Abstract

To support a mission of cultural democracy and interact with new visitors, the Museum of Copenhagen has set out to explore different strategies to encourage user participation. This paper looks at two participation-based initiatives launched recently by the museum, namely the WALL and the Nørrebro Outreach project. The WALL is a platform of dialogue combining the participatory functionalities of the web 2.0 with a physical presence outside the museum. In the city streets, a multi touch screen gives easy and playful access to thousands of archive images of Copenhagen and the users can add their own media while interpreting, adapting and augmenting the museum collections. In the Nørrebro project, 10 young persons were employed at the museum for a period of two years to collect and display material from their own neighbourhood. Their work has created a diverse collection of objects and images that contribute plurality and nuances to the capital’s heritage as it is represented in the Museum of Copenhagen. The paper discusses how the two projects have worked to facilitate an exchange of a multitude of meanings created by personal experience of the city, and how this in turn has made the museum both more inclusive and more integrated in contemporary Copenhagen.