum under an obligation to take follow-up action.
I n this village, a large country house was used as a holiday centre for the
local children and for those of the neighbouring villages. However, the centre
was not fulfilling all the hopes that had been placed in it. People thought that
it might serve as a sort of museum and school of agricultural skills. Two years
later, a slightly different project seems to be taking shape. Ten communities,
al l of them rural and neighbours of the one in which we mounted our exhibi-
tion, have joined forces to set up a Permanent Nature Study Centre. It is
proposed that this centre, which would be open all the year round, should
organize educational and cultural courses for groups of children or adults
around the general theme of the natural and human environment, studied in
the context of the rural and urban, agricultural and industrial aspects of life
in the Urban Community of Le Creusot-Montceau-les-Mines. Such a sequel
is surely the best justification for experiments of the kind I have described.
[Tramla fed from French]
23
Map showing how the establishment of
steel works affects the economy of the
region.
Per-Uno Agren
On the preparation of a new exhibit
in the regional museum
of Vsterbotten (Sweden)
The preparation of a new basic exhibition always presents a challenge. You 24
have to estimate what there was before, how it was used and misused, its Ume and the
strong points and its defects. Perhaps you must take a new look at your point
of departure, facing the fact that usages are constantly changing and that your
visitors today have totally different frames of reference than your visitors
thirty years ago. Further you have to keep in mind that your visitors tomorrow
may find your attempts at communication quite unintelligible or uninteresting.
But you have to make up your mind about your goals and the public you are
trying to reach, about methods and contents. Finally, you have to take a
decision on all these points.
Map showing location of Vsterbotten,
of Vsterbotten,
The background
Vsterbottens museum is a regional museum for one of the northernmost
counties (I&) in Sweden. It was built in 1943 and has two floors of exhibition
space, each about 3 j o m2, for the presentation of its collections .1 I t is com-
bined with an open-air museum. During the 19jos and 1960s the permanent
exhibition was reduced to make place for teniporary exhibits and to accom-
modate the museum library. I n 1969 a new wing was completed, with a hall
for temporary exhibitions and a new auditorium. From then on a rearrange-
ment of the exhibition of 1943 in the old museum has been regularly discussed.
I n general terms the task of our museum is to present a comprehensive
picture of the historical development of the region. With the given space and
collections what form should be chosen, what means of information and to
suit what group of visitors needs?
The hi story
Vsterbotten is a sparsely populated area ( 23 3,000 inhabitants or four inhabitants
per square kilometre) with a comparatively young history. The coastal area
was permanently settled in the Middle Ages around the estuaries of the big
rivers, the river valleys serving as the main route of communication and
colonization to the inland and mountain region. But the settlers made their
way at a slow pace. The valleys of the inland were not populated until the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, leaving the vast forests still uninhabited.
AU the time there was a confrontation between the settlers and the nomadic
I, See: Arne BiGmstad, Museums in
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ , ~ ~ ~ s ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ , ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ d
VOL D, 949. p. 7-62 (in particular p. 4s and 49).
172 Per-Uno Agren
reindeer-breecking and hunting Sameh (Lapps) about whose history and origin
so far little is known.
The problem is to give a simple chronological picture as the objects of the
collectiion are related to a history, the nature- of which is the coexistence of
many stages of cultural development at any given moment.
At an early stage we determined that the methods of presentation should be
adapted to schoolchildren H 1-1 5 years of age-they have for many years been
an ever-increasing category of visitors, though the museum has been deplorably
inadequate to meet the needs of modern school-work. The guidelines for the
study of history in school stress the irnpoftance of starting in the neighbour-
hood, with the history of a setting which is familiar and concrete, giving the
local museums a h e ~pport~Paity of co-operation. The task of the museum
must be to supplement the gene Jdstory of &e textbooks, to furnish the
teachers with t h i s local material. also have a notion &at &e pedagogical
adaptation to thi s group will prove acceptable to most of our grown-up visitors
as well as to pupils of lowet grades.
