7.2 millions. That is the number of people who emigrated by boat from Bremerhaven in Germany to USA and other destinations between 1830 and 1974.

It is only about 4 years ago, that Deutsches Auswandererhaus was opened as a museum of emigration, in the port of Bremerhaven. A visit to the museum allows you to follow in the footsteps of the emigrants: from the impressive re-creation of a pier with steamship ready to be boarded, through the steerages and cabins of the ships to the landing at Ellis Island, New York.

With the use of an active ticket you will also be able to follow the destiny of a selected emigrant. And in the beautiful “archive-room” you will learn about reasons for emigration in different periods, as well as be able to look into the file cabinets for histories of real emigrants.

Should you happen to be in the vicinity, the emigration museum is definitely worth a detour.

This is a rare occasion: an exhibition of Krass Clement. It is Nivaagaard art museum in North Zealand which shows a retrospective with pictures from the last 22 years.

Photo: Krass Clement – from the exhibition poster

I can only think off one criticism: the exhibition should have been larger. Fortunately for those of you who live far from NivÃ¥, there is a very well produced catalogue. If you come from so far away, that you even don’t know who Krass Clement are, take a look here – and then go get the catalogue.

Mike Johnston at The Online Photographer (TOP) has written a thoughtful post on the subject: what makes photographs valuable for the future. As usual, the post has caused a lot of comments. The following is my own contribution, as posted on TOP. Please go here to read Mike’s original post and all the other comments.

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What this interesting post and the comments illustrate nicely, is that “value” is not something absolute or intrinsic to an object, but something that is attributed to the object in a certain context. And as the context change, the value may change likewise.

In a market economy, value is often equated with price. However, objects can have value in many other ways. Value is often a function of the story or meaning the object conveys to somebody – be that an individual or a certain group of people.

This is where public museums come into play. Their objective is to find, preserve, exhibit and communicate such objects, which convey stories or meaning of importance to society.

This, I can say from my own personal experience, is not an easy task.

At the Dept. of Modern History, Danish National Museum, where I work, we do collect photographs. However, we seldom accept or reject photos based on their artistic value – and never on the basis of their commercial value.

One of the main aims of the department is to documents changes in people’s daily life throughout the last 350 years. Thus, we have in our collection both the archives of commercial photographers, family albums and personal collections as well as a vast number of “diverse” photos, including such that has been taken by museum staff for documenting purpose.

What is important for us is to gather as much information as possible for each photo. As we ultimately collect objects in order to be able to tell stories of the past, we need as much information about the objects as possible. A photo with no information about who took it, why and when can be useless to us, even if it’s a beautiful example of photographic craftsmanship.

That is also why, that in an ideal world we would collect most of our objects not just from what the public more or less randomly comes to offer us, but as part of carefully planned research programs. This would ensure that we get as much relevant information as possible and that we expand our collections in areas, which are particularly relevant. Unfortunately, we have only very limited funding to do so.

Contemplating how time flies?
Piccolo Mondo restaurant, Malmö, Sweden
8^th February 2009

Looking back at the historical evolvement of photography as a mass medium, from the point of view of a museum, there has and will be different challenges. From the early period of photography, the number of objects to be collected is scarcer and some of them involve at lot of work and expenses, when it comes to preservation and storing. During the mid-20^th century there is a vast increase in the number of objects, since photography becomes accessible for everybody.

But still: as long as taking pictures – even family snapshots – involves a rather lengthy and not especially cheap process of buying the film, taking the picture, having it processed, sorting out the best ones and putting them in an album, there is a great chance that the family album more or less consciously reflects the self-image of its producers: these are the pictures, that the original photographer valued and cherished. This makes such an album a possible source of how people at a certain time and space interpreted their own lives.

With the advance of digital photography, however, the number of pictures has exploded. The process of photographing is now quick and almost free, so there is no reason not to photograph anything that catch your eyes – be it important or not. For the future museum curators, who inherit a collection of digital snapshots, the job of sorting out the meaning of the photos as the photographer’s interpretations of his or her own life becomes much more complicated. What is important here, what is not – and in what sense and context?

There are great challenges ahead, in the area of research methodology and theory.

Building 4 is the former dyeing-hall at BredeTextile Mill. The mill is now part of the National museum, and the building is being renovated for use as an exhibition hall, for the exhibition of the cultural history of industrial society.

I have a special feeling of attachment to building 4. Not only is it a beautifulindustrial building in its own right. But I’m also responsible for the content in this part of the exhibition. In a cooperation between colleagues of the museum, designers and film-makers, we are planning to make building 4 come alive again as a textilemill, through extensive use of video, sound and lightning. 

Handheld at 1/30 sec. with Pentax K10D and Sigma 18-50 2.8 EX.  “Cross-processed” in Photoshop.

(Sorry – this post is danish only)

Det kulturhistoriske museum skaber forstÃ¥else af fortiden gennem sine genstande. Denne forstÃ¥else vokser imidlertid ikke automatisk ud af genstandene – den skabes gennem fortolkning. Museet foretager en sÃ¥dan fortolkning, og stiller den til rÃ¥dighed for offentligheden. I dette arbejde er museet forpligtet af de regler som gælder for den videnskabelige diskurs, herunder Ã¥benhed og selvkritik. Kun pÃ¥ denne mÃ¥de kan museet fremstÃ¥ med troværdighed i sin formidling.

Men museologien mÃ¥ ogsÃ¥ forholde sig til den anden del af museernes dobbelte rolle: den formende. Nogle vil mÃ¥ske mene, at vi dermed bevæger os over i det normative, og at museet som offentlig institution bør holde sig fri af den slags. Men fordi museet altid eksisterer i en nutids kontekst, sÃ¥ kan det ikke frasige sig sin formende rolle. Det er ikke nødvendigvis museets opgave som institution at udøve samfundskritik. Men det er som minimum museets forpligtelse at være en relevant resurse for borgerne i deres individuelle og kollektive kulturelle praksis – herunder ogsÃ¥ en samfundskritisk praksis….

Læs mere i Fra det mugne liv, et essay om kulturkritik og museer. Oprindeligt skrevet til Nils Bredsdorff og Niels Finn Christiansen (red.): Det kritiske blik – festskrift til Morten Thing. Tiderne skifter, København 2005. Artiklen ligger nu i arkivet.

  

The other day I accidentally came across Elliot Erwitts Museum Watching – at a sale in a museum shop. The book contains photos from a number of coutries and from half a century.

I might be a museum fetchist by profession. But I find Erwitts book extremely charming. His pictures of museum guest that are spectating, speculating or simply having fun are sometimes thought-provoking, sometimes funny – but never indifferent. The style is more or less classic street photography, but taken to the distinguished halls of museums…. 

As it is normally the case with books from Phaidon, the technical quality is impeccable.As it is normally the case with books from Phaidon, the technical quality is impeccable.

Elliott Erwitt: Museum Watching.
Phaidon, London 1999.
160 pages.