Colourful, wild mixture: Museum visitors choose exhibits for the future in participatory action

MÜNSTERLAND The Münsterland has voted: Museum visitors have selected cultural assets that they want to send into the future. Included are objects, buildings, ideas and customs. Behind this is the "Apocalypse Münsterland" project led by Münsterland e.V. Now the selected exhibits are being digitised and brought together to form a new exhibition.

In Ibbenbüren it has become the steam reel, in Gronau museum visitors have chosen the analogue mixer, and the people of Borken want to preserve the Maitremsen celebration. These and 25 other exhibits were selected by more than 2000 museum visitors in Münsterland-wide participatory actions as worthy of preservation. Now the cultural assets are to go on tour through the region in digital form in a new exhibition.

Behind this is the extraordinary cooperation project "Apocalypse Münsterland" under the project management of Münsterland e.V. The fictitious starting point: the future has lost its culture and is sending an SOS to the present. "Help us, send us culture you want to preserve!" From October to December 2018, visitors to 28 museums and exhibition halls in the region had heard the call for help and diligently filled out ballot papers, attended voting cafés and evenings or voted online for exhibits.

Project manager Kathrin Strotmann is impressed by the result of the participatory campaign: "We are delighted with the colourful, wild mix of cultural assets that were selected. The result is as multifaceted as our region and our museum landscape itself. In the new digital exhibition, objects as diverse as an antique ceremonial vessel, a pit horse, a pedal drill or a cloister gallery can then stand side by side and be discovered."

The participating museums and exhibition houses also gain added value from participating in the project. "We were able to enter into conversation with our visitors in a new and personal way through the participatory action and develop a new, very engaging and rousing event format," explains Britta Kusch-Arnhold, director of the FARB Forum Altes Rathaus Borken. There, in the "Borken Election Arena", eleven musicians, local and regional authors and experts had given blazing election speeches for the cultural assets up for selection. The audience voted for the Maitremsen celebration, a traditional neighbourhood custom.

"Audience participation is important for museums to position themselves for the future. Only in this way can institutions be close to their visitors," emphasises Astrid Kießling-Taskin from the board of the Commerzbank Foundation, which is one of the project's sponsors. "What I find particularly exciting about 'Apocalypse Münsterland' is why the visitors chose certain exhibits. And the best thing is: there is no wrong answer to the question 'What do you want to preserve and why?'"

In the next step, the cultural assets will be digitised and virtually staged under the motto "Museum of the Future" by students of Münster University of Applied Sciences, Department of Architecture (MSA | Münster School of Architecture). They are scanning the exhibits with the help of the 3D object scanner "EVA", among other things. They are supported by BOK + Gärtner GmbH (agency for communication design and scenography) and the FabLab Münster of münsterLAND.digital e.V..

In summer 2019, the new digital exhibition will tour the region in a mobile container that acts as a "cultural ark" and broadcasting station.

www.apokalypse-muensterland.de