Abstract
This chapter seeks to explore the role of museums in society by employing the notion of soft power as the focus of discussion and using a critical/cultural approach to support the investigation of the relationships established between museums and community. The first part of the text focuses on a discussion of this concept, analysing its relationship with museums and its potential as a methodological approach. The second part presents two case studies: a project developed in 2015 by the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga (MNAA), in Lisbon, Portugal, which had a great national impact, and another, developed since 2009 by the Arte Marginal collective, in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil. We propose a critical reflection on the different forms of power exercised by museums in the light of these two experiences, their motivations and possible impacts, namely through documentary analysis and interviews.
‘Is a box filled with works of art, then, a museum?
Is it a museum if it doesn't have walls? Can one make a museum that is not?’
Elena Filipovic (2009) A Museum That is Not, e-flux journal.
This text is part of the chapter published in Portuguese authored by Alice Semedo ComingOut—E se o Museu saísse à rua? A exposição-como-um-mundo dentro do mundo-como-uma-exposição, published in 2017 in the book Bens culturais e Relações Internacionais: o patrimônio como espelho do Soft Power, organised by Rodrigo Christofoletti.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
- 1.
See international documents in UNESCO (2020), p. 18, ICOM (2020), p. 2.
- 2.
In addition to the loss of many lives, on 13 April 2022, in an interview with AFP from Paris, Lazare Eloundou Assomo, director of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre, gave a warning about the loss of Ukrainian heritage sites: ‘The symbolic mark of 100 damaged or totally destroyed heritage sites will be surpassed on Thursday or Friday. This morning we had 98 sites or monuments registered in eight regions of the country’. Accessed 15 April 2022: https://www.uol.com.br/nossa/noticias/afp/2022/04/14/cem-patrimonios-ucranianos-foram-danificados-pela-guerra-alerta-unesco.htm.
- 3.
- 4.
- 5.
- 6.
The text benefitted from the collaboration of Manuel Sarmento Pizarro who, despite not having participated in the design, discussion and analysis or writing of the text, conducted the interview with the then Director of the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, Filipe Pimentel (2010-19), according to a pre-designed script, transcribing it carefully.
- 7.
Among them: JOSEPH S. NYE, JR. Soft power: The Means to Success in World Politics, New York, Public Affairs, 2004; JOSEPH S. NYE, JR. Power in the Global Information Age: From Realism to Globalization, London, Routledge, 2004; JOSEPH S. NYE, JR. O Paradoxo do Poder Americano: Por Que é Que a Única Superpotência Mundial Não Pode Actuar Isoladamente? [transl. Tiago Araújo] Lisbon, Gradiva, 2005; JOSEPH S. NYE, The future of power. New York: Public Affairs, 2011.
- 8.
- 9.
It is worth mentioning the historical importance of Lisbon’s Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, officially founded in 1884 to safeguard works of art mainly from the old convents and monasteries vacated by the law expelling religious orders from Portugal in 1834. From 1910, with the establishment of the Republic, it was joined by collections from the royal palaces and even more collections were created with the law on the separation of the State and the Church in 1911, which led to the nationalisation of property from the episcopal palaces and even from various churches in the country. Over the years, there were several patrons who donated works to the Museum, such as Calouste Gulbenkian. The MNAA's collections reflect this reality, chronologically framed between the Middle Ages and the nineteenth century and with numerous works of religious art produced nationally and abroad, mostly painting, sculpture and goldsmithery. It also holds an important nucleus of collections of oriental art for export, and of African art, which document the era of the Descobrimentos and the Portuguese Empire, as witnesses to the relationships established on a global scale, from Brazil to Japan, passing through Africa, India and China.
- 10.
- 11.
- 12.
As Hoskins (2006, p. 76) notes, this approach calls into question the boundaries between subjects and collective representations, underlining the importance of the phenomenological dimension of our interactions with the material world and the need to interrogate the objects that fascinate us as well as the reasons for that. As objectifications of cultural capital, art reproductions take on a special status because, as Fyfe (2004, p. 51) points out, at the moment of their consumption we often ask questions about what is presented to the eye (gaze); what is absent; and to what extent the intentions of the work and the author are fulfilled.
