Legacies: Why Museum Histories Matter

The conference is organised by Leiden University's Museum Lab. The University Museum Lab encourages Leiden University students to get involved with museums while building on the university's museum studies and art history programmes. Museums are currently undergoing a period of change, with all kinds of new expectations and challenges. There is, for example, a great demand for new ways of making ancient art more accessible to today's audiences in a modern way. Furthermore, museums need to take a critical look at the way art from the former colonies has been included in their collections.
The Museum Lab, therefore, invites students to submit papers that focus on museums with an important founding history, as evidenced by their buildings, collections, commemorative functions, collectors or founders, which are currently engaged in institutional reflection in various ways, such as through exhibitions, acquisitions, restitutions, or renovations.