The document discusses the role and value of museums in creating happiness and well-being for communities. It presents principles for a "Happy Museum" that focuses on creating conditions for well-being, pursuing mutual relationships, learning for resilience, being good stewards of the environment and active citizens. The document also provides examples of specific programs and initiatives at various museums in the UK aimed at achieving these principles.
9. The Western Economy
… has given us wealth beyond measure, but has
taken away the chief benefits of wealth, the
consciousness of having enough
Robert and Edward Skidelsky
10. We sign fewer petitions,
belong to fewer organizations
that meet, know our
neighbours less, meet with
friends less frequently, and
even socialize with our families
less often. We're even bowling
alone. More Americans are
bowling than ever before, but
they are not bowling in
leagues
11. • More unequal societies are bad
for almost everyone within
them – the rich as well as the
poor
• Almost every modern social
and environmental problem –
ill health, lack of community
life, violence, obesity, mental
illness, long working hours big
prison populations – is more
likely to occur in a less equal
society
12.
13.
14. It is ]the free voluntary associations which
strengthen civil society by creating Habits of
the Heart
Alexis de Tocqueville 1835
22. Happy Museum
Principles
1. Create conditions for
wellbeing
2. Pursue mutual
relationships
3. Learn for resilience
4. Value the environment
and be a steward of
the future as well as
the past
5. Be an active citizen
6. Measure what matters
23. Happy Museum
Principles
1. Create conditions for
wellbeing
2. Pursue mutual
relationships
3. Learn for resilience
4. Value the environment
and be a steward of
the future as well as
the past
5. Be an active citizen
6. Measure what matters
24. Happy Museum
Principles
1. Create conditions for
wellbeing
2. Pursue mutual
relationships
3. Learn for resilience
4. Value the environment
and be a steward of
the future as well as
the past
5. Be an active citizen
6. Measure what matters
25. Happy Museum
Principles
1. Create conditions for
wellbeing
2. Pursue mutual
relationships
3. Learn for resilience
4. Value the environment
and be a steward of
the future as well as
the past
5. Be an active citizen
6. Measure what matters
26. Happy Museum
Principles
1. Create conditions for
wellbeing
2. Pursue mutual
relationships
3. Learn for resilience
4. Value the environment
and be a steward of
the future as well as
the past
5. Be an active citizen
6. Measure what matters
27. Happy Museum
Principles
1. Create conditions for
wellbeing
2. Pursue mutual
relationships
3. Learn for resilience
4. Value the environment
and be a steward of
the future as well as
the past
5. Be an active citizen
6. Measure what matters
28. For every £1 invested we
gain over £4 of social
value
Valuing and
encouraging
happiness and
emotional investment
Joint local approaches
to progression
Hidden value of family
outcomes
Key investment in
cultural heritage
29. The value of Museums
and Happiness
The Value of Musuems to people’s
happiness is £3,200 per year, per
person.
This compares to:
Being an audience in the Arts £2,000
Participation in Arts activity £1.500
Participation in Sport £1,500
30. Chiltern Open Air Museum Imperial War Museum North
The Beaney Art Gallery, Canterbury
Reading Museum The Garden Museum, London
Shakespeare’s Birthplace The Cinema Museum, London
London Transport Museum The Manchester Museum
The Story Museum, Oxford Godalming Museum
The Lightbox, Woking Derby Museums
Slough Museum Kirkstall Abbey, Leeds
Woodhorn Torquay Museum
Abergavenney Museum
Ceredigion Museum Gwynedd Museum and Art Gallery
Bilston Craft Gallery Royal West of England Academy
42. Make, Share
An Philosopher Giving that Lecture on
the Orrery, in which a Lamp is put in
the
Place of the Sun
1766
43. Derby Silk Mill
Daniel Defoe’s ‘A Tour thro’ the Whole Island of Great Britain’ (1742) records: -
“This engine contains 26,586 Wheels, and 96,746 Movements, which work 73,726 yards
of Silk-thread, every time the Waterwheel goes round, which it does three times in one
Minute.”
44.
45. Re:make
enabling and encourage co-production
for mutual benefit.
Citizen Maker/Curator
seeing change as opportunity to experiment,
involve and enrich.
“Tell me and I forget, teach me
and I may remember,
involve me and I learn.”
Benjamin Franklin
58. What they said about Derby
Museum in 1881
[The new Art Gallery]
“should not provide a
fashionable lounge where
our exquistites alone may
congregate to study and
admire the beautiful, but to
develop the artistic
aspirations of all sorts and
conditions.”
59.
60. What they say about Derby
Museum in 2015
• Objects which reflect
the rapid
democratisation of
society since 1990.
• Challenging the
perception of history
being something that is
distant or not touchable
So although the last 20 years has seen a slew of new and inspiring museums being built on the back of economic growth (growth that in the UK especially was built on debt and speculation).