To stress the idormation carryring aspect we soon ceased to speak about
exhibitions. Instead we &scussed areas of information that should be pre-
sented. The COX of each area should be an exEbition, but material that codd
be more adequately presented inwritten fom, in slides, tape-recordings OP:
Hms should be presented that vay. Moreover we had a hyajotihesis that &e
starting-point of &e study of history in a museum should bring about a
perception of &e whole setting, should be some kind of experienced whole,
Preparation of a new exhibit in the regional museum of Vsterbotten (Sweden)
I73
from there one should proceed to analysis and the last stage should be some
kind of action. Each area of information thus will consist of three parts. The
experienced whole corresponds to the presentation of a setting, e.g. the
objects are exhibited in a proper setting (we could compare lessons held in
the open-air museum with lessons in the department of agriculture with dull
rows of systematically arranged objects on a wall). The experience should
make the visitors curious, ready to ask questions, in short lead them on to a
phse of analysis. The analysis corresponds to aroom of facts where the
theme of the area is more deeply penetrated. The room of facts is built with
components that can be easily removed to give place to new information.
It seems urgent in workshop-form or as role improvisations to make it possible
to communicate the continuous documentary work of a museum. Lastly each
area ought to have a room for activities suitable for different subjects of study.
Areas of information
Returning to the necessary choice of themes to be presented, we tried to
delimit periods of decisive changes in our history when new technologies
were introduced, making it possible to exploit the natural resources in a new
way, thus starting new lines of cultural development. We sorted out six themes,
giving us three for each floor.
One should present the cultural ecology of the inland area, where the traditional
technologies have persisted longest: the hunting and fishing revealed in the
prehistoric sites of river banks and lake shores, the reindeer-breeding and the
grassland cultivation characteristic of cattle-breeding settlers. A thorough
knowledge of nature and a comparatively simple outfit of implements is
common for the carriers of these forms of culture.
The other floor should describe the coastal area where the fundamental
innovations which brought the region into the modern age took place and
reshaped traditional culture forms. As has already been pointed out the
focuses of change are to be found at the estuaries of the big rivers, where the
sea transport met the arteries of communication of the inland, where churches
were first built, where the first towns were founded and the first industries
came into being. Urbanization, industrialisation and specialised agriculture
are to be the themes of this floor.
-
2/
VSTERBOTTENS MUSEUM, Ume. I n the
newly laid out Vsterbottens Museum
each of its major sections will consist of
three parts: the general presentation of a
theme, documentation and activities.
Documentary room on industrial history:
(a) the first big industry of the region is
depicted through a model of a water-driven
saw-mill on the banks of the Ume River
(in the upper part of the photograph);
(b) the next stage of industrialization-a
steam-driven saw-mill.
A test exhibition
Having got that far we wanted to test different methods to be used in the
rooms of facts. A test arrangement (on the theme reindeer-breeding) was
constructed in co-operation with the department of pedagogics of Ume
University and was tested on I,ZOO pupils from Werent schools and stages
in the autumn of 1974. We tried to integrate small exhibitions of objects-
diagrams-sparse labelling with video-tapes, audio-visual gadgets and fact-
sheets. The result was overwhelmingly positive and we decided to work out
the educational programme from the experience gained. With relief we decided
to abandon the transferred class-room teaching that has long dominated the
school-work of the museum and to base the programme on the independent
work of small groups of pupils seeking their own information. As a conse-
quence it is no longer necessary to keep free space for big class groups, which
has saved precious space for the exhibitions. The key to the whole system
will be study-cards giving the groups specific directions about where to
find information on the topic heading the card, to carry out practical
experiments with the aid of equipment available in the activity-room etc.
A school visit then should start. with dividing the class into study-groups
I. cf. Outline for a Teaching Programme, Mummz,
Vol. XXVII, No. 2, 197s. p. 52-3, Fig. 3 (a), (b), ( c ) .
each of which is given a topic related to the subject studied at school .l
Per-Uno Agren
26
Documentary room on agriculture in the
coastal area* (a) Panel showing the Years
work for men (above) and women (below).
Simple texts, three-dimensional pictures
and documentary photos are combined.
(b) Models showing the common
agricultural implements. (c) Simple graphic
representations of the traditional ways of
drying, rhreshing and grinding corn.
