82

A rqoindér to ‘The museam us communicator’

James Porter

There is much to admire in ‘The Museum as Communicator’. As Co-director of the international course which Sir Roy Strong addressed, I can vouch for the fact that the impact on senior museum educators from some eighteen countries was immen- sely stimulating.’ His description of the role of director reflects the highly successful and stylish way in which he himself has played the role. His emphasis on the importance of publicity, of the museum as a building with many different uses and his encouragement to museums to hold the ‘middle ground’ are all of considerable value.

However, beginning with the noble wish that museums should preserve and promote all visions and not overemphasize one against the other, he quickly betrays his own sense of prior- ity when he talks of the necessity to take brave, non-popuht decisions. He speaks of the ‘mountaineers’ who enter the museum at the level of either school, university or postgraduate. Such a reference is revealing as over 90 per cent of adults in the United Kingdom will not have been either undergraduates or postgraduates. He defends the museum as a centre of excellence and considers that there is nothing to apologize about if visitors are made up of a large proportion of very highly educated people.

I want to argue that while the view taken by Sir Roy may be appropriate for the director of ‘the world’s finest and most com- prehensive museum of the decorative arts’ it is inappropriate for the great majority of museums either in the United Kingdom or in the rest of the world. The difficulty is not to take the non-populist or élitist decision; the real challenge is to take a brave populist decision without sacrificing the excellence of what the museum has to communicate.

The view that the museum is first and foremost a place that simply selects and collects the finest and then, as Veblen would say, keeps them ‘like knowledge in a cool, dry place’ is totally at variance with the whole spirit that led to the establishment of the museum in the nineteenth century and which encourages public authorities and private benefactors to maintain them to- day. Of course, the museum has to have things of value to share. However, it is the sharing that represents its particular function and which legitimizes the appointment of the staff, the maintenance of the building and the continuity of the activity of the museum as collector, preserver and communicator.

The museum needs the scholar, the person who will collect, identify and conserve, but the essential test of the success and relevance of the museum is its ability to communicate about its collection and to be part of that broad popular movement of education that began in the Western world in the nineteenth century and is now universal. A collection is not a museum any more than a library is a university. The latter can be legitimized only by its function as an institution for teaching and learning. However gifted the professors or excellent the materials in the

laboratory the purpose of the university is to apply those re- sources to the task of education. Thus, however well informed the curators or comprehensive the serried rows of artefacts in the store, the museum’s purpose is to share its collection, to enable the public to participate and enjoy the particular aspects of culture which it represents. The museum is not simply a place to house a collection of precious objects to be knowingly con- templated by a small group of scholarly gazers: its cardinal work is to communicate, not as an option but as the central feature which everything else must facilitate.

The contemporary museum, while considering the past, should also illuminate and enable us to understand the present. The comparison with the university is quite an interesting one. Coming from a career in higher education, I note that one of the most marvellous features of the museum is that it is essen- tially a place whose doors are open to everyone irrespective of age, of previous qualifications or of special knowledge. Educa- tional systems tend to take on the characteristics of an obstacle race, the obstacles getting higher as individuals attempt to con- tinue their formal education. Access to knowledge is limited, either by lack of financial resources or failure to achieve arbitrary standards. The joy of the museum, which it shares with parks and libraries, is that it .is open, is accessible and belongs to everyone.

All museums have their special audiences who gain some- thing precious and continuing from association with a museum. However, it is no surprise that museums around the world are at their busiest at the week-end when people can seize the chance to make use of their own cultural centre. It is those whose knowledge and understanding of the world rests upon a shallow foundation and who have had limited cultural ex- periences who represent the real challenge to museum staff. There is something wrong if the great majority of visitors are made up of people who have already had an advanced education rather than from the vast majority of the population who have had little chance to nourish their own understanding of the world.

The museum can be a significant counter to the prevailing educational imbalance which tends increasingly to reward those who have already had the largest share of the resources and provides so minimally for the majority who never have access to any formal educational provision after they leave school.

The true role of the museum, therefore, is to be a communi- cator of the cultural heritage and contemporary life that belongs to everyone. Too often that is the fact that is forgotten.

1. The British Council’s ‘Museums in Education’ course was held at the Commonwealth Institute, London, in June 1982. It was directed by James Porter, Director of the Commonwealth Institute, and Max Hebditch, Director of the Museum of London.