A Living Exhibition: The Smithsonian and the Transformation of the Universal Museum by William S. Walker

2014 ◽  
Vol 112 (4) ◽  
pp. 720-721
Author(s):  
Simon Knell
Keyword(s):  
Universal Museum

The Universal Museum

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (46) ◽  
pp. 72-82
Author(s):  
Fatima El-Tayeb
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Focal Point ◽  
Refugee Crisis ◽  
Global Context ◽  
Colonial Art ◽  
Internal Structures ◽  
Universal Museum ◽  
Long Term Impact

This article addresses the long-term impact of colonialism on Europe’s internal structures and on its self-positioning in a global context. Using the 2015 refugee crisis as a focal point and centering the German example, the author explores the complex relationship between memory discourses and visions of Germany’s and Europe’s postunification future. The author argues that the erasure of colonial violence from the continent’s collective memory has a direct, negative impact on its ability to let go of a racialized identity that is in increasing tension with Europe’s actual multiracial and multireligious composition. The article traces this dynamic around the example of the non-European collections in Berlin’s Museum Island and the future Humboldt Forum, conceptualized as the world’s largest “universal museum.” The narratives through which this art is integrated into Europe’s cultural heritage are in stark contrast to those that simultaneously defined the refugees, who arrived from the same region in which the art originated, as fundamentally different and threatening. The narratives intersect in the Multaqa initiative, which offers Arab language tours of Museum Island to refugees, and in the controversy around the site of the Humboldt Forum and the colonial art it is meant to house.

scholarly journals Political Issues of the Louvre's Internationalisation

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 150-168
Author(s):  
Marie-Alix Molinié-Andlauer
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
United Arab Emirates ◽  
British Museum ◽  
Abu Dhabi ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
Heritage Site ◽  
National Heritage ◽  
Close Relationship ◽  
Universal Museum ◽  
The Impact

This article focuses on the internationalisation of the Louvre since the 2000s. A flagship of French culture, it is, along with the British Museum in London, the universal museum of reference. The French state, through successive governments, has mobilised the Louvre, that is, the institution, as an intermediary in international agreements. This museum and cultural institution then become a real stakeholder in international relations. Thus, the whole point of our remarks is to analyse the issues and controversies surrounding the close relationship between the Louvre and the French State. The Louvre, a renowned French museum and heritage site, is now multi-spatial. This model responds in part to a request from the French government to perfect the interplay of international influence. The internationalisation of the Louvre is thus understood not as the Louvre's reputation on an international level, but as the use of this heritage in international political strategies. By approaching this case in French international relations, we can first of all question the stakes of the transition from heritage to National Branding. In other words, to understand how in contemporary literature, heritage is transformed not only as a tool to retrace the past of a society, but also how it becomes an emblem that can be mobilised by States to claim a form of legitimacy from other States. The method, which is essentially based on interviews conducted within the framework of these, aims to answer two questions. What does the deterritorialisation of a national heritage such as the Louvre produce regarding international relations between the Louvre, the city of Abu Dhabi and in relations between France and the United Arab Emirates, then the impact that the Louvre Abu Dhabi can have at the local and regional level.

Relational Objects: Connecting People and Things Through Pasifika Styles

2008 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 159-179 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anita Herle
Keyword(s):  
North America ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Ethnic Boundaries ◽  
Law And Ethics ◽  
The World ◽  
Cultural Properties ◽  
The Common ◽  
Universal Museum ◽  
Different Parts

Debates around cultural properties tend to focus on law and ethics, on appropriation and ownership, with media representations often producing stereotypes that reinforce and polarize the terms of the debate. The common, typically polemical, notion is that rapacious museums are merely a final resting point for captive static objects, with repatriation viewed as simply restorative compensation. A robust challenge to this view was developed in the Declaration on the Importance and Value of Universal Museums signed in 2002 by the directors of 19 leading museums in Europe and North America. The concept of the universal museum asserts that objects are cared for and held in trust for the world, overriding shifting political and ethnic boundaries and enabling the visitor to see “different parts of the world as indissolubly linked.” Although many would be in sympathy with the rhetorical position asserted, critics have argued that the declaration is a thinly veiled attempt to bolster immunity to repatriation claims. On both sides of the debate, the hegemonic position of many museums remains unsettling.

Universal Museum, Global Museum:

2020 ◽  
pp. 107-126
Author(s):  
Sylvie Ramond
Keyword(s):  
Universal Museum

Territories and cultural mobilities : Louvre-Abu Dhabi Universal Museum

EPISTÉMÈ ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 18 ◽  
pp. 29-51
Author(s):  
Baujard Corinne ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Abu Dhabi ◽  
Universal Museum
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