Seventeenth International Conference on the Inclusive Museum

Abstract

Recipes are ubiquitous things. We grow up hearing their words recited in kitchens like mantras, or seeing them on food splattered pages propped up on kitchen benches. But their quotidian nature belies their significance. Family recipes are precious cultural narratives that can tell us important things about what it is to be human: identity, migration, community, belonging, intergenerational knowledge and cultural adaptation to name a few. But, generally speaking, they are nowhere to be found in museum collections. What does this omission tell us about what histories, knowledge and experiences have traditionally been valued by museums? What would it mean to create an archive of recipes and food narratives within a museum? And how would concerns of representation and inclusion be addressed by such an endeavor? This paper explores these questions through the lens of an ongoing recipe collecting project at Tāmaki Paenga Hira Auckland Museum, which holds the central question - how is ‘the recipe’ a cultural narrative? As well as exploring these narratives, this paper will explore shifting curatorial practice within this project, which centers a collaborative model of collection development and elevates conversation and storytelling over object-based collecting. It will also consider how a recipe - so specific to time, place and person/community - can foster inclusion, connection and a sense of the universal.