After having worked through the study-card the group is expected to
surnmapize its results to their class-mates in the museum or after their return
to school. The study-cards seem to have many possibilities both as far as
group-work and individualization is concerned. It is only a question of pro-
ducing enough cards and making them interesting. For that purpose we are
now with a team Of
I
An ~~W~~~~~~
Haying decided upon the main themes of the exhibition and on the methods
to be used to make available the historical knowledge of the museum, we
informed a wide selection of teachers about the themes we planned to present
and asked them to .list what questions they nted to have answered when
they came to the museum with their pupils. have tried to analyse the lists
and sort out which questions can be answered in what part in each area of
information. From this work the outlines of the exhibitions have emerged,
slowly and painstakingly.
The ideas directing the new installation have been worked out by the museum
staf to which has been added the skill in visual cormaaunication and pedagogics
of Gran Carlsson, also teaching at the teachers high school in Ume&, and the
Preparation of a new exhibit in the regional museum of Vsterbotten (Sweden) I75
27
Documentation section on urban history:
a part of the model showing entrance to
a store.
1-76
The museum and the blind
I. Samuel Thompson, 'The Museum and the
Handicapped', MuJeuta, Vol. VI;Ro. 4, 1953,
p. 257-65 and Muxeum, Vol. XX, No. 3, 1967, p. 191.
Fig. 45.
The problem of science exhibitions and the blind
raised by Dr Halina Duqmal-Pacowska s
only one aspect of problem which has alrearky
been exercising a number of museum authorities
-how t o find ways of faciltatng museum-
going for the handicapped. Obvioi~dy, there CQE
be no one solution t o all the dizcdties
encountered by the handicapped, but a number
of experiments seem t o point t o the following
conc Zusons:
Architecture and facilities. Any plan for
the buldng of a museum or for the remodelling
of its layout should provide for: access faciltes,
such as ramps and lifts, adapted t o the needs
of the infirm and elderly; areas specially
adapted-by means of handrails, different floor
coverings, continuous tables, notices in Braille,
etc.-to bring the handcapped ittto contact with
objects and works of art selected for them.
Reception. C&ides and guards should be trained
t o he& the handicapped. At least some of the
. staff in education departments should be capable
of working n colZabovation with those in charge
The blind are as much entitled as anyone
else to enjoy the benefit of cultural activities,
to have access to knowledge and to play
their own part in the development of
science.
What can be done to make science exhibi-
tions accessible to them? I tried to answer
this question i n an exhibition, Geology of the
Moon, which I organized i n Warsaw in 1965
and which presented all the best-known
hypotheses of &e time concerning the
structure and evolution of the moon's crust.
Our attempt to enable the blind to 'see'
that exhibition was, alas, unsuccessful: the
difficulties were great and we had too little
time to reproduce the illustrations in relief.
The technical progress achieved since 1965
has undoubtedly removed many of the
of special education for the principal categories
of hafldicapped persons: the blind, the mentally
handicapped and the physically disabled.
Layout of the exhibition. Two possible
solutions: t o provide areas adapted t o the needs
of handicapped visitors at various points
throughout the exhibition; or t o design special
exhibitions for the handicapped.
It seems, howver, that a great deal more
thought needs t o be given t o this question.
Progress can be made only if there is close
collaboration between museuf~z and exhibition
afthortes, museum designers and specalxed
educators. The I COM Itaternational Committee
fir Education and Cultural Action has airea&
collected information on a few recent exper-
nients, szlch as that of the Royal Museums of
Ar t and History in Brussels, which is described
ti this issire. It would be glad t o receive more
information besore throwing open this complex
question t o general discusson.'
J ean PAVI~RE
obstacles which hindered us at that time.
At all events, this is a problem of an
international scale which deserves general
attention, especially from museum staff and
the organizers of science exhibitions.
The method outlined here might be called
'Method L'-the L standing for lumen, the
Latin for light. The object is, indeed, to bring
light to the blind.
Main features of the method
I , Visitors go round the exhibition in single
file: the objects on display are placed
against walls and screens.
2. A thick rope barrier is placed at a
distance of 60 cm from the walls and
screens (Fig. 28).
3. A second rope is placed parallel to the
Museum notes I77
first and some 70 cm away from it so
as to form an aisle along which the
visitors can move.
4. Objects standing in corners are placed
at an angle.
5 . A ball attached to the first rope barrier
indicates the start of a new section; a
description in Braille is given on a small
card set into the ball (Fig. 29).
6. Exhibits are arranged along the wall,
a certain distance apart, and not far
from the first rope.
