Interweaving multiple contexts for objects in museum exhibitions: a contextual approach

This study explores how to recontextualise objects in exhibitions to provide a bridge between the objects and visitors in museums by revealing two important strategies, which include establishing specific (sub)themes and frameworks as well as organising objects in groups. First, exhibit themes (reflecting exhibit frameworks), gateway objects, and exhibit atmospheres can be strategically combined to recontextualise objects. Second, objects either associated with or beyond spatio-temporal proximity can be grouped together in exhibit context. Both strategies reconstruct the micro, macro, and/or specific dimension(s) of objects’ contexts, weaving together visitors’ personal and social contexts to enhance their engagement with the objects. This study is based on fieldwork from thirty-two Dutch museums, a series of semi-structured interviews, and direct observation. The paper argues that using objects’ original context is an important source for increasing the creativity involved with curating museum exhibitions.