Abstract
Traditionally, museums have organized their exhibitions on the basis of objects and an institutional discourse. New theories have encouraged changes in these processes through public participation, audience development or cultural democratization. However, in the exhibition Huir con lo puesto (25 October 2024 - 2 February 2025), the Museo del Traje presents a new way of disseminating: through testimonies. This exhibition, organized in collaboration with UNHCR ACNUR UN Refugee Agency, presents the experiences of refugees as the axis. In order to establish the exhibition discourse and make the stories of these people materialize in an exhibition, the Museum presents clothing and accessories inspired by the results of the interviews conducted by the curators of the exhibition to groups of refugees. This transfiguration of the lived experiences is received by the audience while developing a new exhibition dialogue to make the viewer aware of the lived horror, enriching society by raising awareness of this barbarism and fostering empathy for the lived situation. In this way, the traditional work of curatorship is also modified, giving rise to a new form of research, a participatory research where the focus is placed on the experiences of migrants. This paper shows how the process of collaboration and participation between all the agents involved in both the design and the implementation of the exhibition was carried out. It also delves into the inclusion of this group within an organization such as this museum, both for the theme of the exhibition and for the activities organized.
Presenters
Íñigo Ayala AizpuruLecture, Social Science Area, Faculty of Education, Universidad Internacional de La Rioja, Spain
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Participation; Museum; Audience development; Refugees; Museo del Traje
