The Poetics and Politics of the Swedish Model for Contemporary Collecting

Abstract

Between 1977 and 2011 the Swedish organization Samdok presented a nationwide programme for contemporary museum collecting, including an increasingly flexible intellectual and methodological framework. This article considers Samdok, its evolving programmes and self-presentations. It suggests that Samdok’s self-image was one of inclusive progressiveness, social engagement and equality. It also suggests that they display four major rhetorical shifts: from an economic rationale to a social and cultural approach; from studies of a welfare state based on industrial production to fieldwork concerning the adaptation to a postindustrial economy; from modern to post-modern epistemologies; and finally from engineering collecting to networking collecting, connecting contemporary collecting in Sweden to a transnational professional community. It is suggested that the case of Samdok casts light on the ways in which museums negotiate managerial issues, professional values and needs for inspiration and friendship.