Collaborating to Enliven Heritage Collections

Abstract

Museums are heritage sites holding invaluable wealth that should not be locked away in storage or archives. A dynamic approach to sharing knowledge of heritage constructively in museums worldwide would ensure that the memory of this heritage is kept. Through partnerships, museums could create a platform for discovery and ensure the pooling of knowledge, enquiry, reflection and meaningful debates. This would bring to bear the much needed collaborative initiatives that would in turn ensure value addition to the heritage. In this way, heritage that may otherwise remain invisible could be enlivened and celebrated. In order to create bonds between visitors, generations and cultures around the world, museums need to ensure that their collections remain dynamic. A common classical understanding of museums as static permanent repositories (see ICOM definition of ‘museum’ as laid out in the ICOM Statutes 1946–2007) is in dire need of re‐evaluation and re‐activation in order to ensure meaningful museum visits. On an international level, the approach of museums – especially those with ethnographic and natural history collections and programmes – will then shift from didactic presentations and interpretation to being active custodians of rich living heritage. Sharing collections and experience among museums is a good way to improve visitors’ comprehension and emphasise intercultural exchanges. A comme Afrique / A for Africa and Africa's Wealth are two such separate collaborative initiatives that were staged by various heritage and non‐heritage stakeholders through the National Museums of Kenya. Material culture from geographically diverse sources, expertise in exhibition development and resources were brought together and involved in actualising the purposes of the two initiatives. Audiences who visited the two exhibitions were immersed in interactive dialogues and deeper discoveries concerning what would normally be mere reference material or usual day‐to‐day news items about Africa and the world. Partnerships with other structures, cultural or otherwise, can also contribute to the museum's mission. Engaging with other like‐minded actors enhances the existence of the heritage institutions and how they relate to various heritage stakeholders. A more meaningful symbiotic relationship is thus forged and may drive the institutions to re‐organise their future existence in order to remain dynamic and relevant to the visitors.