- 13.
- 14.
Available at: https://www.jn.pt/artes/furtado-um-terco-dos-quadros-expostos-nas-ruas-de-lisboa-4910739.html/ (Accessed 12 April 2016).
- 15.
Available at: http://observador.pt/2015/10/01/ja-foi-roubado-um-dos-quadros-expostos-na-rua/ (Accessed 10 March 2016).
- 16.
Available at: http://observador.pt/2015/12/06/robin-das-artes-tirou-quatro-quadros-do-chiado-e-deu-os-ao-miratejo/ (Accessed 10 March 2016).
- 17.
Available at: http://www.gazetadorossio.pt/mais-dois-quadros-roubados-a-exposicao-do-museu-nacional-de-arte-antiga.html (Accessed 10 March 2016).
- 18.
Available at: http://observador.pt/2015/12/12/chiado-acordou-tres-obras-arte-nas-ruas/ (Accessed 26 February 2016).
- 19.
Vamos pôr o Sequeira no lugar certo, MNAA, Press Release. Available at: http://museudearteantiga.pt/content/files/modalidade_pagamento_sequeira.pdf?nonce=e9f7b7729e2ab65df072377a97c45b7c (Accessed 6 March 2016).
- 20.
Available at: https://www.pcv.pt/auction.php?n=1063&displaymode=resultssummary&ref=auctionspastinfo (Accessed 26 February 2016).
- 21.
On the historical racial rift in Latin American countries see Quijano (2005).
- 22.
On hip-hop culture see: http://latinoamericana.wiki.br/verbetes/h/hip-hop-cultura.
- 23.
At that time graffiti was considered a criminalised means of expression.
- 24.
Graffiti is an artistic language that reflects the reality of the streets and of the less favoured groups of society. This popular language is linked to other movements, such as hip-hop. It is territorial writing in the city, designed to assert territory. Its manual, spontaneous stroke structurally opposes well painted or printed political or advertising legends and challenges these institutionalised languages by altering and/or superimposing them (Canclini 1997).
- 25.
Income, education, housing conditions, gender, cultural capital, generational situation, among others, represent important aspects for us to understand the different ways of using and appropriating cultural spaces and practices (Ibram 2012).
- 26.
- 27.
For other examples of street museums in Brazil, see the Museu Aberto de Arte Urbana in São Paulo website (https://museuabertodearteurbana.wordpress.com/) and the Museu de Arte de Rua website (https://www.mar360.art.br/).
- 28.
On community museums in Brazil see Santos (2017).
- 29.
‘This will be replicable by whoever wants to (…); this is what is expected of the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga: that it gives the standard that others, in their turn, replicate; that it be the Admiral Ship that, when it moves at sea, digs into the ocean to allow smaller boats to follow, and this is fundamental because smaller boats do not have the draught to withstand the size of the waves; we have to be the ones at the front to do that’ (A.F. Pimentel, Interview on 26 February 2016).
- 30.
Examples in the Guia de Museus e Memórias, Rede de Favelas Sustentável (https://favelasustentavel.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/2020-11-Guia_Museus_Memorias_ESPELHADO.pdf).