7. All the objects are exhibited at the same
height, 70 cm from the ground.
8. Upright exhibits should not be more
than I m in height. Exhibits displayed
flat should not be more than 60 cm in
height.
9. Theexhibition will consist chiefly of
illustrations and models (see Part 2).
I O. The written explanations for sighted
visitors will be hung on the walls behind
the exhibits, out of reach of .the blind.
The latter should not be able to touch
these notices, since they are likely to
mistake them for exhibits and wonder
what they are supposed to be.
DetaZs of the applcatoti of Method L
I. Models must have no rough surfaces or
sharp corners, so that they cannot cause
injury. I n order to avoid damage to the
models, they should be fastened firmly
in place.
2. Old maps are placed under transparent
sheets. The contours of the map are
reproduced in relief on the sheet. These
contours are of different colours and tex-
tures so as to be intelligible to both the
sighted and the blind (Fig. 30).
3. Illustrations are presented in the same
way, with explanations in Braille, when
the difficulties are otherwise too great.
4. Maps and photographs may be repro-
duced in relief,
5 . Tape-recorded commentaries supply the
blind with as much information as pos-
sible about the exhibition.
6. The visitors book for the exhibition is
made of a type of paper such .that the
blind can write on it in Braille.
Method L cannot, of course, be used for
exhibitions of paintings and drawings, but
it could be adapted for exhibitions of
sculpture. It is best adapted to science
exhibitions. Science and technology should
be made accessible to all, including those
handicapped by nature.
.
Halina DUCZMAL-PACOWSKA
c
P
28
28
Plan of the exhibition: (a) a corner of the
room; (b) first barrier; (c) second barrier;
(d) positions of specimens and pylons;
(e) beginning of each new pylon.
29
Ball with small board on the first barrier.
30
The different lines on the transparent
board.
178 . Museum notes
31
ROYAL MUSEUMS OF ART AND HISTORY,
Brussels. The museum for the blind.
Workshop created in 1971 and christened
Dynamuseum. (a) Play of forms:
movements in space. (b) Play of lines
executed jointly by a group of blind people.
32
Blind person visiting the exhibition with
the help of a mini-cassette.
Every museum, in its relations with the
public, has to face the problem of adapting
itself to all kinds of circumstances.
It is the constant concern of a museums
educational department to meet the needs
of groups that request its assistance, to suit
its comments to observed attitudes, and to
individualize contact with works of art as
far as possible.
Sometimes, however, attempts at commu-
nication come up against apparently insur-
mountable obstacles, and this is particularly
true in the case of the visually handicapped.
Yet they, more than anyone else, long for
access to the microcosm of the museum
which reveals to them an unsuspected world.
It is our duty to satisfy this legitimate desire.
Indeed, it is a real challenge to try to present
material, hitherto considered rather wrongly
as designed to be looked at only in such a
way that it can be appreciated through other
senses.
Although museum objects are always
marked PLEASE DO NOT TOUCH, it is to be
hoped that this rule can be broken in excep-
tional cases. It is thanks to the waiving of
such taboos that the blind have so far been
able to run their fingers over objects which
are not liable to suffer in consequence. But
the collections that lend themselves to this
handling are few and far between. Sculpture
and furniture exhibits are virtually the only
ones that permit of such contact. And even
there it becomes evident in practice that it
is impossible to allow many works to be
touched, either because they are too large
or too delicate, or because they are too
precious or too fragile. Handling must be
avoided in many cases and there is then the
risk of causing a feeling offrustration rather
than the anticipated pleasure of discovery.
On the other hand, there are many objects
in showcases which would take on meaning
and new life in sensitive hands and it is a
pity that they cannot be placed within reach
of those who feel the need to broaden their
experience of external reality.
Our museums are aware of these problems
and for some years now have been seeking
possible solutions.
An initial experiment was made in 1971
thanks to the help and moral support given
by the Arts Committee of the Brussels
Rotary Clubs.
The difficulties were not only of a practical
kind. Sceptics had to be convinced and even
the organizers of the experiment .had to
persuade themselves that it was sound.
Specialized educators were consulted and
individual contacts were made in artists
studios and, lastly, works were chosen
which would form a meaningful whole for
tactile analysis.