There is no guarantee that western economic growth will return to pre-2007 levels for at least decade, if at all.
and this is despite compelling research from academics like Kate Pickett and Richard Wilkinson that more equal societies do better
Ceredigion Museum is delighted to offer a part-time internship as part of its latest project funded by the Happy Museum Commission Reaping the knowledge. The internship is open to students in business studies and management. The aim of the internship is to give the intern experience of the work of the museum, and to enable them to apply their academic and business expertise in working with the museums commercial ventures. Harvesting the Knowledge is a collaborative project between Ceredigion Museum and Tircoed that will promote social enterprise in traditional crafts funded by The Happy Museum. The intern would be working with the Assistant Curator, Alice Briggs on developing marketing and branding for the new product line created for the museum shop through the project Harvesting the Knowledge.
Define and Understand - What is the issue we are trying to solve or change?
What are our guiding principles? Who is involved? What does success look like? What are the available resources/constraints?
A Philosopher by Lamplight (or an Hermit)
Think and Imagine - What are our ideas – how far can we push them if we are willing to take risks?
This is the alchymist in search of the philosophers stone discovers phosphorus.
Model and Prototype Which ideas are strongest? Can we combine, expand and refine our ideas and make a prototype or pilot?
Blacksmiths Shop
Test and Evaluate. How are we going to know it has worked? What improvements do we need to make? What did people think, feel do?
An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump
Make and Share What resources do we need to make it happen? Who else needs to be part of it? Who should we be telling about what we are doing? How does this feed into our other work or areas or the work of others?
The Orrery.
We needed to define and understand what the Silk Mill means – to us, to our audiences and partners – to the world.
We went into a crazy period of experimentation, one that hasn’t really stopped actually. (Read through the images….)
Looking at outside influences and other sectors - Maker Spaces, Hack spaces, Fab Labs, Coderdojos, Tinkering Schools. Makerfaires, TED Ex
We’ve run 3 makerfaires and are part of the international Artscience Prize – a global learning programme with young people exploring issues that matter to them under a shared theme – this year’s is Biodiversity.
Over 20,000 people in a closed museum – experimenting, exploring what we needed this to be.
And so, the most recent stage Re:make was born in 2013…we developed Remake as a pilot project to actually remake the museum and get the ground floor back open 4 days a week to the public and the rest of the time as a resource. Designing/prototyping everything needed – from café tables/chairs to exhibition cases and installations. But rather than doing it behind closed doors – how might we continue this coproduction mindset and do it as our public programme?
Open access and involvement as the public programme 4 days per week. Producing unexpected things…
Open access and involvement as the public programme 4 days per week.
Final space is unexpected
The ground floor space is raw, beautiful, flexible and is being used extensively for a huge range of activities.
Embed the co-production approach into our other organisation projects… Nature Gallery at the Museum and Art Gallery opened last month. Our latest Makers in Residence have just completed their residencies in our Institute of STEAM.
I’d like to share the approach we took for our new Nature Gallery at the Museum and Art Gallery.
‘notice nature feel joy’
In particular how we built on the RE:Make coproduction methodology and adapted it to fit our timescale and the nuances of the project.
We had 10 months to develop and deliver the space which opened last month.
A £70k proportion of a bigger DCMS / Wolfson funding pot to strip out the existing 1001 Objects gallery, replace the floor and lighting, decorate and design and build the fixtures.
We began project with strong desire to do this WITH people and not TO people
And a shared commitment to high production values
We believe the best museum is a place of encounters. Somewhere people can look at the world differently, form new friendships and be active. Our visitors must feel they are entitled to participate.
Our great museums have collections to inspire free thought, feelings of commonality and a shared stake in the future. But they have to be open to participation and constant change , they have to be brave and stand up for their values in public, but above all they have to embody the notion of ‘the civic’ where citizens and institutions co-operate in a free and open public realm
I’ve worked in museums since 1997, which I think co-incides with what could be described as the good times for culture. It was a a time when expansion and growth were unprecedented. Our major towns and cities have a slew of new, beautifully designed and inspiring museums. These new museums and the policy of free admission have inspired increasing numbers of people to enjoy arts and their heritage. But this kind of exponential growth can’t go on forever. The current financial crisis has shown the limits of growth. A desire for growth has skewed the way people who work in culture think. By proving our contributes to the economic potential of a locality or the country as a whole, we get more money, with more money we can do more stuff for more people.
This is fine to a point but I think it has created a rigid, mechanistic mindset in the practice of museum people. We spend much time trying to prove to treasury for the next CSR or our local authority next round of budget setting, that culture can contribute to objectives in a range of areas from reducing crime to improving educational attainment, to improving health and contributing to economic regeneration. Whilst this may be true, for me this approach has taken much of the joy out of our work. We may be culturally richer than ever before but are we happier.
I think our efforts should be less geared to producing more cultural stuff and but should concentrate on the happiness of our people be they, visitors, contributors, staff or volunteers. We often pride ourselves in putting people at the heart of the museum – we should put the museum in the hearts of our people. This is the way to build the social capital which is the keystone to the resilient and sustainable communities of the future.