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Research and the Museum Ecosystem, March 2020

Image of a gallery within the National Museum in Cardiff. A collection of stones have been collected into a circle, in front of a collection of paintings.
Gallery view, National Museum Cardiff © Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales

19 March 2020

Research and the Museum Ecosystem was originally planned as a live event due to take place at the National Museum Cardiff in March 2020. This would have focused upon arts-based research in the museum, gallery and academic worlds, and was intended to provide a fresh opportunity to investigate how the concept of a museum ecosystem might offer an alternative to, or even an improvement upon, more traditional frameworks of curatorial practice.

A ‘museum ecosystem’ can be understood in relation to a variety of evolving, responsive and sometimes regenerative forms of interaction: across and within the environments of individual museums and galleries; across and between a series of interconnected institutional spaces within a particular locality or region; or between such institutions and their wider environments.

Curators, academics, artists, independent scholars, museum and heritage sector professionals and beyond were invited to open up new perspectives on how such ecosystems have shaped, and might in future shape, curatorial and scholarly research as they relate to collections, collections care and management.

Due to the Covid crisis the event was cancelled. The original programme for the planned live event is available to download here:

Subsequently, a number of speakers recorded versions of their presentations, which can be found on BAN’s YouTube channel, or by scrolling to the bottom of this page.

Here, Emily Pringle, Head of Research, Tate, reflects on the original programme and the recorded presentations, the impact of Covid on the sector at large, and explores the question of research in museums. Follow the links in the text below to view the presentations.

Trish Scott & Mike Tooby | Caretaking Relations
Ólöf Gerður Sigfúsdottir | Museums as Epistemic Institutions
Jillian Sutherland | “Who knows what you do?”
Sophie Hatchwell & Carol Thompson | Midlands Art Papers