References
Appadurai A (1986) The social life of things: commodities in cultural perspective. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Arendt H (2007) A Condição Humana, 10th edn. Editora Forense-Universitária, São Paulo
Baudrillard J (1983) Simulations (trans: Foss P, Patton P, Beitchman P). Semiotext[e], New York
Bennett T (1995) The birth of the museum: history, theory, politics. Routledge, London
Bennett T (2004) The exhibitionary complex. In: Farago C (ed) Grasping the world: the idea of the museum. Ashgate, Aldershot and Burlington, VT, pp 413–441
Bergeron Y (2009–2010) Los museos y las crisis. Tendencias en los museos norteamericanos. Museos.es, n 5–6, p 58–67. Available at https://dialnet.unirioja.es/servlet/articulo?codigo=3668550. Accessed 5 June 2021
Bhabha H (1998) O local da cultura (trans: Avila M, Livia reis E, Gonçalves G). Belo Horizonte, Editora UFMG
Bolaños M (2009–2010) La belleza de la crisis. Museos.es, n. 5–6, p 18–27. Available at https://pt.calameo.com/read/000075335586d490a82c6. Accessed 5 June 2021
Booth R (2014) National identity at the margins of Europe: history, affect and museums in Slovenia, vol Doctoral Dissertation. University of Connecticut Graduate. Retrieved from http://digitalcommons.uconn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6606&context=dissert
Braidotti R (2011) Nomadic subjects: embodiment and sexual difference in contemporary feminist theory. Columbia University Press, New York
Brasil. Instituto Brasileiro de Museus (2012) O “não público” dos museus: levantamento estatístico sobre o “não-ir” a museus no Distrito Federal. https://www.museus.gov.br/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/naopublico.pdf. Accessed 1 May 2022
Caetano MJ (30 September 2015) Arte Antiga nas ruas de Lisboa. “Não é a obra verdadeira, pois não?” DN. Retrieved from http://www.dn.pt/artes/interior/arte-antiga-nas-ruas-de-lisboa-nao-e-a-obra-verdadeira-pois-nao-4806041.html
Cai Y (2013) The art of museum diplomacy: the Singapore-France cultural collaboration in perspective. Int J PolitCultSoc 26:127–144. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10767-012-9122-7
Cameron D (1971) The museum, a temple or the forum. Curator Museum J 14(1):11–24
Canclini NG (1997) Culturas Híbridas - estratégias para entrar e sair da modernidade (trans: Lessa AR, Cintrão HP). EDUSP, São Paulo, pp 283–350
Casey D (2001) Museums as agents for social and political change. Curator Museum J 44:230–236. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2151-6952.2001.tb01163.x
Chagas M, Gouveia I (2014) Museologia social: reflexões e práticas (à guisa de apresentação). In: Museologia Social. Cadernos do Ceom. Ano 27(41). Unochapecó, Chapecó, pp 9–22
Chagas MDS (1994) No museu com a turma do Charlie Brown. Cadernos De Sociomuseologia, 2. Retrieved from https://revistas.ulusofona.pt/index.php/cadernosociomuseologia/article/view/535
Chagas M (2002) Memória e Poder: Dois Movimentos. Cadernos De Sociomuseologia 19(19). Retrieved from https://revistas.ulusofona.pt/index.php/cadernosociomuseologia/article/view/367
Clifford J (1997) Routes: travel and translation in the late twentieth century. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA
Coelho AP (30 October 2015) Os quadros estão na rua, Alexandra Prado Coelho. Público. Retrieved on 10 Feb 2016, from https://www.publico.pt/culturaipsilon/noticia/os-quadros-estao-na-rua-1710530
Cury MX (2003) O projeto museológico da exposição Brasil 50 Mil Anos. In: Xavier M (Org.) Resumos do Encontro de Profissionais de Museus: a comunicação em questão: exposição e educação, propostas e compromissos. São Paulo, MAE/USP/STJ, pp 45–60
Deleuze G, Guattari F (1987) A thousand plateaus: capitalism and schizophrenia, vol 2 (trans: Massumi B). University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis. Retrieved from http://projectlamar.com/media/A-Thousand-Plateaus.pdf. Accessed 11 Jan 2015
Duncan C, Wallach A (1980) The universal survey museum. Art Hist 3(4):448–469
Duncan C (1995) Civilizing rituals: inside public art museums. Routledge, London and New York
Eco U (1995) Faith in fakes: travels in hyperreality (trans: Weaver W). Minerva, London