A large exhibition was thus organized in
the main hall of our museums illustrating
the history of Western sculpture. Contribu-
tions from the Royal Museums of Fine Arts,
as well as from individual artists, made it
possible to cover the subject from its be-
ginnings down to the present day.
The idea was to arrange a variety of
shapes, materials, techniques and types of
expression in historical order so as to observe
reactions and discover what may become a
source of self-fulfilment for sightless people.
Putting the works together was only the
first step. An eagerness also had to be
aroused in those for whom the spatial world
is reduced to strictly utilitarian limits.
It was in this prospective phase that the
Museum notes I79
33 ( al
Rotarians help was so precious, as it was,
too, in establishing links between specialized
institutions and the museum and in providing
a reception service during the exhibition.
A great variety of groups attended: young
and old, intellectuals and people with only
an elementary education, those who had
been born handicapped and those whose
blindness was due to an accident or an ill-
ness. All soits of cases had to be envisaged
and the workers of the Educational Depart-
ment had to face the crucial problem of
adjustment to a new form of communica-
tion.
The experience was inspiring in every
respect. Never had visitors been more
receptive, more delighted to discover this
world of art which many of them had never
dreamed of.
All preconceived ideas about the internal
values of a work being inaccessible were
immediately dispelled. It is a mistake to
think that the sense of touch is concerned
only with the surface of things, with the
purely material nature of volumes or the
mere pleasure of recognizing familiar forms.
On the contrary, the blind person grasps
the psychological character of a work and
its expressive value more clearly and better
than those who can see. The aggressiveness
of a shape is perceived even before the
mental image-the synthesis of all the per-
180 Museum notes
ceptions-is formed. All our educators were
struck by the ease with which the blind
enteredinto the world of abstract art without
experiencing, as so many seeing people do,
the mental blockage caused by the conven-
tional conception of reality.
The education which we seek to develop
must not be allowed to dull this sensitivity
to all forms of expression. This is virgin
soil, and those responsible for museums
must realize that our perception of the outer
world should not be imposed as a universal
rule but that, on the contrary, it is we who
should extend our own range of awareness
by a perfect association of all our senses.
Our colleague, Mrs T. Destre, in an article
published in the Bulletin des Mmes Royaux
dArt e t dHistoire (I~~I-TZ), drew the
following conclusion from the experiment:
This new tactile understanding of the
works. . . was conveyed to us through the
spontaneous impressions of people who
could not see. And she added: We hope
to arrange to have in our Museums.. . a
room where a number of objects can be set
out both for those who can see and for
those who cannot, because to handle an art
object gives one a better understanding of
it than any commentary.
The idea has progressed, though not
without some complications. Mention should
be made of a particularly interesting attempt
to introduce the blind into the world of
forms and space through experiments in
creativity by setting them to work in the
museums workshop, called the DynamusCe,
set up in 1971. As its name would suggest,
this workshop fosters an approach to the
work of art both through analysis of the
creative process and through creative action:
Figures j a( a) andjr(b) (electric wires, strings
glued to a paper background, modelling
clay, etc.)
Side by side with these practical exercises,
the two educational departments-the Fle-
mish one especially-offers regular theoret-
ical courses for the blind in order to intro-
duce them in a systematic fashion to the
museums collections and to the visual arts
in general. The programme includes famil-
iarity with materials, proportions, develop-
ment of forms and styles as applied to relief
work, statues, objects in the museums col-
lections and, as far as possible, those of
other Belgian museums. A growing enthu-
siasm shows that these efforts are bearing
fruit and fill a real gap in the education of
the blind.
I n 1973. a second exhibition of sculpture
took place-again in collaboration with the
Rotary Club-this time with an icono-
graphic theme, The Animal-Shapes and
Symbols. Here, there was a risk that the
visitors reaction might be limited to the
mere pleasure of recognition. Such pleasure
is only a first step-if not a wrong step-in
the direction of pure aesthetic perception.
We were well aware of the trap and our
educators were particularly careful not to
fall into it.
Here again, it was possible to supplement
the visit to the ehibition with manual work,
which revealed what liberation can come
from clay modelling and how seldom educa-
tors take advantage of this.
As a result of these observations, it be-
came clear to us that the museums not only
should, but could, play their part in the
general programme of special education for
the visually handicapped.
