Instead of fighting the pull of contemporary culture, I believe that it’s actually crucial that museums find ways to insert themselves into it. This can be done in a manner that does not jeopardize their brand, but gives them a much louder voice than saying “ I am here!“ This is one important way for museums to nurture the connection with their audience and expand their reach. What I observe when I look to the museums that are flourishing now is a conscious responsiveness to and engagement with contemporary issues and concerns.Ĭlearly, not every institution is heavily engaged with the contemporary dialogue, and to my mind this begs the following question: Is the fear of loss of dignity as an institution stunting the growth-or effectively signing the death sentence-of some really wonderful museums? But if you take a look at the museums that are thriving, you will find a willingness to do just that. Within the museum world (with the exclusion of those that address this as part of their institutional mission) there seems to be some reluctance to engage with contemporary culture in a deep way. When a museum fails to call attention to itself, I simply don’t see it.įor those in the museum world, relevancy lies at the heart of a question you should always be asking from the perspective of your audience: “Why should I care?” What is the issue here? Do we just not care about historic house museums? Or is it something more like “Who needs to go there when I can go to the Met?” Why had it been invisible to me before? If I had lived around the corner from the MoMA, could I have somehow missed it? It is a site of considerable importance, and yet I remained completely ignorant of its existence until many months into my residency when my roommate pointed it out to me.
The museum in question is the lovely Morris-Jumel Mansion, a historic house museum. Here, I lived not five blocks from a beautiful pre-Revolutionary War mansion turned cultural institution that has served the public as a museum since the turn of the century.ĭo we just not care about historic house museums? When I first moved back to New York in early 2013, I called Washington Heights my home for a few months.
#IN INVISIBLE EMMIE THE AUTHOR USES DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVES SERIES#
In this third installation of our series on museums, place, and branding, I’d like to examine the issue of museum visibility.
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