Emotion and the Contemporary Museum: Development of a Geographically-Informed Approach to Visitor Evaluation

98 Pages·2020·3.351 MB·English

by  Candice P. Boyd, Rachel Hughes

Emotion and the
Contemporary Museum
Development of a
Geographically-Informed
Approach to Visitor Evaluation
Candice P. Boyd
Rachel Hughes
Emotion and the Contemporary Museum
Candice P. Boyd · Rachel Hughes
Emotion
and the Contemporary
Museum
Development of a Geographically-Informed
Approach to Visitor Evaluation
Candice P. Boyd Rachel Hughes
School of Geography School of Geography
University of Melbourne University of Melbourne
Parkville, VIC, Australia Parkville, VIC, Australia
ISBN 978-981-13-8882-8 ISBN 978-981-13-8883-5 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-8883-5
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Enduring thanks to Nicholas and Graylan, my dearest and closest,
who continually support and sustain me
—Candice P. Boyd
For Rob and Una, with love and thanks for everything, including
many hours of museum companionship
—Rachel Hughes
A
cknowledgements
With this, perhaps more than any other endeavour, I am mindful of
how collective effort produces a yield greater than the sum of its parts.
Hester Parr first suggested the drawing method. Pompeo Martelli openly
invited us to enter into a conceptual dialogue with the museum to which
he has dedicated so much of his life. Claudia Demichelis was the very
embodiment of generosity, knowledge, and enthusiasm throughout our
time in Rome. Deborah Tout-Smith and Linda Sproul from Melbourne
Museum were gracious and open in their acceptance and encouragement
of our thinking. Carolyn Meehan was a critical inspiration. Elizabeth
Straughan, Meighan Katz, and Sarah Bennett were their great creative
selves in offering incisive and insightful opinions that informed this work.
I am most grateful, however, for the friendship, support, and collegi-
ality of Rachel Hughes who, as a mentor, has made her indelible mark
on me as a cultural geographer. It has been such a pleasure to share this
journey together.
April 2019 Candice P. Boyd
My thanks also go to our wonderful curator- and scholar-collaborators
in Rome and Melbourne. In addition, I acknowledge that the School
of Geography at the University of Melbourne funded my travel to
Rome, and that the Institute of Australian Geographers provided us
with an early opportunity to present our research. Many thanks to that
vii
viii ACKNoWLEDGEMENTS
audience for their questions and responses, and to all in the School at
Melbourne for their ongoing collegiality. I also acknowledge the support
of the University of Melbourne McCoy Scheme who funded some of the
research presented here.
I thank my family, for their love and acceptance of my research
demands.
Candice conceived of this project and invited me to join her. From
writing the original ethics committee application to chasing my then
three-year-old around Piazza di Santa Maria in Trastevere to ease our
travel stress, to developing and expertly managing the McCoy Grant
with Museums Victoria, to negotiating a book contract, she has led the
way intellectually and in many pragmatic domains. I greatly admire her,
thank her for her friendship, and sincerely thank her for this fascinating
and enjoyable co-research and co-writing experience.
April 2019 Rachel Hughes
c
ontents
1 Museology, Cultural Geography,
and the Non-representational 1
2 Exhibiting with Emotion 11
3 The Museo Laboratorio della Mente 23
4 WWI: Love and Sorrow Exhibition 51
5 Conclusion 77
Index 89
ix
l f
ist of igures
Fig. 3.1 Rome workshop materials 28
Fig. 3.2 Drawing B2 31
Fig. 3.3 Drawing B27 32
Fig. 3.4 Drawing A35 33
Fig. 3.5 Drawing B26 34
Fig. 3.6 Drawing A16 35
Fig. 3.7 Drawings A11, A26, A32 36
Fig. 3.8 Drawing A31 37
Fig. 3.9 Drawing A12 39
Fig. 3.10 Drawing A18 40
Fig. 3.11 Highly abstract drawings 41
Fig. 3.12 MLM floor plan with drawings clusters 42
Fig. 3.13 Exhibit-focussed drawings 44
Fig. 3.14 Colour-focussed drawings 47
Fig. 4.1 Drawing workshop materials 57
Fig. 4.2 Really attractive man 59
Fig. 4.3 Children 60
Fig. 4.4 Mental and physical pain 63
Fig. 4.5 Sticky objects 64
Fig. 4.6 Empty letterbox 66
Fig. 4.7 No! 68
Fig. 4.8 Sometimes I’m afraid 70
Fig. 4.9 Exhibition panels on display 71
Fig. 4.10 Exhibition of research findings 72
xi
CHAPTER 1
Museology, Cultural Geography,
and the Non-representational
Abstract This chapter commences with an overview of recent trends in
museology. Starting from the ‘new’, Boyd and Hughes consider the ways
in which museums have become increasingly performative in what they
do. From this base, they argue that non-representational theory in cul-
tural geography provides a useful framework for theorising the work of
the contemporary museum.
Keywords New museology · Museum geographies · Cultural
geography · Non-representational theory
introduction
This book has several intentions. The first is to present two studies con-
ducted in two different museums, across which a particular method
of audience evaluation was developed. Another is to open up a cross-
disciplinary conversation between cultural geography and museum studies
for what one has to offer the other. But perhaps this book’s most ambitious
intention is to prompt a re-thinking of how we experience heritage that
acknowledges the power of the non-representational. This is not easy at
the best of times but is perhaps even more difficult in a field like museum
studies where representational discourses have dominated for decades.
In terms of this book’s structure, Chapter 1 takes on the role of
providing a rationale grounded in recent developments in museology.
© The Author(s) 2020 1
C. P. Boyd and R. Hughes, Emotion and the Contemporary Museum,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-8883-5_1