A decision was recently taken to create
a permanent section for them. Although
this section will indeed be permanent, its
subjects wilb change periodically (twice a
year). The first topic selected is Wood in
theHands of Man (Figs. 32, 33(a)> (b), (c).
Other materials used in art will come later.
The participation of the ethnography sec-
tions is just as important. as that of the
archaeology sections, if not more so, at
least in this first display.
(Pur intention in establishing a section
called The Museum of the Blind was to
arouse public awareness and to proclaim
dearly that there is nothing paradoxical in
the association of the two terms.
We chose to use the preposition of rather
than for in order to express the notions of
both possession and purpose, and we hope
that this museum will become a meeting
place for the blind, a place where they will
feel at home and in direct contact with the
objects taken out of the reserve collections
for their benefit.
These objects are chosen by the curators
in close collaboration with members of the
Educational Department. Such a programme
obviously requires perfect concordance be-
tween these two aspects of museology in
order to be successfully planned and carried
out.
S. DELEVOY-OTLET
Flevohof was not onginal& intended as a museum.
It is Q national agricultural show, sonisthing
of a fair and somethng of an amusement park.
Nevertheless, in conception t has much in
common with the modem museum that forms
an integralpart of a leisure centre and thereby
offers children and adults an opportun9 .f
discovering things of interest and of learning (IS
part of their recreational activio.
At the 7j-year jubilee of the Agricultural
University in Wageningen in 1962, the
suggestion was made to present a temporary
exhibit showing the research of the students.
From this initiative arose the establishment
of Flevohof, a permanent agricultural show.
The main object of Flevohof is to reveal to
people how the agricultural world (in the
widest sense of the word)-farmers and
flower growers, people who look after the
distribution of- agricultural products-adapt
themselves to the changing seeds of the
modern world.
The total cost of Flevohof until now has
been 20 million Dutch guilders of which
about 4 million is on mortgage. Flevohof is
a foundation owing its origin to various
types of institutions and firms with widely
different aims, all ofthem connected in some
way with agriculture or horticulture or the
processing OK selling of various products.
Their contributions were often made in
kind.
Flevohof was opened by Their Royal
Highnesses Princess Beatrix and Prince
Claus on 21 May 1971. Up until March
1973, it received over z million visitors.
181
Museum notes
_ .
FLEVOHOF. (a) aerial view; (b) general plan:
I. Parking lot. 2. Restaurant. 3. Main
pavilion on Dutch agriculture in general.
4 and 5 . Hills and ponds adding an
element of surprise to an otherwise flat
landscape. 6. Dairy pavilion. 7. General
pavilion devoted to science and nature.
8. Livestock farm. 9. Poultry pavilion.
IO. Self-service caf-restaurant, with
terraces overlooking the ponds. II. Potato
pavilion. 12. Sugar and grain pavilion,
bakery. I 3. Arable farming. 14. Mushroom
beds. I 5 . Greenhouses for flowers.
16. Work and demonstration shed for
vegetables and flowers. 17. Greenhouses
for flowers. 18. Beehives and candle
factory. 19. Childrens farms. 20. Childrens
nursery, with trained supervisors.
21. Childrens village with possibilities
for creative play, indoors and out.
22. Indian village and cowboy saloon,
in the jungle.
Museum notes
31
The main pavilion. On the ground floor
of the main pavilion are Flevohofs
offices, together with a large cloakroom,
toilets and a place in the main hall for
having a drink or a moments rest.
On the same floor a lecture hall for
conferences in the winter and all sorts of
demonstrations in the summer. On the
upper floor there are slide-projections and
audio-visual presentations providing a
wealth of information on all aspects of
agriculture and horticulture.
36
The dairy pavilion. Here the visitor is
given an idea of the modern processing
industry which dairy farming has become.
He can follow here, by means of several
audio-visual presentations, the various
stages in milk production from the cow
to the milk bottle. Different processes suda
as pasteurization, sterilization and
centrifuging are illustrated.
37
Pottery workshop.
38
Cowboy saloon in the childrens village.
Grouped round a small hill there is a
pond, an Indian Camp and a Cowboy
saloon, where the children can enjoy
themselves acting out the adventures of
their imagination in all sorts of play.,
Group visits and lectures are organized,
especially in winter.
