Semester:
Offered:
Suzanne Blier
This course explores a vital cluster of themes around museums and the relation between objects, knowledge, culture and society. The focus is at once contemporary practice, historical, and theoretical. A key aim is to move beyond Euro- American geographies to think about constructions of the universal and the global, and the relationship between works of art, museum displays, and the construction of meaning. Since the early twentieth century, scholars, artists, and activists have closely questioned the movements of objects and the role of museums, particularly in relation to socio-political developments. Why do individuals and societies collect, conserve, and display objects? How has this practice changed over time and space? What role do culture and taste play? These are some of the questions we will be addressing alongside practical experience designing programs for exhibitions.