Abstract
The museum experience starts long before a visit to a museum takes place and extends beyond the visit itself, formed by prior experiences and forming future experiences within and beyond museums. Yet, much research on museum audiences centers on the time spent inside the museum, either as in situ walk-alongs or as semi-structured interviews conducted immediately after the visit. This study suggests a novel research method and topic: understanding the imaginaries at play in the museum experience - as they are continuously shaped by experiences with, amongst other things, popular media, high culture and cultural education. In this, imaginaries refer not to an established theoretical concept, but is understood as that which is imagined by the audiences. But how does one go about researching something as intangible as the imagined? We explore imaginaries through a creative collage method in which audiences are tasked with illustrating their imaginaries associated with themes involved in two exhibitions at the National Museum of Denmark: the religious lives of Ancient Egyptians and Vikings, respectively. Recruited in 15 pairs of two, each participant creates their own collage while discussing with their partner the process along the way. Some will create their collages before the visit, others immediately after, and some one month after the visit. Visual creative research method can arguably help us explore the ‘unconscious’ of the audiences’ imaginaries, function as ‘tin-openers for talk’ and help circumventing socially desirable responses. Thus, we believe the method may help us explore imaginaries at play in the museum experience.
Presenters
Ea Christina Valentin WillumsenPostdoc, Department of Design, Media and Educational Science, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Visitors, Museums, Culture, Media, Method, Popular media