Esche C (April 2004) What’s the point of art anyway? Retrieved from http://republicart.net/disc/institution/esche01_en.htm. Accessed 3 Mar 2016
Filipovic E (March 2009) A museum that is not. Retrieved from e-flux journal #4: http://www.e-flux.com/journal/a-museum-that-is-not/. Accessed 11 Apr 2016
Foucault M (1980) Power/knowledge selected interviews and other writings, 1972–1977. Pantheon Book, New York
Fyfe G (2004) Reproductions, cultural capital and museums: aspects of the culture of copies. Mus Soc 2(1):47–67
Gell A (1998) Art and agency—an anthropological theory. Clarendon Press, Oxford
Giddens A (1977) Studies in social and political theory. Basic Books, New York
Grincheva N (2013) Cultural diplomacy 2.0: challenges and opportunities in museum international practices museum and society. Mus Soc 11(1):39–49
Hardt M, Negri A (2005) Multitude: war and democracy in the age of empire. Routledge, London
Hardt M (1999) Affective labor. Boundary 2 26(2):89–100. Retrieved from http://www.sv.uio.no/sai/english/research/projects/anthropos-and-the-material/Intranet/economic-practices/reading-group/texts/hardt-affective-labor.pdf
Holden J, Bound K, Briggs R, Jones S (2007) Cultural diplomacy. DEMOS, London
Hoogwaerts L (2012) What role do museums and art institutions play in international relations today and specifically in the development of What Joseph Nye called ‘soft power’? Retrieved from Institute for Cultural Diplomacy website: Pak-Japan Relations: A Multi-Dimensional Engagement
Hooper-Greenhill E (1992) Museums and the shaping of knowledge. Routledge, London and New York
Hoskins J (2006) Agency, biography and objects. In: Tilley C Handbook of material culture. Thousand Oaks, London, pp 74–84
Huyssen A (1995) Twilight memories: marking time in a culture of Amnesia. Routledge, London and New York
International Council of Museums (ICOM) (2020) Report Museums, museum professionals and COVID-19. Available at https://icom.museum/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Report-Museums-and-COVID-19.pdf. Accessed 2 June 2021
Kirshenblatt-Gimblett B (1998) Destination culture: tourism, museums, and heritage. University of California Press, Berkeley
Kirshenblatt-Gimblett B (2000) The museum as catalyst. In: t. S. ICOM Sweden (ed) Museums 2000: confirmation or challenge. Vadstena, pp 1–19. Retrieved from https://www.nyu.edu/classes/bkg/web/vadstena.pdf
Marstine J (2006) Introduction. In: Marstine J (ed) New museum theory and practice: an introduction. Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, pp 1–35
Mcclellan A (2003) A brief history of the art museum public. In: Mcclellan A (ed) Art and its publics: museum studies at the millennium. Blackwell, Malden, MA, and Oxford, pp 1–49
Miller D, Tilley C (1984) Ideology, power and prehistory: an introduction. In: Miller D (ed) Ideology, power and prehistory. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp 1–16
Miller JB (1992) Women and power. In: Wartenberg W (ed) Rethinking power. SUNY, Albany, NI
Munro E (2014) Doing emotion work in museums: reconceptualising the role of community engagement practitioners. Mus Soc 12(1):44–60
Nye JS (1990) Bound to lead: the changing nature of American power. Basic Books, New York
Nye JS (2004) Soft power the means to success in world politics. Public Affairs, New York
Nye JS (2008) The powers to lead. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Nye JS (2021) Soft power: the evolution of a concept. J Polit Power. https://doi.org/10.1080/2158379X.2021.1879572
Nye JS (2006) Soft power, hard power and leadership. Retrieved from http://www.hks.harvard.edu/netgov/files/talks/docs/11_06_06_seminar_Nye_HP_SP_Leadership.pdf. Accessed 16 Mar 2016
Nye JS (2008) Public diplomacy and soft power. Ann Am Acad Polit Soc Sci 616(1):94–109. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002716207311699
Nye JS (2014) The information revolution and soft power. Curr Hist 113(759):19–22. Retrieved from Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard: http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:11738398
Paynter R, McGuire R (1991) The archaeology of inequality. Blackwell, Oxford
Pearce S (1989) Museum studies in material culture. Leicester University Press, London
