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Anette Rein

Commnunicating the museum, part II:

A “Communicating the museum" conference

(Berlin, July 12-15, 2016)

Within two weeks, two international conferences about fered by a commercial agency with their own specific
museums as important cultural institutions happened in rates. The General Conference was characterised, on the
July 2016. The first one was the General Conference of one hand, through some common meetings of all partici-
the International Council of Museums (ICOM), which had pants in the mornings, listening to five official keynote
its 24 conference together with the celebration of the speakers, and during the receptions in the evenings. On
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70 birthday in Milan, Italy July 3-July 9, 2016. This con- the other hand, the conference time was divided in many
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ference was already reviewed for EXPOTIME! in Decem- different meetings in different places between the par-
ber/January 2016/17 as part I of the comparison. The ticipants of the administrative discussions, the meetings
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second conference “Communicating the museum" (CTM), of the international committees, and through various ex-
organized by a commercial agency for cultural communi- cursions visiting Italian cultural highlights.
cations, situated in Paris (founded in 1995 ), happened
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in Berlin for the 16 time July 12-July 15, 2016. As the ICOM conferences, the CTM conferences are or-
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ganized in different cities, but annually. In 2016, the
In this review, I will concentrate on comparing the differ- German capital Berlin, as a cultural landscape rife with
ent ways of the two conferences concerning methods of art and innovation, and with its many refugees living
communicating a museum. The same three questions will there since 2015, was choosen as the place to be, with
be the frame of my second article too: the suitable topic “Dialogue”. Contrary to the ICOM
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General Conference, the conference in Berlin was of-
• Who are the different target groups of the two fered by an independent, commercial agency. No mem-
associations which are framing their different ways of bership was the criterion for participation. Everybody,
mediating museum contents? who could pay the conference fees (about 1.080 US$),
• How did the process of communicating with the was free to participate.
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media on an international level?
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• Which ‘key learnings’ from both conferences Whereas ICOM concentrated on internal topics, the view
could the participants take home – or rather ‘hidden of the CTM conference was a comparing one, as the
messages’? founder of the agency Agenda, Corinne Estrada comment-
ed: “It’s about learning from outside, copy from what
The target groups people do successfully in other industries”. This impli-
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cates that museums are unable to develop criteria for
In the ICOM general conference which happens every their own development while other "industries" are the
three years, all participants were members of this asso- pacemakers of the future. One such discussion centered
ciation or working together with museums closely. This on the "Multaka" project of five Berlin museums. Arab na-
general conference concentrated on issues concerning tive speaking trained guides facilitate visits for refugees
their museum work, on the birthday of the association from Arab speaking countries, to nurture connections be-
(exhibition), on the new logo, and on important adminis- tween Germany’s history and cultural heritage and their
trative topics of the international association ICOM (like own. A good example of inter- and transdisciplinary mode
the election of the new president). According to the offi- to initiate a cross-cultural engagement through commu-
cial numbers, 3,433 members out of 129 countries and nicative structures with different museums.
territories participated in Milan. Within the conference
space, there was a museum fair, in which companies pre- In Berlin, about 200 participants from 27 countries
sented their products. This was the transparent commer- (mainly from Europe and USA) were counted, including
cial aspect of the ICOM conference. The conference fee the 50 invited local and international speakers. The main
for members was between 350,00 € and 550,00 €, for conference place happened in the Schlüterhof (court-
non-members 450,00 € ‒ 650,00 € for the general confer- yard) of the Deutsches Historisches Museum (DHM), and
ence. The participation in pre- and post-conference in different places within the museum ‒ as for the fund-
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tours, were organised by the 30 participating internation- raising day and the workshops on July 14, 2016.
al committees (out of 119 national committees), or of-

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EXPOTIME!, issue August/September 2017