The Exhibitionary Complex

Decolonising museum cultures: An artist and a geographer in collaboration

“…These shape the ways in which “other” cultures are encountered and understood at the museum (Bennett, ). The effects of imperial taxonomies dictate the cultural logics through which we make meaning of artefacts and cultural representations (Bennett, , ; Hall, ).…”

“…At the 4th Emotional Geographies conference at the University of Groningen, The Netherlands in July 2013, we were invited to curate a “special session” that was in a format beyond the usual conference plenary or paper presentation. We designed an experience entitled “Theatres of Pain,” which aimed to reflect our long‐term collaboration on thinking through the question “How can 21st‐century museum displays of Pacifika cultures be post‐Imperial and post‐racial?” The exhibition space of the national museum is seen here as a theatre of pain; a vehicle of effecting the pain of epistemic violences, of overlooking the biography of artefacts (Gell, ), imperial genocide, and ecological imperialism (Crosby, ), and the deadening of artefacts (Bennett, , ; Tolia‐Kelly, ). Overall the British Museum, or indeed any art museum exhibiting artefacts from Māori and Pacific or Tangata Moana (people of the Pacific), “becomes a mausoleum for the European eye, but which petrifies living cultures” (Bennett, , p. 268).…”

“On display: Bodies and consumption in the ‘new’ Canadian cultural history”

“…Describing a transnational shift, Tony Bennett argues that institutions of the modern exhibitionary complex (e.g. museums and international exhibitions) transferred bodies and objects from private collections to public displays and formed “vehicles for inscribing and broadcasting messages of power” (, 74). Building from the work of Gramsci and Foucault, Bennett argued that this shift allowed people not just to be known, but also to know (Bennett, , 76).…”

Visual Expressions of Black Identity: African American and African Museum Websites

“…Researchers have discussed how museums are changing from authoritative, elitist organizations (e.g., Bennett, ; Hooper‐Greenhill, , ; McLean, ) to places where museum visitors can participate and offer their own interpretations of art or artifacts (Hooper‐Greenhill, ). Pieterse () said that the curator is no longer the sole interpreter; the interpretation is now a shared exchange between the museum goer and curator.…”