Situated in the middle of the Netherlands
at one hours drive from Amsterdam, on
what was only a few years ago the bed of
the Zuyder Zee, this 350-acre area not only
gives a spectacular and comprehensive view
of modern farming operating all year round,
but also provides a unique recreational
centre. Two hundred and fifty acres are
occupied by two ultramodern farms, where
all the daily activities are open to visitors.
Seventy-five acres have been devoted to
exhibition areas, restaurants, outdoor cafks,
parks, including a rose garden and bulb
fields, and parking lots. At the entrance, in
the shopping centre, visitors can buy Flevo-
ho products. There is a parking lot for
8,000 cars and 200 coaches, Twenty-fiTe
acres are the exclusive domain of children,
with a village of their own.
Man-made hills allow panoramic views
over the Ijsselrheerpolders, large lakes alive
with waterfowl, sunny and sheltered terraces
and the cultivated countryside.
The livestock farm covers eighty-eight
acres. Modern barns have overhead walk-
ways for visitors. I t keeps IOO cows, 70 pigs,
30 sheep and 5,000 chickens. I n the 162-
acre arable farm one can observe agricultural
machinery as well as the harvesting and
storage of grain, potatoes, onions and other
outdoor crops. The horticultural section
includes mushroom beds with continuous
harvesting and a large greenhouse in which
peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers and lettuce
are grown in rotation. Another glasshouse
shelters flowers and pot-plants. A dairy
pavilion, including audio-visual presenta-
tions, displays everything connected with
milk products from cow to factory.
The general pavilion, showing how new
land is prepared for the various types of
cultivation, is devoted to the relationship
between science and nature. I n the meat and
poultry pavilion, there is a presentation of
processed products from the farm; it is
possible actually to taste these products:
spit-roasted chicken, or even an Indonesian
sateh, which the visitors can prepare them-
selves on the barbecues in the pavillon and
outside on the terraces. The arable farming
pavilion offers demonstrations of how sugar,
potato products, beer and bread are made.
Covered corridors, heated in winter, con-
nect the different pavilions and offer com-
fortable seating. Attention is drawn to
several old Dutch arts and crafts along these
pathways and also to the bee section installed
in one of them.
The chi!drenss village is one of the best
attractions. Youngsters of all ages can be
parked here by the main gate and enter a
world of their own. Children are given,
free of charge, a Flevohof passport by the
customs officers on duty at the entrance to
the childrens village. There are twelve little
houses in the village where they can enjoy
themselves with all kinds of activities and
creative play, indoors and out. There is a
pottery kiln, a pancake bakery where they
can make their own pancakes, a painting,
drawing and modelling house with an
abundance of materials, a bowling and ball-
game tent and, last but not least, a ghost
house, Another attraction is the television
studio in one of the houses. The children
can take a train journey round the village,
visit a special farm with ponies and other
domestic animals and a lively ranch in which
they go wild west in the most adventurous
way, or even run their own tribal activities
and build their own wigwams in the Red
Indian Reserve.
There is a restaurant, seating 1,000, serv-
ing food from the surrounding farm, and a
quaintly shaped self-service snack bar over-
looking a picturesque stretch of water, and
many picnic places with no forbidden to
trespass notices.
A visit to Flevohof is much more than
mere sightseeing. I t is a living, moving,
inspiring panorama of Dutch agriculture
and horticulture.
Museum notes 183
Avthors Picitwe credits
PER-UNO AGREN
Born in 1929 at Umea, Sweden. Studied
Art History (B.A.) at the University of
Uppsala, 1953. Since then on the staff of
the Vsterbotten Museum, Ume. Masters
Degree, University of Stockholm, 1963.
Since 1973, Director of the Vsterbotten
Museum.
'
BERNARD J EANNOT-VIGNES
Born in 1941. Licence in ethnology and
sociology. Masters Degree in Rural
Sociology. After having worked with the
Rural Sociology Group at the University
of Paris X was responsible, between 1971
and 1973, for the Department of Study and
Planning in the Directorate of Indigenous
Affairs of the Government of Chile
(Santiago da Chile). I n 1974 entered the
ecomuseum of the Communaut Urbaine
Le Creusot-Montceau-les-Mines to look
after the rural sector. In,1976 was respon-
sible for preparing for the Fonds d'Inter-
vention Culturelle of the French Ministry
of Culture, a project aimed at presenting
the prehistoric and historic heritage of
the Veztre Valley in Dordogne and is now
engaged in organizing the execution-of
the project. Has attended at the same time
G. H. Rivitre's courses at the University
of Paris I and carried out expert missions
in the field of natural parks and eco-
museums.
