MUSEUM EXHIBITIONS AND THE DYNAMICS OF DIALOGUE

Abstract

most prominent and public of all museum offerings, exhibitions are the soul of a museum experience for the millions of people who visit them, as well as for many of the people who create them. As unique three-dimensional composi tions, exhibitions show things, whether a work of art or a working machine, a history timeline or a bit of bone. This showing or exhibition is the one feature common to all muse ums, from institutions engaged in scholarly research for a small professional audience to large multidisciplinary organizations providing services for the broadest spectrum of people. The act of showing brings with it an inherent dialectic be tween the intentions of the presenter and the experiences of the spectator. Even in the earliest temples of the muses, someone set forth some object for others to experience, and who selected what for whom is the question at the heart of all conversation about exhibitions. The objects may be trophies of conquest, curious things from the natural world, masterpieces, or con structed environments, but embedded in their presentation is material evidence of the presenter's intentions and values. Teasing out and uncovering this evidence has been an increasingly attractive activity for some museum professionals, critics, and social theorists, particularly since the intentions of exhibit cre ators are often opaque or hidden from public view, and some times even unconscious.