Kalender

Difficult issues: How to decide what to be remembered, forgotten or hidden at museums

21. September 2017 - 23. September 2017, Helsingborg, Sweden

ICOM Iceland, ICOM Norway, ICOM Sweden, ICOM Finland, ICOM Denmark, ICOM Germany

 

ICOM Germany and ICOM Nord jointly organize a conference in Helsingborg, Sweden, on September 21–23, 2017 with the theme “Difficult issues".

Museums play a key role in creating and representing the shared cultural heritage of various communities. What is to be said about the stories museums facilitate? Why is something remembered and something else forgotten? What is highlighted, what hidden? What does restrict museums' freedom to act and / or do we restrict ourselves? What are the roles of public and local societies? Are museums prisoners of their own familiar practices and processes?

Six national committees of the International Council of Museums – ICOM Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Germany – jointly invite to a conference addressing demanding issues for today's museums and museum professionals.

 


Conference venue

Dunkers Kulturhus, Kungsgatan 11, 25189 Helsingborg, Sweden

> More information about the conferene venue and how to get there

 
 
REGISTRATION
 
 
 
PROGRAMM
 
 
12:00 – 13:00

Registration

13:00 – 14:30

Welcome
Katherine Hauptman, Chair ICOM Sweden
Beate Reifenscheid, Chair ICOM Germany
Mats Sander, Mayor of Helsingborg, Sweden

Welcoming speech
Suay Aksoy, President, International Council of Museums (ICOM)

Introduction to the conference theme
Stefan Bohman, ICOM Sweden

14:30 – 15:15

Coffee break

15:15 – 16:30

Ethical Challenges for Museum Professionals

 

Moderator: Helga Lára Thorsteinsdottir, Board Member ICOM Iceland

Moral challenges for museum professionals when working with difficult issues – a short overview
Kathrin Pabst, Head of Department for Research, Collection Management and Education, Vest-Agder Museum, Kristiansand, Norway

House of Silicone: displaying macabre and contested history at the Saga Museum
Gudrun D Whitehead, Assistant Professor of Museum Studies, University of Iceland, Reykjavik, Iceland

The German Tank Museum: a blood diamond as a regional touristic crown jewel?
Ralf Raths, Director, German Tank Museum Munster, Munster, Germany

16:30 – 17:00

Coffee break

17:00 – 18:15

Difficult Objects and Sensitive Stories

 

Moderator: Eero Ehanti, Chair ICOM Finland

Witch hunts, immigration and integration. New 'difficult' museums in the making
Lulu Anne Hansen, Head of History Department, Museum of Southwest Jutland, Ribe, Denmark / Flemming Just, Director, Museum of Southwest Jutland, Ribe, Denmark

Conservational challenges in dealing with Holocaust objects
Natalie Meurisch, Student, Cologne Institute of Conservation Sciences, Cologne, Germany

Documenting collective grief
Birgitta Witting, Antiquarian, Kulturmagasinet, Helsingborg, Sweden

FOLK: an exhibit on science, identity, and politics
Ageliki Lefkaditou, Senior Curator of History of Medicine, Norwegian Museum of Science and Technology/National Medical Museum, Oslo, Norway / Jon Røyne Kyllingstad, Senior Curator, Norwegian Museum of Science and Technology, Oslo, Norway / Henrik Treimo, Senior Curator, Norwegian Museum of Science and Technology, Oslo, Norway

18:30 – 20:30

Reception at Dunkers

Guided tours through the different exhibitions at Dunkers are available.

 
 
Thursday – Friday

Roll-up Presentations (Foyer)

 

The following Roll-up Presentations on the theme of the conference will be on show during the conference (Foyer):

Congo Gaze – people, encounters and artifacts. Obstacles trust and mistrust
Tone Cecilie Simensen Karlgård, Museum Lecturer, Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Norway

An international refugee museum
Anne Sofie Vemmelund Christensen, Curator, Varde Museums, Varde, Denmark

'Kunst auf Lager': from blind spot to spotlight
Carolin Vogel, Project Manager, Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg, Germany

An open forum for reflection about ethics – a new ICOM International Committee on ethical issues?
Kathrin Pabst, Head of Department for Research, Collection Management and Education, Vest-Agder Museum, Kristiansand, Norway / Søren la Cour Jensen, Senior Curator, Head of Archives and Manager, The House of Knud Rasmussen, Hundested, Denmark / Per B. Rekdal, retired Head of Exhibitions, Education and Public Services, Museum of Cultural Heritage, Oslo, Norway


08:30 – 09:00

Registration

09:00 – 10:15

Museums and Changing Communities

 

Moderator: Kathrin Pabst, Board Member ICOM Norway

Guovtti ilmmi gaskkas. Balancing between two contested worlds. The challenges and benefits being an indigenous museum professional
Áile Aikio, Curator, Sámi Museum Siida, Anár/Inari, Finland

