Thread by @profdanhicks

A SHORT MANIFESTO to kick off #MuseumsUnlocked Day 50 (Weds 20 May) #CurationAfterLockdown. Please share yours with the #MuseumsUnlocked hashtag! (thread) 👇👇👇

1/ Humanity. We need museums and galleries that care about people before they care about objects. #MuseumsUnlocked #CurationAfterLockdown

2/ Expertise. Museums must invest in bespoke, hands-on curatorial expertise above some vague sense of "the digital". Knowledge of collections is not metadata. Museums need expertise and their own personalities not just good websites. #MuseumsUnlocked #CurationAfterLockdown

3/ Resources. We've had years of ultra-centralisation of collections, power and money in a handful of the richest metropolitan institutions. An urgent task of redistribution lies ahead—in Europe's regions, and across the Global South.
#MuseumsUnlocked #CurationAfterLockdown

4/ Diversity. We must start to represent the communities we serve. Doing all we can to diversify our sector in all repects is critical. In the UK,dedicated Positive Action training and PhD funding for BAME colleagues are one urgent task. #MuseumsUnlocked #CurationAfterLockdown

5/ Theft. Let's strive for museums where NOTHING in the collections is STOLEN. Let's lead the public dialogues about facing up the the ongoing legacies of European colonialism: seeing museums as sites of conscience and restitution.
#MuseumsUnlocked #CurationAfterLockdown

6/ Collections. Museum databases are disgracefully patchy. Museums have a public duty to understand and share knowledge of what objects they hold. Investing in collections documentation, and public domain photography, is long overdue. #MuseumsUnlocked #CurationAfterLockdown

7/ Community. Let's stop 'engaging the public' or endlessly expanding visitor numbers and start building communities. Museums—as places & ideas, online & in real life—are public spaces. Our audiences are now our equal partners—or we'll fail #CurationAfterLockdown #MuseumsUnlocked

Some of these ideas were explored in more depth in my op-ed for @artnet last week news.artnet.com/opinion/dan-hi… #MuseumsUnlocked #CurationAfterLockdown

8/ Space. We've never needed outdoor heritage—ancient monuments, urban built environments, historic parks and gardens, bridleways or coastal paths—more than we do now. Let's promote free access to them, as living landscapes not theme parks #MuseumsUnlocked #CurationAfterLockdown

9/ Access. Lower visitor numbers places the future of free entry at risk. We must work with and grow our communities of supporters to find new scales of giving and membership models, so those who can give can underwrite free access for all #MuseumsUnlocked #CurationAfterLockdown

10/ Reputation. A crisis shines a light on any mismatch between the principles for which institutions stand, and how they act. For example, green-washing oil companies degrades the social legitimacy of museums working with Indigenous people #MuseumsUnlocked #CurationAfterLockdown