MOHAMED AZIZ LAHBABI
Licence in philosophy (Sorbonne and
University of Caen). Diploma of the Ecole
Nationale des Langues Orientales (Paris).
Post-graduate diploma (DES) in Letters.
State Doctorate in Philosophy (Sorbonne).
Research Fellow of the French National
Centre of Scientific Research, 1953-18.
Professor, Titulary of Chair in Philosophy
at the University of Rabat, 195 8. Dean of
the Arts Faculty, University Mohamed V,
1961, and Honorary Dean since 1969.
Professor at the University of Algiers and
subsequently Adviser on Scientific Research
(Ministry of Higher Education). Author
of many publications on literary and
philosophical themes in French and in
Arabic, including a French-Arabic
dictionary of philosophical terms.
KWASI ADDA1MYLES
Born in 1935~at Assin Damang (Ghana).
B.A. (Honours History), University of
Ghana, I 961 o Diploma in Public Admin-
istration, Ghana Institute of Management
and Public Administration, Accra, 1962.
Academic Diploma in Prehistoric Archaeol-
ogy, University of London, 1965. Graduate
Certificate in Museum Studies, University
of Leceister, 1971. Assistant Curator,
1962-70, Ghana Museums and Monuments
Board, of which has been successively
Keeper 1970-73, Assistant Director,
1973 to date and Acting Director since
May 1974. Publications: Chorkor-A
Preliminmy Re$ort (Ghana Notes and
Queries No. IO, 1968), the New SBWA
Building, High Street, Accra; Some Wooden
F&ures in ths National Collection ( h & "
Occasional Papers 1-5); A Clay Tobacco
Pipe (Museums Occasional Papers 1-5).
HUGUES DE VARINE-BOHAN
Studies in history and archaeology.
Attach at the French Embassy in Lebanon,
1958-60. Director of ICOM 1964-74.
Author of L a Cidture des Autres, Paris,
Editions du Seuil, 1976.
I , Parc Naturel Rgional des Landes de
Gascogne (Ollagnier); CI), Victoria and
Albert Museum, London; z ( b) , National
Galerie, Berlin; z(c), Nam-Marie Markarian,
Paris; 3, Naturhistoriska Museum,
Stockholm; 4, W. Hugentobler, Neuchtel;
1, M. Discop; 6(a), Birla Industrial and
Technical Museum, Calcutta; 6(b) ~ Atelier
Municipal de Reprographie, Marseille;
7(a) ~ Museo National de Antropologa,
Mexico; 7( b) , Museum of Primitive Art,
New York; 8(a), ( b) , Les Muses du Mans,
Le Mans; 9> Service des Monuments
Historiques des Arts et du Folklore du
Maroc; IO, Service des Monuments Histo-
riques des Arts et du Folklore du Maroc
(Rouami); ZZ(Q), (b), Muse du Batha, Fts;
I ~ ( Q ) , ( b) , Muse de l'Artisanat, Rabat;
29-27, Ghana Museums and Monuments
Library, Accra; 28-22, Ecomuse de
la Communaut Urbaine Le Creusot-
Montceau-les-Mines; 29-27, Vsterbottens
Museum, Ume; j i ( a ) , (b), Dynamuse,
Bruxelles; 32, Le Soir, Bruxelles; 3j ( a) >
News Service, Bruxelles; 33(b), (c),
D. Mallinus; 34, Studio Ger Hup Elburg,
Amsterdam; 3j , 37, 38, Flevohof Ostelijk
Flevoland; 36> Paul C. Pet, Amsteheen.
t
Forthcoming :
Special issues of Museum are now i n
preparation and will deal wi th the following
themes :
Forms of 'Friends of Museums' Associations
throughout the world and their different roles
Cultural heritage and development: the
museum, its presence and its role
New aspects of historical museums
Museums and interdisciplinarity
.
i