A difficult issue, or a difficult place? Adapting National Museum Policies to local museum realities
Maja Leonardsen Musum, Head of Department for Exhibitions and Education, Randsfjordmuseene, Oppland, Norway

The politics of diversity: excluding identities from the inclusivity movement
Antonio Rodriguez, Consultant, Traveling Exhibitions and International Programs, Strategic Partnerships and Alliances, Washington D.C., USA

Trembling walls. When the earthquake changes the identity of local museums
Valeria Pica, National Coordinator for Education and Mediation, Rome, Italy

10:15 – 10:45

Coffee break (Presenters will be available at their Roll-up for a short oral presentation! – Foyer)

10:45 – 12:00

Contested Histories

 

Moderator: Stefan Bohman, ICOM Sweden

Managing the 'Other': stories of the Estonian Russian-speaking minority in the core exhibition of the Estonian National Museum
Terje Anepaio, Researcher Curator, Estonian National Museum, Tartu, Estonia / Kristel Rattus, Researcher Curator, Estonian National Museum, Tartu, Estonia

Warsaw, 2004 – Gdańsk, 2017. Evolution of the Polish museum boom
Maria Kobielska, Jagiellonian University, Research Center for Memory Cultures, Krakow, Poland

Ingeborg Holm changed the world. An early whistleblower
Anja Petersen, Antiquarian, Kulturmagasinet, Helsingborg, Sweden

12:00 – 13:30

Lunch break

13:30 – 14:45

Museums and Public Responsibilities

 

Moderator: Beate Reifenscheid, Chair ICOM Germany

Collection management and public consent: the practice, politics and perception of collections disposal and transfer
Michael Terwey, Head of Collections and Exhibitions, National Science and Media Museum, Bradford, UK

Hidden objects on display
Karen Sivebæk Munk-Nielsen, Head of Holbæk Museum, Museum Vestsjælland, Holbæk, Denmark

A bloody tradition – whale killing in paintings by Mikines
Solveig Hanusardóttir Olsen, Curator, National Gallery of the Faroe Islands, Torshavn, Faroe Islands

14:45 – 15:15

Coffee break

15:15 – 16:15

Collecting and Displaying the Hidden Contemporary

 

Moderator: Katherine Hauptman, Chair ICOM Sweden

Collecting and telling outside the comfort zone
Diana Chafik, Curator and Project Manager, Sörmlands Museum, Nyköping, Sweden / Peter Ostritsch, Head of Collections, Sörmlands Museum, Nyköping, Sweden

Collecting the Troubles and Beyond: the role of the Ulster Museum in interpreting contested history
Karen Logan, Project Curator, National Museums Northern Ireland, Belfast, Northern Ireland

At home with people with severe mental illness
Ellen Lange, Curator, National Medical Museum/Norwegian Museum of Science and Technology, Oslo, Norway

16:15 – 17:00

Unfolding dark Narratives

 

Moderator: Minna Sarantola-Weiss, Board Member ICOM Finland

Museums and presentation of education, wars and the socialist period as problematic memories – experiences in Slovenia
Branko Šuštar, Museum Councillor, Slovenian School Museum, Ljubljana, Slovenia, and President, Historical Association of Slovenia

Sind wir noch Freunde? Displaying the difficult history of the German presence in Finnish Lapland, 1941-44
Mirkka Hekkurainen, Coordinator, University of Helsinki, Finland / Eerika Koskinen-Koivisto, Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Jyväskylä, Finland / Suzie Thomas, University Lecturer in Museum Studies, University of Helsinki, Finland

17:00 – 19:00

ICOM Germany Annual Meeting (only for German members!)


09:00 – 09:45

Bridging History with the Present

 

Moderator: Tine Bagh, Board Member ICOM Denmark

Post-mortem photography – is it right for museums to decide who is remembered, forgotten or hidden?
Satu Savia, Curator, Helsinki City Museum, Helsinki, Finland / Hanna Talasmäki, Freelance Curator, Helsinki, Finland

Difficult issues around gender
Merete Ipsen, Director, Women’s Museum in Denmark, Aarhus, Denmark

09:45 – 10:30

Closing Session

 

Moderator: Suay Aksoy, President, International Council of Museums (ICOM)

Panel with Session Moderators & Audience

10:30 – 16:30

Field trip to Elsinore, Denmark

 

We continue the conference theme in Denmark, and take the ferry from Helsingborg to Helsingør to visit the repeatedly rewarded Maritime Museum of Denmark and have a welcome and guided tours at Kronborg Castle. There is no organised trip back to Helsingborg.

> More information about the field trip

 

More information at : http://www.icom-helsingborg-2017.org/tagung/