Quijano A (2005) Colonialidade do poder, eurocentrismo e América Latina. In: Lander E (Org.) A colonialidade do saber: eurocentrismo e ciências sociais. Perspectivas latino-americanas. Colección Sur Sur. CLACSO, Buenos Aires, pp 107–130
Raymond E (2001) The cathedral and the bazaar: musings on linux and open source by an accidental revolutionary. O'Reilly Media, Inc. Retrieved from http://www.unterstein.net/su/docs/CathBaz.pdf. Accessed 14 Mar 2016
Ribeiro MOS (2019) A Roda do Teatro de Rua girou no Chafariz da Cabloca e aconteceu um Museu. Dissertation, Master's in Museology, Universidade Federal da Bahia, Faculdade de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas
Santiago S (1978) O entre-lugar do discurso latino-americano. In: Uma literatura nos trópicos: ensaios sobre dependência cultural. Perspectiva, São Paulo
Santos SS (2017) Ecomuseus e Museus Comunitários no Brasil: estudo exploratório de possibilidades museológicas. Dissertation, Master in Museology, Interunidades em Museologia, Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo
Semedo A (2014) Museum mediators in Europe. Connecting learning in a field of experience. In: Books B (ed) Museum worlds: advances in research, vol 2, pp 170–176. https://doi.org/10.3167/armw.2014.020110
Semedo A (2015) Los objetos performativos como de aprendizaje en la formación de los profesionales de los museos. In: Fontal Merillas O, Marín Cepeda S (eds) La Educación Patrimonial: Visiones Caleidoscópicas. TREA, pp 121–136
Semedo A (2019) Questões de autoridade em museus. Anais do 3° Simpósio Internacional de Pesquisa em Museologia: o futuro dos museus e os museus do futuro organization Ana Gonçalves Magalhães. Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, pp 151–169
Silva C (2015) ComingOut. Atenção aos ladrões, o Museu de Arte Antiga saiu à rua. Jornal i (online). Retrieved from http://www.ionline.pt/414145
Soja E (2000) Tirdspace: expanding the scope of the geographical imagination. In: Read A (ed) Architecturally speaking: practices of art, architecture and the everyday, pp 13–30
Studart D (2020) Pandemia global de Covid-19 e Impactos para os Museus: Crise ou Oportunidade? Revista Museu. Available at https://www.revistamuseu.com.br/site/br/artigos/18-de-maio/18-maio-2020.html. Accessed 20 May 2021
Sylvester C (2009) Art/museums: international relations where we least expect it. Paradigm Publishers, London
Synec M (2015) Num Exercício de Confundir por Alguns Momentos a Cópia com o Original da Pintura. Umbigo. Retrieved from http://umbigomagazine.com/um/2015-11-09/comingout-o-museu-saiu-a-rua.html
Tilley C et al (2006) Handbook of material culture. Thousand Oaks, London
Tolentino ÁB (2016) Museologia social: apontamentos históricos e conceituais. Cadernos de Sociomuseologia 52:21–44
United Nations Organization for Education, Science and Culture (UNESCO) (2020) Report Museums around the world in the face of COVI-19. Available at https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000373530. Accessed 2 June 2021
Weber M (1978) Economy and society: an outline of interpretive sociology. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA
Witcomb A (2003) Re-imagining the museum: beyond the mausoleum. Routledge. Museum Meanings series, London and New York
Thanks
Our thanks to the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga and its team and to Coletivo Arte Marginal Salvador for granting us the images. A very special thanks to the Director of the MNAA, António Filipe Pimentel, and to the creator of the Coletivo Arte Marginal, Fabrício Brito, for the generous conversations. And, of course, to Manuel Sarmento Pizarro for his collaboration.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Semedo, A., Lima, L. (2023). Between the Power of the Museum and the Power of the Community: Case Studies in Portugal and Brazil. In: Christofoletti, R. (eds) Soft Power and Heritage. The Latin American Studies Book Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-41207-3_21
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-41207-3_21
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-41206-6
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-41207-3
eBook Packages: HistoryHistory (R0)