This project is included in the 2009 action plan of the World Federation of Clubs, Centres and Associations for UNESCO (WFUCA) as well as of the European Federation of Clubs, Centres and Associations for UNESCO (EFUCA).
Project organiser is ELITE ART Club for UNESCO - a non-governmental organisation based in Bucharest, which promotes Romanian contemporary art and cultural events. ELITE ART Club for UNESCO is active member of the Romanian Federation of Clubs, Centres and Associations for UNESCO.
Team members are Dr Daniela Popescu (project director), Dr Bianca Tudor (project manager), MA Adeline Popescu (fundraising coordinator) and MA Constantin Adrian Grigore (artistic programme coordinator).
As part of the YOUth and MUSEums Project, the European Conference on Youth Education in Museums was held on May 14-17, 2009 at the "D. Gusti" National Village Museum in Bucharest under the joint aegis of UNESCO-Paris.
The context that substantiates the present proposal and the problems addressed
Culture is a window on world and on self, a dynamic process involving learning - as a social and transformative process - and sharing.
Cultural education plays a decisive role in constructing the young European generations; it represents the key to the development of a society of communication and tolerance on sustainable basis. At the same time, cultural education enhances the exchange of ideas and values as well as the mutual understanding between young people.The museum - nucleus of research and reflection, on one side, and space of encounter and dialogue, on the other side - preserves vestiges of material culture, thus mediating the public access to the non-material dimension of culture. Thereby, artistic, spiritual and identity values are put across society, in particular across the youth.
Along with a good continuation of a wide range of scientific activities, such as study and conservation, the European museums are nowadays called upon challenging the alternative offers extant on the market as well as upon meeting the latest demands made on by a culturally diverse youth.
In this context, we ask ourselves:
What should museums do to draw in and hold the attention of the young European generations?
By which means can museums still attract the young audience and how can they keep the interest of this audience alive?
To which extent should high-technology penetrate into the museum sphere?
How far can the educational programmes promoted in museums reach the young audience?
In which ways can the respective programmes influence the youngster's lifestyles, enrich their knowledge and stimulate their imagination and creativity?
In which ways can the quality of engagement with the museum be measured?
How could the relationship between big events and focused engagement with the museum be kept in balance?
What has become the museum and what will/should it look like in the future?
The YOUth and MUSEums Project brings into focus key-issues regarding cultural youth education in museums and searches for a plurality of answers to the above mentioned questions.
Targets
This project aims to substantially contribute to developing successful youth educational programmes in museums via a series of debates between curators for young people's education. At the same time, this project promotes the exchange of educational methods, strategies and technologies between the participant institutions in order to elaborate youth educational programmes common to museums from several European countries including Romania.
Not least, YOUth and MUSEums aims at a sustainable development of the European youth sensibility and respect for the values of the intra- and interregional heritage as means of intercultural dialogue as well as of knowledge and preservation of one's cultural identity.
The present project will contribute to consolidating an international network of young audience education and developement experts.
YOUth and MUSEums clearly opens perspectives for a sustainable tourism in Europe, in general, and in Romania, in particular, by encouraging the (local) cultural heritage preservation as well as the mobility and intercultural dialogue between the European youngsters.
This project is to be also implemented outside the European continent.
Key activities
The short-, respectively long-term activities to be carried out in order to develop youth educational programmes common to the museums involved in this project are the following:
(1) The European Conference on Youth Education in Museums (Bucharest, May 14-17, 2009) - a meeting between representatives of UNESCO-Paris, of several well-renowned European museums ad galleries and of the European Federation of Clubs, Centres and Associations for UNESCO.
(2) The YOUth and MUSEums virtual forum, that will network several European museums, cultural organisations, schools, colleges and universities from Romania and abroad.
The participation in the forum at issue will be restricted to museum curators for young people's education and to representatives of educational institutions, of UNESCO-Paris, of ELITE ART Club for UNESCO, and of the European Federation of Associations, Centres and Clubs for UNESCO. Nevertheless, the results of the discussions held on the virtual forum will be freely accessed by everybody.
The management of the YOUth and MUSEums Project is made out of Romania. ELITE ART Club for UNESCO is in charge with the coordination of the main activities related to the maintenance and upgrade of the web-site.
(3) The electronic archive YOUth and MUSEums. This archive will collect updated articles, resources and links regarding cultural youth education in museums, that will be thematically, geographically and chronologically listed.
Focus will go on information issued from the education departments of the European museums participating in the YOUth and MUSEums Project. Thereby, the departments at issue will be networked and the wide range of their electronic resources concerning the topic under discussion interlinked. Once the electronic archive set up, a common ground for upcoming debates on youth education in museums will be thus established.
(4) The Guide of Good Practices in Cultural Youth Education in Museums, that will gather the most efficient and creative youth educational programmes developed in the European museums participating in this project.
Ways to promote the project
YOUth and MUSEums will be promoted via internet, press releases and conferences, TV interviews, and conferences held in high schools and universities from Romania and other European countries.
Bibliographical references
BENNETT T., The birth of the museum: history, theory, politics (Routledge, 1995).
HOOPER-GREENHILL E. (ed.), The educational role of the museum (Routledge, 1999), second edition.
LANG C., REEVE J., WOOLLARD V. (eds.), The Responsive Museum: Working With Audiences in the Twenty-first Century (Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2006).
Electronic resources
Europa Gateway to the European Union
National Foundation for Educational Research, United Kingdom
Integrating New Technologies into the Methods of Education
EdChange Multicultural Pavilion, Working Definition of Multicultural Education
To be continued ...
Ministeries and cultural institutions participating in the YOUth and MUSEums Project
Musee Bargoin, Clermont-Ferrand
K21 Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Duesseldorf
Piraeus Bank Group Cultural Foundation, Athens
Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon
Modern Art Centre of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, Lisbon
Yekaterinburg Gallery of Modern Art
The State Monument Museum St Isaac Cathedral, Sankt Petersburg
Rodriguez Acosta Foundation, Granada
Swedish Travelling Exhibitions, Visby
Sakip Sabanci Museum, Istanbul
National Museum of Art of Romania, Bucharest
The Museum of the Romanian Peasant
National History Museum, Bucharest
National University of Arts, Bucharest
ASTRA National Museum Complex, Sibiu
D. Gusti National Village Museum, Bucharest
Bruckenthal National Museum, Sibiu
Romanian Ministry of Culture, Religious Affairs and National Heritage
Cygnus Scientific Society, Suceava
To be extended ...
