I met Ania Danilewicz last October. She was in
Portugal for a few months and she wanted to know more about museums and in
particular about GAM – Group for Access to Museums. Two more meetings followed
after that, long conversations, and in both of them Ania striked me with her
energy, her eagerness to learn, her critical spirit, her wish to intervene and
to do more. In this post she shares, with great sense of humour, her thoughts and feelings about going back
to her country, full of ideas that would seem to be of no use in an environment
quite resistant to change, only to realize that good things do happen
everywhere, even at her own museum, even if at a smaller scale. It´s not
impossible, but it´s one step at a time. The lucky ones meet three old ladies in the way... mv
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| Adam Malysz, Polish olympic champion in ski jumping (Photo: Associated Press/East News) |
Some time ago, three really old ladies were visiting
our exhibition. This is a quite modern presentation (interactive too), but they
preferred the old-fashioned style of touring: just looking, not touching, going
around in silence, keeping a distance from all exhibits. However, they were
satisfied, because the exhibition was showing the town at the time of their
youth. Close to the exit one of the guides approached them:
“-Have you already tried our new listening station?”
“-For God’s sake, no! It’s not for us… let’s give
space to the youngsters…”
“-But you can find original songs there, from the time
of your youth!”, insisted the guide. “You see, this is an original phone from
the 30s. If you choose the odd numbers, you can listen to all these hits!”
And the three old ladies did it. They picked up the
phone, which is a listening station, and they all moved closer to the handset.
Closer, but still carefully. Some time later they started... to sing softly,
giggling like little girls. They tried also even numbers, which contain the
same songs, but in a contemporary remix. And they enjoyed it so much!
Why am I writing about
this story? Because it saved me from the post-Portuguese slump! Here are some
of the symptomes of my recent sickness (if you recognise any of them, look for
three old ladies as soon as possible!).
I returned recently from
a longer visit to Portugal, where one of my permanent occupations was visiting
museums and meeting with people from the sector. During my stay, I discovered,
with pleasure and amazement, great museum attractions, such as a special
touring route in the Tile Museum (Museu do Azulejo) composed of the
replicas of azulejos panels especially
made for the blind – to be touched and to recognize a structure, shape, surface
and colours -, but received with interest by other visitors too. I was
enormously delighted with my visit to the Batalha Community Museum (Museu da
Communidade Concelha da Batalha), admiring all
amenities that make this small institution so special for the local community
and so important for the worldwide network of museum professionals. And
I’ve appreciated a lot all my conversations with Maria Vlachou in the context
of accessibility and the GAM - Group for Access to Museums (Grupo para a
Accessibilidade nos Museos).
I have also realized, of course, that marvellous
examples are the exceptions that confirm the rule. And the rule is the same
like everywhere – that the majority of museums are not so modern, open and
ready for new trends. But anyway, I found enough good examples to feel inspired
and motivated for new projects in my museum.
I work for The Army Museum in Bialystok, a mid-sized institution, without any
special distinction. It’s modern enough (the entire permanent exhibition was
changed in the last three years, the first time in… 38 years) to offer visitors
nice tours and programmes. But it’s also quite underfunded and old-fashioned,
in need of further development. So my return meant two things: the
confrontation of the inspiring ideas I was bringing with me with the museum
reality; and the obligation to write this post for Maria about the museum
sector in my city and country.
And this was the genesis of my sickness. I was searching like crazy for something good and impressive enough to be worth
showing on this international blog. “What can possibly stand next to the Louvre
or National Museums in Liverpool!?”, I though to myself. A friend of mine asked the simplest question:
“Why not your museum?”. At first, I burst out laughing, but soon after I met
the three ladies I mentioned and that experience convinced me, in fact, of how
easy and simple the use and implementation of ideas like accessibility,
openness, participation could be, even if results are not so spectacular as in
some other cases (Liverpool, Portugal, Louvre).
The three ladies showed
me that creating an accessible and friendly environment could simply mean
giving appropriate information and being ready to adapt existing conditions to
the needs of different visitors. If we had proposed the ladies to listen to
modern remixes of old sings, they would have refused for sure, like they did
when I proposed to them to try the ‘listening station’. ‘Remix’ and ‘listening
station’ are not words from their world. But an invitation to answer the phone,
that plays the role of the listening station, seams to be a good way to
convince them to interact with the display, as well as introduce them to modern
music. Ipso facto, they jumped from the level of “individual consumes
content” to “individual interaction” (presented by Nina Simon in her blog, one
of diagrams about social participation) without any special action or programme from us. If it is so easy, why don’t
we try that more often? Creating that display, we had also planned an audio
description for blind people and an audio guide for all visitors. Not having
enough money to buy two sets of mobile devices, we decided to record one
narration, attractive to any visitor, regardless of disabilities or abilities.
And just then we realized that this is an example of universal thinking and
designing, which is one of the most important challenges for museums now. Wow,
we can do that too!
I could also mention
another example from my first days in the museum. It was March 2011 and the best Polish ski jumper, a
national hero for all Poles, Adam Małysz was ending his professional career. Many people took part in the spontaneous
action “The whole of Poland wears a moustache” (Adam Małysz has a very
characteristic moustache...), where everyone put on a fake moustache (some even
grew it especially for the occasion!). And we did it too! At a time when the
museum was mostly seen as an old-style, conservative place, we glued colourful
paper moustaches to all our soldiers in the exhibition. And that was it! That
simple action changed our image radically, showing us and other people that we
could take a step back and
look at ourselves with a sense of humour and, despite the so serious historical plots in our
displays, we could also be funny, people-oriented. It was just one day, but it
gave the team an incredible power to start thinking about actions from a
totally different perspective, overcoming set templates.
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| Photo: The Army Museum in Bialystok |
Maybe these examples are
not big, significant or impressive enough to be presented between notes about
National Museums Liverpool ot the Louvre. But they do show that big change
often begins with small steps. It is easy to say that we cannot change
anything, due to lack of money or people. It is much more challenging and
important to start with the question: what can I change or improve in my
surrounding right now? These small steps may sometimes have a wider influence
than a big action. They prepare us to transform and adapt because of a need,
not just due to special, sporadic occasions.
I am almost recovering
from my post-Portugal depression. Almost, because deep inside I still have that
strong need to implement and develop all possible new elements in our
programme. But now I know how to do that – step by step.
Anna Danilewicz is a cultural animator and manager, Head of the Department of
Education and Organization of Exhibitions in the Army Museum in Bialystok. She
previously worked for the Drama Theatre in Białystok and was a juornalist for
the biggest newspaper in Podlasie region, Gazeta Wspolczesna. She has
cooperated with many associations and some independent projects, such as Street
Culture Enthusiasts Association ENGRAM, Borderland Summer School, Foundation of
the University of Białystok, Marcel Hicter Foundation in Brussels. She got the
European Diploma for Cultural Projects Management in 2012 and attended the
International Seminar for Cultural Operators, organized by
the National Centre for Culture and the Foundation Marcel Hicter. She graduated
from Bialystok University in 2005.
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