Samdok - Nordiska museet

connecting collecting: merritt
The Internet has provided a way to separate physical
from intellectual access in a way that really is a paradigm
shift – one museums have not fully incorporated into
their thinking and ways of operating. Research and interpretation
increasingly start with electronically available
data and images. Thus these activities can be partially
divorced from the issue of who actually cares for the material.
Museums mount digital information about their
collections on the Web, and frequently mount digital exhibitions.
Recent research by the Media and Technology
Committee of the AAM shows that museums typically
have twice as many visitors to their websites as they do to
their physical museums. For some museums in the survey,
the online audience was ten times more than their
physical audience.
And, if the main issue is to know where collections
are and be able to access them (or access relevant information)
would not this goal be as well served by putting a
large chunk of these resources into electronic catalogues,
metadata, search tools for knowing where this material
is (whoever holds it), and then leverage access in other
ways? Typically a museum only has 4 or 5 percent of its
collections on exhibit. (Less, at a natural history museum
with large research collections, more at an arts center
with relatively small collections.) If museums are desperately
overcrowded, as they say, perhaps there is a role for
encouraging private owners of collections to make them
publicly accessible. Such an alternate system or preservation
and access could release museums of the sole responsibility
of housing collections that benefit the public.
As long as an object is accessible to exhibit designers,
educators, and researchers, does it actually need to be
owned by the museum? Particularly when museums report
an acute dearth of adequate storage?
This might be achieved through a system that encourages
a donation of rights similar to land trust or
building preservation easements. In such systems, the
private owner gives up certain rights in return for a tax
benefit. An organization, such as a land trust may exercise
oversight or stewardship of such easements. Perhaps
private collectors of art or antiquities could donate access
rights to the public in return for tax breaks. A certified
conservator and registrar could assess the works,
their storage conditions, and documentation periodically,
as prerequisite of the arrangement. The private owner
would make information on the work publicly accessible
via the Internet, perhaps on a national database of collections
resources. And the owner would make the works
accessible to scholars on a regular basis, as well as for
public exhibition through loan to museums.
Are museums caring for the right
collections?
The data cited above reveals the vast gap between the resources
museum have and those they need to adequately
care for this material. Before we can ask private donors,
foundations, or the government to pour more money
into taking care of these collections, they can rightly ask:
does it all belong in a museum, is it worth our money to
preserve? Unfortunately, the answer is a resounding ‘no.’
Anyone who works in a museum, in the course of browsing
through the storage rooms, or participate in an inventory,
comes across something, probably a lot of somethings,
which elicit the reaction ‘What in the world was
someone thinking when they accepted this?’ Sometimes
the thing itself does not belong in a museum; sometimes
it is simply out of place in that particular museum. In fact,
the US Accreditation Commission finds this is a widespread
problem, even in high performing museums, and
is collectively a huge drain on museum resources.
This situation makes a certain sense. Many museums,
in their founding and their operations, are driven by private
goals, not a desire for the public good. Founders,
donors, directors, curators, have their own motivations
for building collections. Private collectors and museum
founders often look for some form of immortality.
Directors and curators gain professional status and
the intellectual satisfaction of pursuing a private vision.
None of these motivations are bad, but they do not necessarily
best serve the public good. Look, for illustration,
back to our examples of museums concentrating risk by
holding comprehensive collections of individual artists.
Definitely good for the museums’ reputations, maybe not
so good for the public. Also, while sometimes the curato-
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