ICOM International Council of Museums - Museo Estancia Jesuitica ...

Harris: The Museum is not transparent
objects an illusion of cultural purity and his work the certainty and simplicity of salvage.”
(Griffiths, 1996: 54)
Katta Djinoong still strongly bears evidence of this type of collecting, it is one of the
main threads of the exhibition although the museum seems oblivious of it. Hence, on
labels discussing displayed objects, one reads repeatedly this sort of statement:
“Hafted metal adze north Canning Stock Route, collection O.H. Lippert, Western
Australian Museum 1931.”
“Boomerang, York, donated by Colonel Phillips, about 1892.”
“Shield, York, donated by Colonel Phillips, about 1892.”
“Spearthrower, Vasse District, Donated by A.E.P. West, 1946.”
“Spear, South-West donated by Police Museum, 1976.”
This denotative language masquerades as neutral. All the labels appear to have been
acquired from European sources. The museum adopts its flat, detached, scientific
voice to record facts about objects made by Aboriginal people. Little information is
given (or probably can be given) about the objects and this shows that the objects have
gone into European hands with little regard for the lives of those who made them. The
issue of the source of the objects is simply ignored. How the objects were used or who
owned them is not recorded, the objects are almost devoid of context.
Their isolated display in glass cases is reminiscent of the way the collector, Johns, is
described above by Griffiths (1996). Examination of these labels illustrates the
historical role of the museum in detaching these objects from their owners and thus
implicates the museum in the colonial process of dispossession. Ironically, the implicit
intention of Katta Djinoong is to address the issues associated with colonialism: loss of
land, murder, sexual abuse, disease, premature deaths and enduring social problems.
At the heart of the exhibition, therefore, is a failure of the museum to recognise its own
role in colonialism. Riegel (1996) describes a similar process of failure to address the
institutional role of the museum at the Royal Ontario Museum in its exhibition, Into the
Heart of Africa (1989-1990) which examined colonial collecting practices.
“In its ambiguous use of irony, it refuses to offer a substantial and unequivocal critique of colonial practices
of conquest. Rather, it ultimately undermines its oppositional potential by refusing to state explicitly the
museum’s position in the narrative itself.” (Riegel, 1996: 93)
In the ten years that separated this famous Canadian example from the mounting of
Katta Djinoong, the Western Australian Museum had the opportunity to respond to this
museological problem. In 2004 when the exhibition was relocated to another part of the
museum the opportunity was presented again. The fact that the Western Australian
Museum did not engage with the institutional role of the museum in the history of
colonialism indicates that this is still something that is too challenging for most
museums.
The museum as a cultural leader
The major museological shift that the Western Australian Museum made in Katta
Djinoong was to use multiple voices, this dialogic difference sets it apart from Into the
Heart of Africa. In the use of multiple voices, the museum shows that it is engaging with
its emerging role in relation to history and that it wishes to be a cultural leader.
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